_Was_ there a Yugoslav ethnic cleansing plan?
Kjell S Johansen (kjellsjo@online.no)
Wed, 28 Apr 1999 09:38:15 +0200
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>Date: Tue, 27 Apr 1999 19:34:43 -0400
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>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood@panix.com>
>Subject: _Was_ there a Yugoslav ethnic cleansing plan?
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>P r e s s I n f o # 6 4
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>T H E W E S T I S I N M O R A L T R O U B L E I F
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>T H E R E I S A N E T H N I C C L E A N S I N G P L A N
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>- A N D I F T H E R E I S N ' T
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>D o c u m e n t s S h o w t h a t N A T O I g n o r e d R i s k s
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>April 27, 1999
>
>"We are told there the West knew already last autumn that President
>Milosevic had a plan to ethnically cleanse all Albanians from the Kosovo
>province. However, while it is true that Yugoslav forces have exploited
>NATO's bombing campaign to drive out Albanians in a way and to an extent
>that must be morally condemned, the unproved allegation that there existed
>a plan tells more about NATO than about President Milosevic - and what it
>tells is not to the advantage of the former," says TFF director Jan Oberg.
>
>"The disgusting expulsion of Albanians from Kosovo can't be defended. The
>Yugoslav authorities who carries it out or lets individuals do it, can not
>defend such human rights violations with reference to NATO' bombing. Sure,
>Serbs will see NATO's destruction of Yugoslavia as work commissioned by
>Kosovo-Albanians/UCK, but it is anyhow up to Yugoslavia to fight NATO, not
>to take revenge against those who are innocent civilians.
>
>Having said that, NATO and the West can not be trusted when it seeks to
>legitimise its Balkan bombing blunder by insisting that it knows of an
>ethnic cleansing plan but has still not provided the slightest evidence.
>Here are some reasons why this is utterly irresponsible and, thus,
>undermines NATO credibility - and the credibility of a free press that does
>not ask more critical questions:
>
>First of all, we never heard anybody talk about such a plan before NATO's
>bombs started falling. Second, the argument for bombing was related to
>whether or not Yugoslavia would sign the Rambouillet Dictate. We never
>heard anybody saying that NATO would bomb Yugoslavia should they carry out
>an ethnic cleansing plan.
>
>Third, if such a plan was known already during autumn, how could the West
>invite representatives of a killer regime to Paris? How could the US send
>ambassador Richard Holbrooke to Belgrade to try to make a last-minute deal
>with such 'a serial cleanser' President?
>
>Fourth - and worst, perhaps of all - if the West knew of such a plan why
>did it do absolutely NOTHING to plan for the humanitarian emergency it
>would cause? Why did Belgrade not actively threaten to prevent it OR
>initiate bombings much earlier? Isn't it simply too immoral to know about
>such a plan and do nothing?
>
>Fifth, if Milosevic, Serbia or Yugoslavia wanted to get rid of all
>Albanians, why did they choose this particularly awkward moment - when OSCE
>verifiers were roaming around every corner of Kosovo, being the ears and
>eyes in the region. (Yugoslavia had discontinued an OSCE mandate already in
>1992 in response to OSCE's suspension of its membership of OSCE). Why did
>it let the Kosovo-Albanian leader Dr. Rugova and his followers hold
>elections, set up a government, travel unrestrictedly in and out of the
>country, and build parallel institutions and why did it let the KLA develop
>since 1993 to the extent that it could occupy and control about 30% of
>territory of Yugoslavia last autumn? It could have prevented all of this.
>
>Sixth, how come that neither the OSCE mission nor any of the numerous
>humanitarian organizations in Kosovo warned the world that such an
>incredibly big and inhuman plan was about to be implemented?
>
>Seventh, if NATO and the intelligence services of leading NATO countries
>which have been in the region all the time knew about such a plan from
>about October last year - when US super-negotiator Richard Holbrooke struck
>the deal with Milosevic - why did NATO not make a better planning of the
>present air campaign? Diplomatically speaking, it looks a bit confused and
>unplanned.
>
>I think NATO's leaders owe us some good answers to these 7 questions. In
>contrast," says Dr. Oberg, "there is evidence that the US and NATO did know
>that the bombing could create havoc. On record we have facts like these:
>
>
>Evidence # 1 Macedonia and OSCE warned already in July 1998
>
>The North Atlantic Assembly (NATO Parliamentarians) held a seminar on
>"Security in South-Eastern Europe" at Lake Ohrid in Macedonia (FYROM) from
>July 4-6 1998 - when the war was raging between UCK/KLA and Serb-Yugoslav
>forces and after NATO's air exercise - Determined Falcon - over FYROM in
>June. The report [AR202. SEM 98 7] was published in February this year and
>contains the following interesting information:
>
>The participants discussed how to stop the fighting in Kosovo; NATO's
>position had 'crystallised' in June 1998 and NATO defence ministers had met
>on June 10-11 to instruct the Military Committee to see how the alliance
>could use the full range of military capabilities to a) stop the violence,
>b) disengage Yugoslav forces and c) provide for negotiations.
>
>Deputy head of the OSCE mission in Skopje, Mr. Julian Peel Yates, argued at
>the seminar that the June 1998 air exercise over Macedonia had aroused
>ambiguous feelings among the Macedonians, it was perceived as an
>encouragement to UCK and divided the population along ethnic lines.
>Furthermore it could 'lead the country on a collision course with
>Yugoslavia. 'Mr. Blagoj Handziski, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the
>Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, also alluded to these dangers.'
>Later, one reads: 'Mr. Alexandros Papadogonas (Greece) noted that military
>intervention could result in 'ethnic cleansing' of the Serbs and lay down a
>dangerous precedent. Julian Yates also cautioned against the temptation to
>use military force to fill a political vacuum.' And 'Representatives from
>the region unanimously demanded to be involved in enhanced consultations
>prior to any operation.'
>
>What we see here," says TFF's director, "is clear evidence that government
>representatives in the region as well as OSCE warned NATO's
>parliamentarians already in July 1998 about some of the risks involved in
>NATO military action: destabilisation of Macedonia, Macedonian-Yugoslav
>conflict and ethnic cleansing. This was a months after NATO had started
>looking into various options.
>
>
>Evidence # 2 General Shelton warned that ethnic cleansing would increase
>
>Sunday Times reported on March 28, "NATO Attacks," that on March 15
>'Clinton and his cabinet members, including William Cohen, the defence
>secretary, and Sandy Berger, the national security adviser, sat in silence
>as Shelton [General Hugh Shelton, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff]
>outlined the thrust of the analysis. There was a danger, he told them, that
>far from helping to contain the savagery of the Serbs in Kosovo - a moral
>imperative cited by the president - air strikes might provoke Serb soldiers
>into greater acts of butchery. Air strikes alone, Shelton stated, could not
>stop Serb forces from executing Kosovars.'
>
>So, the highest American military expertise warned that military action
>could lead to 'butchery' and that airstrikes would not be sufficient to
>prevent it.
>
>
>Evidence # 3 President Clinton was occupied with the Lewinsky affair
>
>Furthermore, New York Times on April 18 and The Times, on April 19, told
>their readers that President Clinton took no part in planning the war:
>'Distracted by the Lewinsky scandal, President Clinton was not even present
>at the fateful meeting last January when a plan was formed to use the
>threat of air power to demand Serb acceptance of a peace deal in Kosovo
>enforced by Nato ground troops.
>
>The White House meeting on January 19, at which Madeleine Albright, the
>US Secretary of State, successfully argued for a much tougher stance
>against Belgrade, was a vital moment in the build-up to war. But Mr.
>Clinton was preoccupied with his impeachment trial, according to a report
>yesterday in The New York Times that paints a picture of a President whose
>attention was focused elsewhere as Kosovo erupted.
>
>At the January meeting Ms. Albright overcame the reservations of other
>senior advisers and the plan, demanding Serb acceptance of NATO troops in
>Kosovo under threat of force for the first time, was sent for approval to
>Mr. Clinton, who was at the moment preparing his State of the Union address
>while the US Senate listened to arguments on whether he should be thrown
>out of office.'
>
>Jan Oberg comments, "With this background and looking at the febrile
>rhetoric and failure of the bombing campaign on its own criteria - creating
>peace and stability in Europe, preventing a humanitarian catastrophe and
>forcing Belgrade to accept all the West's conditions - one is increasingly
>lead to believe, rather, that the whole catastrophe we witness now was
>CAUSED by leading decision-makers ignoring early warnings from the region
>and top-level military expertise, by the US President being 'distracted'
>and by bad judgment and a gross underestimation of the complexity and of
>what was at stake. Or, you may say, by a dangerous combination of hubris
>and human folly, of too much military power combined with too little
>intellectual power.
>
>Until we are shown empirical evidence of a grand Yugoslav ethnic cleansing
>plan and until we get some good answers from President Clinton, Secretary
>of State Albright, Prime Minister Tony Blair, Foreign Minister Joschka
>Fischer and Danish Prime Minister Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, State Department
>spokesman James Rubin and NATO spokesman Jamie Shea to why NATO chose to go
>ahead against the above-mentioned warnings and obvious risks, there is
>little reason to believe their words.
>
>The said plan probably exists only in various propaganda departments in
>NATO capitals. Truth-seeking journalists should keep on pounding questions
>about these matters. Why? Because a humanitarian NATO mission that has to
>be explained and legitimised on such factually lose and morally dubious
>grounds, must give cause for grave concern. It comes after the trick of
>calling the Rambouillet Dictate a 'peace plan.'
>
>I am reminded of what George Braque is believed to have once said: that
>truth always exists, whereas in contrast, lies have to be invented."
>
>© TFF 1999
>You are welcome to reprint, copy, archive, quote from or re-post this item,
>but please retain the source. And this text can be found at
>http://www.transnational.org - like all other PressInfos, Kosovo links etc.
>
>
>
>_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
>
>Dr. Jan Oberg
>Director, head of the TFF Conflict-Mitigation team
>to the Balkans and Georgia
>
>T F F
>
>Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research
>Vegagatan 25, S - 224 57 Lund, Sweden
>Phone +46-46-145909 (0900-1100)
>Fax +46-46-144512
>Email
>tff@transnational.org
>http://www.transnational.org
>
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