July 16, 1999

Special Truth in Media Reports on NATO's Kosovo War and "Peace" S99-124, "Peace" 18

HEADLINES

Pristina                            1. Killing and Pillaging Continues Under

                                            KFOR’s Watchful Eyes

Belgrade                          2. Revenge of the Rats

Redding                           3. The Last Straw: Bill Designed to Kill

                                              Serb Children (by Mary Mostert)

New York                        4. Buckley’s National Review Libels Serbs, Then

                                            Apologizes for Slanderous Comment

Rome                               5. Dozens of NATO Bombs Found in Italy

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1. Killing and Pillaging Continues Under KFOR’s Watchful Eyes

PRISTINA, July 16 - Killing of Kosovo Serb civilians and pillaging of their property continues under KFOR’s watchful eyes, our sources within the Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC) report. Under the cover of the western media headlines filled with stories about the alleged Serb atrocities during the war, there is an open season on Serb civilians who are being slaughtered every day by the Kosovo Albanians.

Serb priests have become the only reliable source of information about what’s really going on in Kosovo these days. And based on the dispatches which we have been getting from the SOC sources this week, every day several Serbs are murdered in cold blood, while their property is taken away or destroyed. As a result, the World Food Program officials estimate that there are now about 146,000 Serb refugees in Serbia who have fled their homes in Kosovo.

Here’s just a small sampling of crimes being committed against the Serbs during NATO’s Kosovo "peace," excerpted from today’s SOC news dispatch:

"Tonight, Albanians have smashed the windows on Metropolis building in Pristina. This is an ancient residence of bishops and a place for gathering of the faithful. In the conversation with the priests from Pristina, we have been informed today that the Serbian houses in Pristina are continuously on fire, so the smell of smoke is always in the air.

Yesterday, at 17:00, Bozidar Davcetovic, a Serb from Pristina, was shot and killed by Albanians while in the town on some business. His corpse was buried today by the priest Milorad Cvetkovic. Only three persons attended the funeral.

Albanians have set fire to the church in Samodreza village, eight kilometers away from Vucitrn, today. The church has been significantly damaged, especially its altar and other valuables.

Albanians have damaged the Holy Trinity church, built 4 years ago, in the refugee settlement in Velika Reka, near Vucitrn.

Yesterday, in Slovinje village, Albanians blew up an Orthodox church which dates back to the 16th century, located only 70m (80 yards) in front of the KFOR military base.

Yesterday, in Gornji Livac village, near Gnjilane, Albanians wounded Zivorad Jankovic and his son Zoran, at the time when they went out to their farm to feed the cattle.

In Klina, the church situated at the Serbian Orthodox graveyard was demolished. In Petric village, the church was blown up, and completely destroyed. The Karic brothers erected this church 7-8 years ago. In Dolac village the church was burned to ashes. The church in Drsnik village was completely destroyed too.

The church in Urekovac was demolished, the parish center was partly burned down and partly demolished. In Pecka Banja, the altar in the church was partly charred and partly demolished. Reliable sources have reported that the Orthodox church in Urosevac has also been set on fire, but this has not been confirmed.

Milovan Kojic, priest from Lipljan, and Ljubisa Crvenkovic, member of the Human Rights Protection Board, have given us additional information on the situation of the Serbs in Lipljan, on the Holy Day dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul ­ July 12. In the main streets of Lipljan, in which the Serbs form 95% of the population, a huge number of Albanians, mainly from the other parts of the province, gathered and started their rampaging against the local Serbs: setting of the Serbian houses on fire, throwing Molotov cocktails and tossing hand grenades.

About 11:00, Serbian houses in Aca Marovic Street were hurled stones at. Molotov cocktails were hurled at four Serbian houses and at Ljubinko Andjelkovic’s business premises. Three houses were mostly burned due to that, but the Serbs managed to extinguish the fire in the mentioned business premises.

At 13:30, Albanians tossed a grenade at Miladin Mladenovic’s house, and thereat Miladin’s son Zoran, aged 32, and Zoran’s friend Sorde Kosinac, aged 33, refugee from Stimlje, were wounded. KFOR drove both of them into the English military hospital located in the ex correctional institution in Lipljan, where they were detained for medical treatment.

Albanians tossed a grenade at Ognjen Todic’s house too, and thereat Milutin Kostic, aged 44, was badly injured. KFOR took Milutin, too, to the mentioned military hospital in Lipljan, and afterwards transferred him by helicopter in Skoplje. A grenade was also tossed at Ljubomir Smiljic’s house, but, fortunately, it did not explode and KFOR disarmed it.

Albanians attacked Miladin Mladenovic, aged 53, from Lipljan, when he went to visit his wounded son and son’s friend. Miladin was seriously injured by knife in the neck and ear parts of the body. He, too, was brought into the military hospital in Lipljan.

We have also been informed that one Serb, while being under temporary arrest in correctional institution in Lipljan, heard from the imprisoned Albanians that Serb Zoran Stanic from Slovinje village, who had disappeared on June 22, was killed by Albanians and buried so, that no one could find him."

Albanians also beat Novica Savic, aged 70, at the farm near his house in Novo Toplicane village, near Lipljan. Novica was seriously injured being stabbed below throat. He also took treatment in the military hospital. However, KFOR soldiers told Novica they should have arrested him, claiming that he had used firearms in self-defense, which he did not do.

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TiM Ed.: So what even if he had done so? Have the Serbs now even lost the right of self defense, under NATO’s "piss process" laws? It certainly seems that the Ottoman-style persecution has returned to Kosovo, only now in the form of KFOR.

At 18:00 on the same day, to the great disappointment of the Serbs, KFOR gathered the Serbs from Lipljan in Novo Naselje and ordered them to hand over the weapons until 9:00 next day.

This tragic event that happened to the Serbs, insufficient KFOR protection of the Serbs, as well as KFOR’s unwillingness to take into consideration the full gravity of the Serbian population’s predicament, have greatly disturbed the Serbian population majority in Lipljan. All that adds to their feelings of insecurity and induces the to move out."

Rt. Rev. Atanasije (Rakita) the Bishop of Hvosno, July 16, 1999

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2. Revenge of the Rats

BELGRADE, July 16 - Lawlessness appears to be spreading to the rest of Serbia, too. We’ve just received a news report from a Belgrade source, titled "Revenge of the Rats." According to this dispatch, Velimir Pavlovic, an editor of the Studio B in Belgrade, one of the rare TV stations in Serbia controlled by the opposition (Vuk Draskovic’s SPO party), was savagely beaten at the studio’s restaurant by two Studio B executives and the waiter. Pavlovic was taken to the emergency center of the Belgrade University Clinic, where he was treated and kept overnight.

Motives for the attack on Pavlovic are unclear, though our Belgrade source speculated that it may have been an act of revenge by the "mobsters and spies who presently occupy executive positions of the Studio B." The source said that Pavlovic was a quiet and unassuming host of the TV talk shows who usually attracted top Serb intellectuals as his guests.

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3. The Last Straw: Bill Designed to Kill Serb Children (by Mary Mostert)

REDDING, CA, July 16 - Here is an excerpt from a thought-provoking piece by Mary Mostert, an author whose name should be familiar to the regular TiM readers (check out her two other Kosovo stories written during NATO’s War on Serbia - S99-34, Day 17, Update 1, Item 2, Apr. 9 and S99-55, Day 33, Item 3, Apr. 25):

"In 1996, I was a very active supporter of the Bob Dole for President, although I thought he was really wrong in some of his statements about the Bosnian war at the time.

As I delved into the problems, reading material from both Albanian and Serb sources, I kept running into articles which claimed that my hero, Bob Dole, was a ‘lobbyist’ for the Albanians. I dismissed the charge as unsubstantiated and unlikely. Bob Dole, I believed sincerely, would not be involved with a terrorist group like the KLA which, it appeared quite early on, to be financed in large measure by the sale of heroin. Illyria, an Albanian publication, wrote admiringly of Bob Dole in an editorial on March 4, 1999:

At the start of this decade, one man, then a powerful senator, stood on the steps of the Capitol and vowed to fight for the rights of the Albanians in Kosovo. Through the loud cheers of thousands of demonstrators, Bob Dole promised he would visit Kosovo and see at first hand the brutality of the Serb regime, which aimed at the ethnic cleansing of the Albanian population. Serb dictator Slobodan Milosevic, who later would win himself the deserved nickname of the Butcher of the Balkans, had just launched a vicious attack on the Albanian people and their institutions. The move marked the beginning of the breakup of Yugoslavia. […]

President Clinton ASKED Bob Dole to try to persuade the Albanians ‘that U.S. intentions are good and that the White House is serious about the issue. Not that the Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is not a respected U.S. official among the Albanians (her dedication on the issue is to be admired), but Bob Dole brings to Kosovo a familiar face -- the face of a man who has fought for their rights in the past and continues to do so.’ (‘Albanian Telegraphic Agency’ http://www.telpress.it/ata/ata.htm)

What I did not know until the last few days was just how much campaign money had gone into Bob Dole's, and other congressional leaders', campaigns from the Albanian lobby. But, what has been the final straw for me was the passage of S 1234 Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2000 which was passed 97-2 on June 30, 1999. Bob Smith, who just this week left the Republican party over matters of principle, and Robert Byrd were the only Senators to vote against the bill.

Tucked away in the depths of the bill, totally undiscussed on the Senate Floor, is a provision which is clearly intended to kill as many Serb children this winter as possible. And 97 American Senators, Democrats and Republicans, voted in favor of it.

I called the office of a Republican senator who shall be temporarily nameless, and inquired if the Senator knew of a provision recently voted on which, according to an e-mail I received, ‘names Yugoslavia a 'terrorist state'. The aide, who had a Croatian name, said without hesitation that I was referring to S 1234, Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2000, section 525 of the bill which did indeed list Yugoslavia as a terrorist state, along with Cuba, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Iran, Sudan, or Syria. […] (also see S99-113, "Peace" 7, Item 3, June 22).

I also found, reading the bill, that Section 578 of S 1234 called for draconian sanctions against Yugoslavia… which are guaranteed to kill hundreds of thousands of people in a nation which is now about 90% unemployed because American bombers destroyed most of its means of production, will remain in place, according to the bill, until the President ‘certifies’ that:

1. The representatives of the successor states to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia have successfully negotiated the division of assets and liabilities and all other succession issues following the dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia;

2. The government of Serbia-Montenegro is fully complying with its obligations as a signatory to the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina;

3. The government of Serbia-Montenegro is fully cooperating with and providing unrestricted access to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, including surrendering persons indicted for war crimes who are within the jurisdiction of the territory of Serbia-Montenegro, and with the investigations concerning the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Kosovo;

4.The government of Serbia-Montenegro is implementing internal democratic reforms;

5. Serbian, Serbian-Montenegrin federal governmental officials, and representatives of the ethnic Albanian community in Kosovo have agreed on, signed, and begun implementation of a negotiated settlement on the future status of Kosovo.

In effect these provisions destroy totally the G-8 agreement that Milosevic and the NATO nations signed in early June. It provides for the Yugoslavia's assets to be totally under the control of NATO - since they are the ones occupying Kosovo, and apparently intend to occupy the rest of Yugoslavia, which is exactly what the Rambouillet agreement required of Milosevic - uncontrolled access not only to Kosovo, but ALL of Yugoslavia by NATO troops.

Recently in an interview on 60 minutes, Leslie Stahl asked Madeleine Albright: ‘I understand that 500,000 Iraqi children have died due to our sanctions...was it worth it?’ Albright replied, ‘It was worth it.’

I asked the Senator's aide almost exactly the same question: ‘This will cause hundreds of thousands of Serb and other children in Yugoslavia to die, just like in Iraq!’ I said. ‘Surely the Senator is not approving that?’ The aide said, ‘That's what they deserve for choosing a man like Milosevic.’

I was dumbfounded. The children have chosen NO ONE! Apparently this whole war IS about money - just as many Serbs have been trying to tell me for weeks - but I didn't believe it. Now I find that the Senate of the United States has passed an appropriations bill that spells it out in detail - and the threat is in effect: Give up your assets to us or we kill your children. […]

What will this mean on the ground in Yugoslavia? (William) Doric noted, ‘As a 'terrorist state', there will be no travel in or out of Yugoslavia. Mail will be stopped and all of us will be subject to government restrictions on communications with Serbia. Speaking out will carry a price that might be considered subversion. There will be no reconstruction by any nation and no medical assistance and tens of thousands of Serbs will die right before our eyes - just like 1.8 million Iraqi people have died in the last 5 years. The stupidity of this bill is that without rebuilding Serbia, where 60% of Europe's trade flows down the Danube River, the trade will permanently stop. Serbia's neighbors will be punished right along with the Serbs. Mitch McConnell has just shown how much hate can drive a person to immoral conduct and hate speech.’

Can anything be done about it? It is not yet law. Call, write, telephone and fax your representative in Congress! (see http://originalsources.com/PLobby/ContactCongress.shtml) Write letters, or send this article, to your local newspaper. For national news sources, go to: http://originalsources.com/PLobby/ContactMedia.shtml.

Back in 1962, I was one of 52 American women who flew to Geneva, Switzerland in an effort to stop the testing of nuclear bombs in the atmosphere because, as a young mother of four little children, I was concerned about the sharp increase in child cancer and leukemia from cancer-causing Strontium 90 that children all over the world were drinking along with their milk. Although the Senate was almost solidly behind the nuclear testing, after six months of work by a small group of women, organized in a loose confederation called ‘Women's Strike for Peace’ the testing of bombs in the atmosphere was stopped - by a vote of 94-6 in the Senate - saving the lives of hundreds of thousands of children worldwide.

It's time for those who care about the children - whether they be women or men - to speak up and demand a halt to US policies which are killing children. We can stop this madness."

Mary Mostert, Redding, California (e-mail: mmostert@originalsources.com)

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4. Buckley’s National Review Libels Serbs, Then Apologizes for Slanderous Comment

NEW YORK, July 16 - In the current issue of the National Review (July 12, 1999, Vol. 51 Issue 13), a publication edited by William F. Buckley, an article written by David Pryce-Jones, who is described as a historian, alleged that the Serbs ran the Jasenovac death camp in Croatia. Actually, Jasenovac was a WW II death camp in which some 700,000 Serbs, 30,000 to 35,000 Jews, and 25,000 Gypsies were murdered by the pro-Nazi Croat "ustashe."

As protests started to pour in, the embarrassed National Review editorial staff started to send out, what it turns out to be, a form letter retracting the claim and apologizing to the readers. Here is the text of the National Review’s letter of apology which several TiM readers have received, and then forwarded on to us:

"Thank you for your letter. Mr. Pryce-Jones addressed the issue in our July 26 issue. ‘Kosovo, from Scratch’ did indeed contain a factual error, missed by both the author and our proofreaders prior to publication. As Mr. Pryce-Jones writes in National Review's July 26 issue, ‘My purpose in mentioning Jasenovac was to illustrate how mass-murdering has conditioned political life in that unhappy region of the Balkans. Recent events in Kosovo confirm the persistent reality of this general point.’ But, as he continues, ‘The Croat Ustashe ran Jasenovac, and Serbs were murdered there along with Jews and gypsies.’

National Review apologies for the error, has corrected it, and assures our readers there was nothing deliberate involved in the mistake."

Sincerely yours,

Kathryn Jean Lopez, National Review

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5. Dozens of NATO Bombs Found in Italy

ROME, July 17 - Italian minesweepers trolling the Gulf of Venice found 34 bombs during the past eight weeks, nearly all of them dropped by NATO jets on bombing runs on Yugoslavia, the Italian navy said, according to an Associated Press report filed from Rome.

All the bombs were destroyed, the navy said, reporting that the mine-hunting operation was winding down. Some of the 10 minesweepers being used will stay in the Adriatic to check out sites where fishing boat crews reported seeing suspicious objects.

In May, an explosion wounded a fishing crew in the waters off Venice, and Italian investigators said the bomb was apparently part of a cluster bomb (see "NATO Calamari," S99-79, Day 53, Item 2, May 15).

In early June, a week before the last air strikes, Italy's defense minister reported NATO-allied planes had dropped 161 bombs, including seven cluster bombs, into the Adriatic on their way back to Italian air bases. Pilots commonly unload bombs before landing to avoid accidental explosions on the ground.

Also, check out... Truth in Media Statement on the Kosovo War, "Wither Dayton, Sprout New War?", "On the Brink of Madness", "Tragic Deja Vu's," "Seven U.S. Senators Suggest Ouster of Milosevic", "Biting the Hand That Feeds You", "A Balkan Affairs Potpourri", "Put the U.N. Justice on Trial", "International Justice 'Progresses' from Kidnapping to Murder", "Milosevic: 'A Riddle Wrapped in a Mystery'...", "Kosovo Lie Allowed to Stand", "New World Order's Inquisition in Bosnia", "Kosovo Heating Up", "Decani Monastery Under Siege?", "Murder on Wall Street",  "Kosovo: 'Bosnia II', Serbia's Aztlan",  "What If the Shoe Were on the Other Foot?", "Serb WW II General Exhonerated by British Archives," "Green Interstate - Not Worth American Lives", "An American Hero or Actor of the Year?" (A June '95 TiM story) and/or "Clinton arme secrètement les musulmans bosniaques", "Kocevje: Tito's Greatest Crime?", "Perfidious Albion Strikes Again, Aided by Uncle Sam"

Or Djurdjevic's WASHINGTON TIMES columns: "Chinese Dragon Wagging Macedonian Tail,"  "An Ugly Double Standard in Kosovo Conflict?", "NATO's Bullyboys", "Kosovo: Why Are We Involved?", and "Ginning Up Another Crisis"

Or Djurdjevic's NEW DAWN magazine columns: "Washington's Crisis Factory,"  and "A New Iron Curtain Over Europe"