Messages In This Digest (13 Messages)
- 1.
- NATO To Test Battlefield Interceptor Missile System In Germany From: Rick Rozoff
- 2.
- Russia Warns NATO Of Nuclear Deployment Over Missile Shield From: Rick Rozoff
- 3.
- Slovakia: NATO Funds Modernization Of Military Air Base From: Rick Rozoff
- 4.
- Pakistan: Three More U.S. Missile Strikes Kill Between 9-13 From: Rick Rozoff
- 5.
- NATO Defense Chiefs To Discuss Continental Interceptor Missile Grid From: Rick Rozoff
- 6.
- Clinton, Kazakh Foreign Minister Advance "Strategic Partnership" From: Rick Rozoff
- 7.
- Hu Jintao's Visit Fails To Bring Thaw To U.S.-Chinese Relations From: Rick Rozoff
- 8.
- Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey Rail Line To "Merge Europe And Asia" From: Rick Rozoff
- 9.
- Report: Push For Joint British-French-German Military Partnership From: Rick Rozoff
- 10.
- Poll: Greater Albania Project Closer To Realization From: Rick Rozoff
- 11.
- Report: NATO Knew Thaci Was Kosovo Criminal Kingpin From: Rick Rozoff
- 12.
- Report Reignites Kosovo Organ Trafficking Claim From: Rick Rozoff
- 13.
- Criminal Kosovo: America's Gift To Europe From: Rick Rozoff
Messages
- 1.
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NATO To Test Battlefield Interceptor Missile System In Germany
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 9:02 am (PST)
http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/article_1614084.php/NATO-to-computer-test-battlefield-missile-defences-in-Germany
Deutsche Presse-Agentur
January 24, 2011
NATO to computer-test battlefield missile defences in Germany
Brussels: NATO is to computer-test in Germany a system designed to protect troops in the field against missile attacks, the alliance's secretary general said Monday.
A number of NATO nations have anti-missile systems designed to protect their troops. They are now working on ways to extend that protection to soldiers from other nations when NATO deploys as an international force.
'In some days, Germany will host a demonstration organised on the occasion of the achievement of the initial operational capacity of NATO's theatre missile defence system,' Anders Fogh Rasmussen said.
The computerized exercise...is designed to test the basic performance of a NATO-built system which would allow a battlefield commander to fight off attacks using anti-missile defences from a number of NATO allies.
....
The exercise, near the town of Uedem, on the Dutch border, is scheduled for January 27, NATO sources said.
The battlefield missile defence system is NATO's first attempt to build an anti-missile screen for all its forces.
If it works, it is expected to serve as the basis for an expanded system, based largely on US technology, which would cover the whole of NATO's territory.
....
- 2.
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Russia Warns NATO Of Nuclear Deployment Over Missile Shield
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 9:03 am (PST)
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5ipn0YAy0hwWHPP_AiH306XKwuToQ?docId=CNG.85bc84cf65dec965e2307bfe85784c7f.7b1
Agence France-Presse
January 24, 2011
Russia warns NATO of nuclear deployment
MOSCOW: Russia wants an unambiguous answer from NATO over Moscow's role in a European missile defence shield and will deploy nuclear weapons if no agreement is reached, President Dmitry Medvedev warned Monday.
"Our partners have to understand that we do not want this simply to have some common toys that NATO and us can play with, but because we want adequate protection for Russia," Medvedev said in televised remarks.
"So this is not a joking matter. We expect from our NATO partners a direct and unambiguous answer," he said, during a meeting with Russia's NATO envoy Dmitry Rogozin.
Medvedev said Russia would be forced to deploy its own missile defence shield if it was not given an equal role in the one being deployed by Washington and its allies over Europe.
"In either case, we are either together with NATO, or we separately find an adequate response to the existing problem," Medvedev said.
"Either we agree to certain principles with NATO, or we fail to agree, and then in the future we are forced to adopt an entire series of unpleasant decisions concerning the deployment of an offensive nuclear missile group."
- 3.
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Slovakia: NATO Funds Modernization Of Military Air Base
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 9:04 am (PST)
http://spectator.sme.sk/articles/view/41429/10/sliac_airport_in_slovakia_will_be_modernised_with_financing_from_nato.html
Slovak Spectator/Agencies
January 24, 2011
Sliač Airport in Slovakia will be modernised with financing from NATO
The international Sliač Airport in Banská Bystrica region, which is also used as a military airport, will be modernised, the TASR newswire reported.
Based on Slovakia's proposal and NATO's later approval, a facility to store propellants and oils is to be built at the airport by 2012 – an investment worth more than €5 million, said Ivan Rudolf from Defence Ministry's press department.
The project will be financed from NATO's budget and carried out by the winner of an international selection process that is to be launched soon. The airport has been shut down since April 2009 for reconstruction work and there have been no commercial flights since 2007. It is expected to re-open in April 2011.
- 4.
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Pakistan: Three More U.S. Missile Strikes Kill Between 9-13
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 9:05 am (PST)
http://www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=3518&Cat=13&dt=1/24/2011
News International
January 24, 2011
Nine killed in three drone attacks in NWA
By Malik Mumtaz Khan
MIRAMSHAH: Unmanned US spy aircraft carried out three more missile strikes in the North Waziristan Agency on Sunday, killing nine people. Some reports said that at least 13 militants were killed in Sunday's drone attacks.
Tribal sources said the drones in the morning fired two missiles, striking a car carrying three people in Donga Madakhel village in Dattakhel Tehsil. They said the three men travelling in the car were killed in the attack and their bodies were mutilated beyond recognition.
In another attack, a drone fired two more missiles and hit a motorcycle in the same area, killing two people. In the third attack, a CIA-operated drone hit a car in Dindarga village near Gharyum area of Razmak Tehsil, killing four people.
The sources said in the first attack, the drone had fired two missiles at a moving car near North Waziristan's boundary with South Waziristan. There were no details about the identity of those killed.
It was the 10th attack by the US drones in North Waziristan since the start of the year 2011. On the other hand, tribesmen continued their protest against the frequent missile attacks by the US drones in North Waziristan.
After Miramshah, which is the main town of North Waziristan and where hundreds of tribesmen had staged a protest on Friday, hundreds of people on Sunday held a huge rally in Mir Ali, the second biggest town of the restive tribal region.
The tribesmen kept their businesses closed and staged a protest on the main Mir Ali-Miramshah Road. They chanted slogans against US President Barack Obama and CIA officials and held them responsible for civilian deaths.
They condemned the drone attacks and killing of innocent people and asked the United Nations and major world powers to take note of the suffering of tribesmen in North Waziristan. The protesters complained that the drone attacks had been promoting militancy and violence in the tribal areas. They also said that a large number of tribesmen were suffering from different mental disorders due to the climate of fear created by the drone strikes.
- 5.
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NATO Defense Chiefs To Discuss Continental Interceptor Missile Grid
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 9:08 am (PST)
http://www.focus-fen.net/index.php?id=n240341
Focus News Agency
January 24, 2011
NATO defense ministers to discuss mechanism for future missile defense system in March
Brussels: NATO defense ministers will discuss the command and control mechanisms of the future territorial system for missile defense at their meeting in March.
"It is about our vision of these mechanisms and their deployment," said the Secretary General of the 28-nation alliance Anders Fogh Rasmussen, cited by RIA Novosti.
....
- 6.
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Clinton, Kazakh Foreign Minister Advance "Strategic Partnership"
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 9:08 am (PST)
http://en.rian.ru/world/20110124/162272587.html
Russian Information Agency Novosti
January 24, 2011
U.S., Kazakhstan secretaries of state to discuss partnership in Washington
Astana: Kazakh Foreign Minister and Secretary of State Kanat Saudabayev will visit the United States January 24-26, Kazakh Foreign Ministry spokesman Askar Abdrakhmanov said at a briefing on Monday.
"Talks are planned between the head of [Kazakhstan's] Foreign Ministy and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, top White House officials, as well as a number of leading congressmen and leading individuals from expert analytical and business circles in the United States," Abdrakhmanov said.
According to him, the status and prospects for the further development of strategic partnership between the two countries, which is based on agreements between Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev and U.S. President Barack Obama, is to be discussed. The agreement was reached in Washington in April 2010.
In addition, Abdrakhmanov said that Saudabayev will visit the European Union headquarters in Brussels on January 27.
During the scheduled meeting with EU officials, including EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton, discussions on the most important issues of bilateral and multi-lateral cooperation are planned.
- 7.
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Hu Jintao's Visit Fails To Bring Thaw To U.S.-Chinese Relations
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 9:08 am (PST)
http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20110124/162273583.html
Russian Information Agency Novosti
January 24, 2011
Hu Jintao's visit fails to thaw U.S.-Chinese relations
Dmitry Kosyrev
Chinese President Hu Jintao ended his U.S. visit in Chicago on the day when the city was announced as Obama's headquarters for the 2012 election campaign. Talks were conducted behind tightly closed doors and no details of the Chinese leader's visit have been leaked.
There is no news about the Korean problem, which was believed to feature prominently on the agenda of Hu's visit because of China and all other countries' concern over North Korea's provocations.
President Hu was expected to focus on South Korea's actions, but it was announced on the day Obama and Hu were to meet that South Korea, which earlier hindered international efforts to resolve the Korean problem, has agreed to hold bilateral talks with its northern neighbor.
As for the other issues on the U.S.-Chinese agenda, your guess is as good as mine. Hu is rumored to have mentioned a realistic exchange rate for the yuan, now called renminbi (RMB), and Obama allegedly said that Beijing wants RMB to become a competitor with the U.S. dollar as an international currency.
However, press reports contain mostly expert opinion rather than direct quotations from the two state leaders. No one knows exactly what they have agreed. Even Hu's meeting in Congress was held behind closed doors.
What could this mean? Perhaps we could gain an insight by analyzing the visit's atmosphere.
America's make-believe view of China
The image sold to the general public goes something like this: an awkward leader from a rogue country comes to the beacon of freedom for a tough exam. He must pass it or face punishment for himself and his country.
Take the question about human rights in China addressed to both Obama and Hu Jintao during an obligatory news conference. "It was a good moment for the American press," writes The Washington Post.
Hu tried to evade answering the question, pointing at his ear as if something was wrong with translation, but the question was repeated and he had to answer it. He said: "China still faces many challenges in economic and social development, and a lot still needs to be done in China in terms of human rights."
You may see this as an honest answer, but those who monitor political debates on human rights, democracy and political reform under Hu Jintao know better. The Chinese president does not like speaking of these issues, and the words "a lot still needs to be done" are a standard and very mild answer in China.
During his meeting in Congress, Hu was denounced as "a repressive leader," a "dictator" and a "human rights abuser."
Congress has been especially concerned over China's efforts to depress the value of its currency, arguing that China has been weakening the yuan to boost exports. Americans said China must do something about it or be "held to account."
Interestingly, some people believe that the Untied States is the only superpower, that "dictators" can be embarrassed by questions, and that the Untied States can force China to do its bidding. This is just another American fairytale, although without a Spiderman, but it's funny nevertheless.
Hu and a hundred Chinese
The atmosphere during the state dinner at the White House was quite different. Holding the dinner for Hu was major news in itself, as it has been more than 13 years since a Chinese president has been the guest of honor at a White House state dinner.
The highlights of the dinner were Michelle Obama's red gown by Alexander McQueen and a large group of Chinese Americans who fought to get an invitation for the dinner. Some of them succeeded, like Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke and San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee, not to mention Jackie Chan. The executive managers of Microsoft, GE, Intel and Du Pont were there too, but none of them are Chinese as far as I know.
The main results of the visit were announced at that dinner and at several other meetings. First, the Untied States has signed $45 billion worth of new trade and investment deals with China, which Obama said will create up to 235,000 new jobs for U.S. workers.
Just to put things in perspective, this is approximately 75% of Russian-Chinese trade in 2010. On top of that, Hu discussed the conditions for American business in China during a lunch with U.S. business leaders. He said China would not discriminate against those foreign companies that bring new technology and would even offer them preferences, if they behave.
Feasibility vs. possibility
The overall result is that Obama's policy towards China - a year of fitful actions followed by a year of harsh decisions - is a major foreign policy failure. Hu Jintao's visit has stopped the U.S.-Chinese relations from becoming worse, but it has not helped to improve them.
Meanwhile, the sides have reached the limit of bilateral hostility, especially since Washington plans to cut budget spending by $2.5 trillion within ten years and given many other military and financial factors.
The Obama administration is aware of the flaws and weaknesses of such a foreign policy, and not only regarding China. However, it cannot replace this product of America's split personality with a normal foreign policy, and no one knows when this will become possible.
- 8.
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Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey Rail Line To "Merge Europe And Asia"
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 3:18 pm (PST)
http://en.apa.az/news.php?id=138971
Azeri Press Agency
January 24, 2011
Trilateral meeting on construction of Baku-Tbilisi-Kars-Akhalkalaki railway to be held in Tbilisi, tomorrow
Nizami Mammadzadeh
Tbilisi: Tomorrow, a trilateral meeting on the construction of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars-Akhalkalaki railway will be held in Tbilisi, Georgian Deputy FM Nino Kalandadze told reporters.
According to him, Baku-Tbilisi-Kars-Akhalkalaki railway will merge Europe and Asia: "The construction of railway is important for Georgia, as well".
He says that, Azerbaijani Transport Minister Ziya Mammadov, Georgian Minister of Regional Development and Infrastructure Ramaz Nikolaishvili and Turkish Transport Minister Binali Yildirim will attend the meeting. The meeting will last until January 27.
- 9.
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Report: Push For Joint British-French-German Military Partnership
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 3:18 pm (PST)
http://www.sify.com/news/france-wants-britain-germany-to-form-joint-military-news-international-lbyuOjfaied.html
Indo-Asian News Service
January 24, 2011
France wants Britain, Germany to form joint military
London: France wants Britain and Germany to join itself and form a military partnership in which all three countries will share equipment and troops, a media report said.
The Germans could join a force set up as part of the Anglo-French defence pact in November, as well as all three sharing transport aircraft and air refuelling tankers, the Daily Mail reported.
Senior British defence officials said Britain was keen to see an improvement in defence relations with Germany.
Defence Secretary Liam Fox is reported to have formed close ties with his German counterpart, Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, while French Defence Minister Alain Juppe said he was 'determined to do everything possible to advance in this direction' in tandem with Britain and Germany.
The matter is likely to be discussed with Germany by Fox and British Prime Minister David Cameron at the upcoming Munich security conference.
....
- 10.
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Poll: Greater Albania Project Closer To Realization
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 3:18 pm (PST)
http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Politics/?id=3.1.1274057015
ADN Kronos International
Jaunuary 18, 2011
Balkans: 'Most Kosovo Albanians favour unification with Albania'
Belgrade: An an overwhelming majority of Kosovo Albanians - 81 percent - favour unification with neighbouring Albania, according to an international survey published on Thursday.
A total of 48.8 per cent of Albanians in Kosovo and 41.8 in Macedonia believe unification could take place soon.
In Albania, support for unification has fallen to 62.8 pe cent from 68 percent last year.
The survey findings came less than three years after Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority declared independence from Serbia.
The survey, conducted by Gallup Balkan Monitor, also showed that 51.9 percent of ethnic Albanians in Macedonia favoured unification within a so-called "Greater Albania" that would also contain Kosovo and Albania.
Ethnic Albanians make 25 percent of Macedonia's two million population and enjoy considerable autonomy in the western part of the country, bordering Albania.
Kosovo's approximately two million Albanians make up 90 percent of the population, which comprises just 100,000 remaining Serbs.
Majority Albanians declared independence in February 2008, with the support of western powers, on the condition that Kosovo can't form a union with any other country.
Serbia opposes Kosovo independence and 71.2 percent of Serbs would rather forsake European Union membership than renounce Kosovo, according to the survey.
- 11.
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Report: NATO Knew Thaci Was Kosovo Criminal Kingpin
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 8:08 pm (PST)
http://in.reuters.com/article/idINIndia-54376220110125
Reuters
January 24, 2011
NATO saw Kosovo's Thaci as "big fish" in crime
LONDON: Western powers backing Kosovo's government considered its prime minister one of the country's "biggest fish" in organised crime, Britain's Guardian newspaper reported on Tuesday, citing leaked NATO military cables.
The newspaper said the documents, produced by NATO's peace-keeping force in Kosovo, also described Xhavit Haliti, a senior ruling politician and a close ally of Hashim Thaci, as having links to the Albanian mafia.
The newspaper quoted a Kosovo government spokesman as dismissing the allegations in the leaked documents.
"These are allegations that have circulated for over a decade... They are based on hearsay and intentional false Serbian intelligence," the spokesman said.
In the military reports, produced "around 2004," Haliti is described as "the power behind Hashim Thaci" and "highly involved in prostitution, weapons and drugs smuggling."
The newspaper did not say how the secret military cables had been leaked. Its report did not elaborate in detail on accusations against Thaci contained in the cables.
Allegations of Thaci's involvement in organised crime were contained in a report published last month by Dick Marty, a Council of Europe rapporteur.
The report by Marty, a Swiss senator, alleged that Thaci ran an organised crime ring during and after the Kosovo Albanian guerrilla war for independence from Serbia in the late 1990s.
Marty said Thaci's group killed opponents and trafficked in drugs and organs taken from murdered Serbs. The Kosovo government rejected that report as baseless and "slanderous."
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/24/hashim-thaci-kosovo-organised-crime
The Guardian
January 24, 2011
Report identifies Hashim Thaci as 'big fish' in organised crimeKosovo's prime minister accused of criminal connections in secret Nato documents leaked to the Guardian
Paul Lewis
Kosovo's prime minister, Hashim Thaçi, has been identified as one of the "biggest fish" in organised crime in his country, according to western military intelligence reports leaked to the Guardian.
The Nato documents, which are marked "Secret", indicate that the US and other western powers backing Kosovo's government have had extensive knowledge of its criminal connections for several years.
They also identify another senior ruling politician in Kosovo as having links to the Albanian mafia, stating that he exerts considerable control over Thaçi, a former guerrilla leader.
Marked "USA KFOR", they provide detailed information about organised criminal networks in Kosovo based on reports by western intelligence agencies and informants. The geographical spread of Kosovo's criminal gangs is set out, alongside details of alleged familial and business links.
The Council of Europe is tomorrow expected to formally demand an investigation into claims that Thaçi was the head of a "mafia-like" network responsible for smuggling weapons, drugs and human organs during and after the 1998-99 Kosovo war.
The organ trafficking allegations were contained in an official inquiry published last month by the human rights rapporteur Dick Marty.
His report accused Thaçi and several other senior figures who operated in the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) of links to organised crime, prompting a major diplomatic crisis when it was leaked to the Guardian last month.
The report also named Thaçi as having exerted "violent control" over the heroin trade, and appeared to confirm concerns that after the conflict with Serbia ended, his inner circle oversaw a gang that murdered Serb captives to sell their kidneys on the black market.
The Council's of Europe's parliamentary assembly in Strasbourg will debate Marty's findings and vote on a resolution calling for criminal investigations. The vote is widely expected to be passed.
Kosovo functioned as a UN protectorate from the end of the Kosovo war until 2008, when it formally declared independence from Serbia.
Thaçi, who was re-elected prime minister last month, has been strongly backed by Nato powers. His government has dismissed the Marty report as part of a Serbian and Russian conspiracy to destabilise the fledgling state.
However, the latest leaked documents were produced by KFOR, the Nato-led peacekeeping force responsible for security in Kosovo. It was KFOR military forces that intervened in the Kosovo war in 1999, helping to put an end to a campaign of ethnic cleansing by Slobodan Milosevic's Serbian forces.
Nato said in a statement tonight that it had instigated an "internal investigation" into the leaked documents, which are intelligence assessments produced around 2004, shortly before tensions with ethnic Serbs fuelled riots in Kosovo.
In the documents, Thaçi is identified as one of a triumvirate of "biggest fish" in organised criminal circles. So too is Xhavit Haliti, a former head of logistics for the KLA who is now a close ally of the prime minister and a senior parliamentarian in his ruling PDK party. Haliti is expected to be among Kosovo's official delegation to Strasbourg tomorrow and has played a leading role in seeking to undermine the Marty report in public.
However, the Nato intelligence reports suggest that behind his role as a prominent politician, Haliti is also a senior organised criminal who carries a Czech 9mm pistol and holds considerable sway over the prime minister.
Describing him as "the power behind Hashim Thaçi", one report states that Haliti has strong ties with the Albanian mafia and Kosovo's secret service, known as KShiK. It suggests that Haliti "more or less ran" a fund for the Kosovo war in the late 1990s, profiting from the fund personally before the money dried up. "As a result, Haliti turned to organised crime on a grand scale," the reports state.
They state that he is "highly involved in prostitution, weapons and drugs smuggling" and used a hotel in the capital, Pristina, as an operational base. Haliti also serves as a political and financial adviser to the prime minister but, according to the documents, is arguably "the real boss" in the relationship. Haliti uses a fake passport to travel abroad because he is black-listed in several countries, including the US, one report states.
Haliti is linked to the alleged intimidation of political opponents in Kosovo and two suspected murders dating back to the late 1990s, when KLA infighting is said to have resulted in numerous killings.
One was a political adversary who was found "dead by the Kosovo border", apparently following a dispute with Haliti. A description of the other suspected murder – of a young journalist in Tirana, the Albanian capital – also contains a reference to the prime minister by name, but does not ascribe blame.
Citing US and Nato intelligence, the entry states Haliti is "linked" the grisly murder, going on to state: "Ali Uka, a reporter in Tirana, who supported the independence movement but criticised it in print. Uka was brutally disfigured with a bottle and screwdriver in 1997. His roommate at the time was Hashim Thaçi."
Haliti is also named in the report by Marty, which is understood to have drawn on Nato intelligence assessments along with reports from the FBI and MI5.
Marty's report includes Haliti among a list of close allies of Thaçi said to have ordered – and in some cases personally overseen – "assassinations, detentions, beatings and interrogations" during and immediately after the war.
Haliti was unavailable for comment. However, in an interview with the media outlet Balkan Insight last week he dismissed the Marty report as "political" and designed to "discredit the KLA". "I was not surprised by the report. I have followed this issue for years and the content of the report is political," he said.
But he accepted that the Council of Europe was likely to pass a resolution triggering investigations by the EU-backed justice mission in the country, known as EULEX.
"I think it's a competent investigating body," he said, "It's a European investigation body. I think that there is no possibility that EULEX investigation unit to be affected by Kosovo or Albanian politics."
Responding to the allegations in the NATO intelligence reports tonight, a Kosovo government spokesman said: "These are allegations that have circulated for over a decade, most recently recycled in the Dick Marty report. They are based on hearsay and intentional false Serbian intelligence.
"Nevertheless, the prime minister has called for an investigation by EULEX and has repeatedly pledged his full cooperation to law enforcement authorities on these scandalous and slanderous allegations.
"The government of Kosovo continues to support the strengthening of the rule of law in Kosovo, and we look forward to the cooperation of our international partners in ensuring that criminality has no place in Kosovo's development."
Road to Strasbourg
It has taken more than two years for an inquiry into organ trafficking in Kosovo to reach the Palace of Europe, a grand building in Strasbourg that serves as the headquarters of the Council of Europe.
The formal inquiry into organ trafficking in Kosovo was prompted by revelations by the former chief war crimes prosecutor at The Hague, Carla Del Ponte, who said she had been prevented from properly investigating alleged atrocities committed by the Kosovo Liberation Army.
Her most shocking disclosure – unconfirmed reports the KLA killed captives for their organs – prompted the formal inquiry by human rights rapporteur Dick Marty.
His report, published last month, suggested there was evidence that KLA commanders smuggled captives across the border into Kosovo and harvested the organs of a "handful" of Serbs.
His findings, which will be subject to a parliamentary assembly vote tomorrow, went further, accusing Kosovo's prime minister and several other senior figures of involvement in organised crime over the last decade.
- 12.
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Report Reignites Kosovo Organ Trafficking Claim
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 8:09 pm (PST)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-12269829
BBC News
January 24, 2011
Report reignites Kosovo organ trafficking claim
By Mark Lowen
Silvana Marinkovic clasps the faded photograph of her husband, Goran; the contours of his face now barely visible.
"He was 26 here," she says. "19 June 1999. The last time I saw him before he was taken."
For over a decade Ms Marinkovic has come twice weekly to a cramped office near the Kosovan capital Pristina.
There, she and other relatives of Kosovan Serbs who disappeared after the war discuss the hunt for their loved ones.
Almost 2,000 ethnic Serbs and Albanians are still missing from the conflict in Kosovo.
"He was kidnapped," she tells me. "It's so hard to think of it. I don't know where he was taken, but I still pray I'll find him alive."
The fate of some lay a few hours' drive away, according to the human rights watchdog, the Council of Europe.
Its rapporteur, the Swiss senator Dick Marty, published a report last month, alleging that members of the ethnic Albanian separatist group, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), took prisoners to detention camps in Albania in the months following the war against the Serbs.
'Yellow house'
In a makeshift clinic in the town of Fushe-Kruje, near the Albanian capital, some are said to have been killed and their organs removed to be sold on the international market.
On Tuesday, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe will debate the findings and vote on a resolution based on the draft report.
That could prompt calls for a fresh investigation.
Allegations of organ trafficking from the Kosovan war have been present for some years.
They previously centred on a building nicknamed the "yellow house" near the Albanian town of Burrel, where kidneys of captured Serbs were said to have been removed.
But after successive investigations ended without prosecutions, many believed the case would be dropped.
Now the Marty report has reawakened those claims, focusing for the first time on Fushe-Kruje.
The building mentioned in the report is described, though its exact location not disclosed.
I travelled to a crumbling house near the town that matches the description.
Local media say it could be the building mentioned since Kosovan Albanian refugees lived here during the war.
Hidden up a stony track, the deserted shell is choked by thick brambles. The window frames are empty, doors removed and even the light fittings ripped out. Old shoes and empty bottles are strewn across the rotting floors.
There is nothing to suggest that it housed an operational organ clinic, but then it is totally derelict.
....
The Marty report claims that witnesses were silenced and paid off by members of the Drenica Group, a faction within the KLA, whose members allegedly carried out the organ trafficking, as well as heroin smuggling and assassinations.
Its leader is named as Hashim Thaci: then the KLA's political chief, now Kosovo's Prime Minister, described by intelligence sources as being "the most dangerous of the KLA's 'criminal bosses'".
Mr Thaci was backed by western powers from the late 1990s, through Nato's bombing campaign to support the KLA and drive the Serbs out of Kosovo.
That support is heavily criticised in the report as fostering a one-sided view of the conflict, with Serbs seen as the aggressors and Kosovan Albanians as the victims.
....
Just outside Pristina lies a gated cemetery to fallen members of the KLA, with each grave decorated by an Albanian flag.
Across Kosovo, the men are seen as heroes of the liberation struggle, martyrs for the Albanian cause.
But an uncomfortable light has now been shone of the other side of that fight and on what may have happened back in 1999 in the KLA's name.
- 13.
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Criminal Kosovo: America's Gift To Europe
Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff
Mon Jan 24, 2011 8:20 pm (PST)
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=22931
Global Research/CounterPunch
January 24, 2011
Criminal Kosovo: America's Gift to Europe
by Diana Johnstone
U.S. media have given more attention to hearsay allegations of Julian Assange's sexual encounters with two talkative Swedish women than to an official report accusing Kosovo prime minister Hashim Thaci of running a criminal enterprise which, among almost every other crime in the book, has murdered prisoners in order to sell their vital organs on the world market.
The report by Swiss liberal Dick Marty was mandated two years ago by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). Not to be confused with the European Union, the Council of Europe was founded in 1949 to promote human rights, the rule of law and democracy and has 47 member states (compared to 27 in the EU).
While U.S. legal experts feverishly try to trump up charges they can use to demand extradition of Assange to the United States, to be duly punished for discomfiting the empire, U.S. State Department spokesman Phillip Crowley piously reacted to the Council of Europe allegations by declaring that the United States will continue to work with Thaci since "any individual anywhere in the world is innocent until proven otherwise".
Everyone, that is, except, among others, Bradley Manning who is in solitary confinement although he has not been found guilty of anything. All the Guantanamo prisoners have been considered guilty, period. The United States is applying the death penalty on a daily basis to men, women and children in Afghanistan and Pakistan who are innocent until proven dead.
Embarrassed supporters of Thaci's little self-proclaimed state dismiss the accusations by saying that the Marty Report does not prove Thaci's guilt.
Of course it doesn't. It can't. It is a report, not a trial. The report was mandated by the PACE precisely because judicial authorities were ignoring evidence of serious crimes. In her 2008 memoir in Italian La caccia. Io e i criminali di guerra (The Hunt. Me and the War Criminals), the former prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague, Carla del Ponte, complained that she had been prevented from carrying out a thorough investigation of reports of organ extraction from Serb and other prisoners carried out by the "Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)" in Albania. Indeed, rumors and reports of those atrocities, carried out in the months following the occupation of Kosovo by NATO-led occupation forces, have been studiously ignored by all relevant judicial authorities.
The Marty report claims to have uncovered corroborating evidence, including testimony by witnesses whose lives would be in danger if their names were revealed. The conclusion of the report is not and could not be a verdict, but a demand to competent authorities to undertake judicial proceedings capable of hearing all the evidence and issuing a verdict.
Skepticism about atrocities
It is always prudent to be skeptical about atrocity stories circulating in wartime. History shows many examples of totally invented atrocity stories that serve to stir up hatred of the enemy during wartime, such as the widely circulated World War I reports of the Germans "cutting off the hands of Belgian babies".
Western journalists and politicians abandoned all prudent skepticism regarding the wild tales that were spread of Serb atrocities used to justify the 1999 NATO bombing of Serbia. Personally, my skepticism extends to all such stories, regardless of the identity of the alleged perpetrators, and I have refrained for years from writing about the Albanian organ transplant stories for that reason.
I never considered Carla del Ponte a reliable source, but rather a gullible and self-aggrandizing woman who had been selected by the U.S. sponsors of the ICTY because they thought they could manipulate her. No doubt the sponsors of the Tribunal she was working for, which was set up by and for the United States and NATO allies in order to justify their choice of sides in the Yugoslav civil wars, would have called a halt before she could stray from her assigned path to stick her nose into crimes committed by America's Albanian protégés. But that does not prove that the alleged crimes actually were committed.
However, the Marty report goes beyond vague rumors to make specific allegations against the KLA's "Drenica group" led by Hashim Thaci. Despite refusal of Albanian authorities to cooperate, there is ample proof that the KLA operated a chain of "safe houses" on Albanian territory during and after the 1999 NATO war against Serbia, using them to hold, interrogate, torture and sometimes murder prisoners. One of these safe houses, belonging to a family identified by the initial "K", was cited by Carla del Ponte and media reports as "the yellow house" (since painted white). To quote the Marty Report (paragraph 147):
"There are substantial elements of proof that a small number of KLA captives, including some of the abducted ethnic Serbs, met their death in Rripe, at or in the vicinity of the K. house. We have learned about these deaths not only through the testimonies of former KLA soldiers who said they had participated in detaining and transporting the captives while they were alive, but also through the testimonies of persons who independently witnessed the burial, disinterment, movement and reburial of the captives' corpses (…)"
An undetermined but apparently small number of prisoners were transferred in vans and trucks to an operating site near Tirana international airport, from which fresh organs could be flown rapidly to recipients.
"The drivers of these vans and trucks – several of whom would become crucial witnesses to the patterns of abuse described – saw and heard captives suffering greatly during the transports, notably due to the lack of a proper air supply in their compartment of the vehicle, or due to the psychological torment of the fate that they supposed awaited them" (paragraph 155).
Captives described in the report as "victims of organised crime" included "persons whom we found were taken into central Albania to be murdered immediately before having their kidneys removed in a makeshift operating clinic" (paragraph 156).
These captives "undoubtedly endured a most horrifying ordeal in the custody of their KLA captors. According to source testimonies, the captives 'filtered' into this final subset were initially kept alive, fed well and allowed to sleep, and treated with relative restraint by KLA guards and henchmen who would otherwise have beaten them up indiscriminately" (paragraph 157).
"The testimonies on which we based our findings spoke credibly and consistently of a methodology by which all of the captives were killed, usually by a gunshot to the head, before being operated on to remove one or more of their organs. We learned that this was principally a trade in 'cadaver kidneys', i.e. the kidneys were extracted posthumously; it was not a set of advanced surgical procedures requiring controlled clinical conditions and, for example, the extensive use of anaesthetic" (paragraph 162).
Skepticism about liberation"
The Marty report also recalls what is common knowledge in Europe, namely that Hashim Thaci and his "Drenica Group" are notorious criminals. While "liberated" Kosovo sinks ever further into poverty, they have amassed fortunes in various aspects of illicit trade, notably enslaving women for prostitution and controlling illegal narcotics across Europe.
"Notably, in confidential reports spanning more than a decade, agencies dedicated to combating drug smuggling in at least five countries have named Hashim Thaci and other members of his "Drenica Group" as having exerted violent control over the trade in heroin and other narcotics" (paragraph 66).
"Similarly, intelligence analysts working for NATO, as well as those in the service of at least four independent foreign Governments, made compelling findings through their intelligence-gathering related to the immediate aftermath of the conflict in 1999. Thaci was commonly identified, and cited in secret intelligence reports, as the most dangerous of the KLA's 'criminal bosses'" (paragraph 67).
The leftists who fell hook, line and sinker for the "war to rescue the Kosovars from genocide" propaganda that justified NATO's debut as aggressive bomber/invader in 1999 readily accepted the identification of the "Kosovo Liberation Army" as a national liberation movement deserving their support. Isn't it part of romantic legend for revolutionaries to rob banks for their cause? Leftists assume such criminal activities are merely a means to the end of political independence. But what if political independence is in reality the means to sanctuarize criminal activities?
Assassinating policemen, the KLA specialty prior to being given Kosovo by NATO, is an ambiguous activity. Is the target "political oppression", as claimed, or simply law enforcement?
What have Thaci and company done with their "liberation"? First of all, they allowed their American sponsors to build a huge military base, Camp Bondsteel, on Kosovo territory, without asking permission from anyone. Then, behind a smokescreen of talk of building democracy, they have terrorized ethnic minorities, eliminated their political rivals, fostered rampant crime and corruption, engaged in electoral fraud, and ostentatiously enriched themselves thanks to the criminal activities that constitute the real economy.
The Marty Report recalls what happened when Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, under NATO threat of wiping out his country, agreed to withdraw from Kosovo and allow a U.N. force called KFOR (quickly taken over by NATO) to occupy Kosovo.
"First, the withdrawal of the Serb security forces from Kosovo had ceded into the hands of various KLA splinter groups, including Thaci's "Drenica Group", effectively unfettered control of an expanded territorial area in which to carry out various forms of smuggling and trafficking" (paragraph 84).
"KFOR and UNMIK were incapable of administering Kosovo's law enforcement, movement of peoples, or border control, in the aftermath of the NATO bombardment in 1999. KLA factions and splinter groups that had control of distinct areas of Kosovo (villages, stretches of road, sometimes even individual buildings) were able to run organised criminal enterprises almost at will, including in disposing of the trophies of their perceived victory over the Serbs" (paragraph 85).
"Second, Thaci's acquisition of a greater degree of political authority (Thaci having appointed himself Prime Minister of the Provisional Government of Kosovo) had seemingly emboldened the "Drenica Group" to strike out all the more aggressively at perceived rivals, traitors, and persons suspected of being "collaborators" with the Serbs" (paragraph 86).
In short, NATO drove out the existing police, turning the province of Kosovo over to violent gangsters. But this was not an accident. Hashim Thaci was not just a gangster who took advantage of the situation. He had been hand-picked by U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and her right-hand man, James Rubin, for the job.
"You ought to be in movies…"
Until February 1999, Hashim Thaci's only claim to fame was in Serbian police records, where he was wanted for various violent crimes. Then suddenly, at a French chateau called Rambouillet, he was thrust into the world spotlight by his American handlers. It is one of the most bizarre twists to the whole tragi-comic Kosovo saga.
Ms Albright was eager to use the ethnic conflict in Kosovo to make a display of U.S. military might by bombing the Serbs, in order to reassert U.S. dominance of Europe via NATO. But some European NATO country leaders thought it politically necessary to make at least a pretense of seeking a negotiated solution to the Kosovo problem before bombing. And so a fake "negotiation" was staged at Rambouillet, designed by the United States to get the Serbs to say no to an impossible ultimatum, in order to claim that the humanitarian West had no choice but to bomb.
For that, they needed a Kosovo Albanian who would play their game.
Belgrade sent a large multi-ethnic delegation to Rambouillet, ready to propose a settlement giving Kosovo broad autonomy. On the other side was a purely ethnic Albanian delegation from Kosovo including several leading local intellectuals experienced in such negotiations, including the internationally recognized leader of the Albanian separatist movement in Kosovo, Ibrahim Rugova who, it was assumed, would lead the "Kosovar" delgation.
But to the general surprise of observers, the seasoned intellectuals were shoved aside, and leadership of the delegation was taken over by a young man, Hashim Thaci, known in law-enforcement circles as "the Snake".
The American stage-managers chose Thaci for obvious reasons. While the older Kosovo Albanians risked actually negotiating with the Serbs, and thus reaching an agreement that would prevent war, Thaci owed everything to the United States, and would do as he was told. Moreover, putting a "wanted" criminal at the top of the delegation was an affront to the Serbs that would help scuttle negotiations. And finally, the Thaci image appealed to the Americans' idea of what a "freedom fighter" should look like.
Albright's closest aide, James Rubin, acted as talent scout, gushing over Thaci's good looks, telling him he was so handsome he should be in Hollywood. Indeed, Thaci did not look like a Hollywood gangster, Edward G. Robinson style, but a clean-cut hero with a vague resemblance to the actor Robert Stack. Joe Biden is said to have complained that Madeleine Albright was "in love" with Thaci. Image is everything, after all, especially when the United States is casting its own Pentagon superproduction, "Saving the Kosovars", in order to redesign the Balkans, with its own "independent" satellite states.
The pretext for the 1999 war was to "save the Kosovars" (the name assumed by the Albanian population of that Serbian province, to give the impression that it was a country and that they were the rightful inhabitants) from an imaginary threat of "genocide". The official U.S. position was to respect the territorial integrity of Yugoslavia. But it was always quite obvious that behind the scenes, the United States had made a deal with Thaci to give him Kosovo as part of the destruction of Yugoslavia and the crippling of Serbia. The chaos that followed the withdrawal of Yugoslav security forces enabled the KLA gangs to take over and the United States to build Camp Bondsteel.
Cheered on by a virulent Albanian lobby in the United States, Washington has defied international law, violated its own commitments (the agreement ending the 1999 war called for Serbia to police Kosovo's borders, which was never allowed), and ignored muted objections from European allies to sponsor the transformation of the poor Serbian province into an ethnic Albanian "independent state". Since unilaterally declaring independence in February 2008, the failed statelet has been recognized only by 72 out of 192 U.N. members, including 22 of the European Union's 27 members.
EULEX versus Clan Loyalty
A few months later, the European Union set up a "European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo" (EULEX) intended to take over judicial authority in the province from the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) that had ostensibly exercised such functions after NATO drove out the Serbs. The very establishment of EULEX was proof that the EU's recognition of Kosovo's independence was unjustified and dishonest. It was an admission that Kosovo, after being delivered to KLA bands (some in war against each other), was unable to provide even a semblance of law and order, and thus in no way prepared to be "an independent state".
Of course the West will never admit this, but it was the complaints of the Serb minority in the 1980s that they could not count on protection by police or law courts, then run by the majority ethnic Albanian communist party, that led to the Serbian government's limitation of Kosovo's autonomy, portrayed in the West as a gratuitous persecution motivated by racial hatred of Hitlerian proportions.
The difficulties of obtaining justice in Kosovo are basically the same now as they were then – with the difference that the Serbian police understood the Albanian language, whereas the UNMIK and EULEX internationals are almost entirely dependent on local Albanian interpreters, whose veracity they are unable to check.
The Marty Report describes the difficulties of crime investigation in Kosovo:
"The structure of Kosovar Albanian society, still very much clan orientated, and the absence of a true civil society have made it extremely difficult to set up contacts with local sources. This is compounded by fear, often to the point of genuine terror, which we have observed in some of our informants immediately upon broaching the subject of our inquiry.
"The entrenched sense of loyalty to one's clansmen, and the concept of honour … rendered most ethnic Albanian witnesses unreachable for us. Having seen two prominent prosecutions undertaken by the ICTY leading to the deaths of so many witnesses, and ultimately a failure to deliver justice, a Parliamentary Assembly Rapporteur with only paltry resources in comparison was hardly likely to overturn the odds of such witnesses speaking to us directly.
"Numerous persons who have worked for many years in Kosovo, and who have become among the most respected commentators on justice in the region, counseled us that organized criminal networks of Albanians ('the Albanian mafia') in Albania itself, in neighbouring territories including Kosovo and 'the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia', and in the Diaspora, were probably more difficult to penetrate than the Cosa Nostra; even low-level operatives would rather take a jail term of decades, or a conviction for contempt, than turn in their clansmen."
A second report submitted this month to the Council of Europe by rapporteur Jean-Charles Gardetto on witness protection in war crimes trials for former Yugoslavia notes that there is no witness protection law in Kosovo and, more seriously, no way to protect witnesses that might testify against fellow ethnic Albanians.
"In the most serious cases, witnesses are able to testify anonymously. However, it was made clear to the rapporteur that these measures are useless as long as the witness is physically in Kosovo, where everybody knows everybody else. Most witnesses are immediately recognised by the defence when they deliver their testimony, despite all the anonymity measures."
"There are many limitations to the protection arrangements currently available, not least because Kosovo has a population of less than two million with very tight-knit communities. Witnesses are often perceived as betraying their community when they give evidence, which inhibits possible witnesses from coming forward. Furthermore, many people do not believe that they have a moral or legal duty to testify as a witness in criminal cases.
"Moreover, when a witness does come forward, there is a real threat of retaliation. This may not necessarily put them in direct danger, losing their job for example, but there are also examples of key witnesses being murdered. The trial of Ramush Haradinaj, the former leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army, well illustrates this. Mr. Haradinaj was indicted by the ICTY for crimes committed during the war in Kosovo but was subsequently acquitted. In its judgment, the Tribunal highlighted the difficulties that it had had in obtaining evidence from the 100 prosecution witnesses. Thirty-four of them were granted protection measures and 18 had to be issued with summonses. A number of witnesses who were going to give evidence at the trial were murdered. These included Sadik and Vesel Muriqi, both of whom had been placed under a protection program by the ICTY."
Europes Dilemma
Naturally, European accomplices in putting the Thaci gang in charge of Kosovo have been quick to dismiss the Marty report. Tony Blair apologist and former Labour minister Dennis MacShane wrote in The Independent (UK) that, "There is not one single name or a single witness to the allegations that Thaci was involved in the harvesting of human organs from murdered victims." To someone unfamiliar with the circumstances and with the report, that may sound like a valid objection. But Marty has made it clear that he can supply names of witnesses to competent judicial authorities. Thaci himself acknowledged that they exist when he stated that he would publish the names of Marty's witnesses – a statement understood as a death threat by those familiar with the Pristina scene.
One of the most prominent Europeans to hope that the Marty report will disappear is the French media humanitarian Bernard Kouchner, until recently Sarkozy's foreign minister, who officially ran Kosovo as the first head of UNMIK after the NATO occupation. Contrary to Kouchner's protests of ignorance, the UNMIK police chief in 2000 and 2001, Canadian Captain Stu Kellock, has called it "impossible" that Kouchner was not aware of organized crime in Kosovo. The first time a reporter queried Kouchner about the organ transplant accusations, a few months ago, Kouchner responded with a loud horse laugh, before telling the reporter to go have his head examined. After the Marty report, Kouchner merely repeated his "skepticism", and called for an investigation… by EULEX.
Other NATO defenders have taken the same line. One investigation calls for another, and so on. Investigating the charges against the KLA is beginning to look like the Middle East peace process.
The Marty Report itself concludes with a clear call on EULEX to "to persevere with its investigative work, without taking any account of the offices held by possible suspects or of the origin of the victims, doing everything to cast light on the criminal disappearances, the indications of organ trafficking, corruption and the collusion so often complained of between organized criminal groups and political circles" and "to take every measure necessary to ensure effective protection for witnesses and to gain their trust".
This is a tall order, considering that EULEX is ultimately dependent on EU governments deeply involved in ignoring Kosovo Albanian crime for over a decade. Still, some of the most implicated personalities, such as Kouchner, are nearing the end of their careers, and there are many Europeans who consider that things have gone much too far, and that the Kosovo cesspool must be cleaned up.
EULEX is already prosecuting an organ trafficking ring in Kosovo. In November 2008, a young Turkish man who had just had a kidney removed collapsed at Pristina airport, which led police to raid the nearby Medicus clinic where a 74-year-old Israeli was convalescing from implantation of the young man's kidney.
The Israeli had allegedly paid 90,000 euros for the illegal implant, while the young Turk, like other desperately poor foreigners lured to Pristina by false promises, was cheated of the money promised. The trial is currently underway in Pristina of seven defendants charged with involvement in the illegal Medicus organ trafficking racket, including top members of the Kosovo Albanian medical profession. Still at large are Dr. Yusuf Sonmez, a notorious international organ trafficker, and Moshe Harel, an Israeli of Turkish origin accused of organizing the illicit international organ trade. Israel is known to be a prime market for organs because of Jewish religious restrictions that severely limit the number of Israeli donors.
The Marty Report notes that the information it has obtained "appears to depict a broader, more complex organized criminal conspiracy to source human organs for illicit transplant, involving co-conspirators in at least three different foreign countries besides Kosovo, enduring over more than a decade. In particular, we found a number of credible, convergent indications that the organ-trafficking component of the post-conflict detentions described in our report is closely related to the contemporary case of the Medicus Clinic, not least through prominent Kosovar Albanian and international personalities who feature as co-conspirators in both."
But EULEX prosecution of the Medicus case does not automatically mean that the European judicial authorities in Kosovo will pursue the even more criminal organ trafficking denounced in the Marty Report. One obstacle is that the alleged crimes took place on the territory of Albania, and so far Albanian authorities have been uncooperative, to say the least.
A second inhibition is fear that the attempt to prosecute leading KLA figures would lead to unrest. Indeed, on January 9, several hundred Albanians carrying Albanian flags (not the Western-imposed flag of Kosovo) demonstrated in Mitrovica against the Marty report shouting "UCK, UCK" (KLA in Albanian). Still, EULEX has indicted two former KLA commanders for war crimes committed on Albanian territory in 1999 when they allegedly tortured prisoners, ethnic Albanians from Kosovo either suspected of "collaborating" with legal Serb authorities or because they were political opponents of the KLA.
A striking and significant political fact that emerges from the Marty report is that:
"The reality is that the most significant operational activities undertaken by members of the KLA – prior to, during, and in the immediate aftermath of the conflict – took place on the territory of Albania, where the Serb security forces were never deployed" (paragraph 36).
Thus, to a very large extent, the Serbian province of Kosovo was the object of a foreign invasion from across its border, by Albanian nationalists keen on creating "Greater Albania", and aided in this endeavor by diaspora lobbies and, decisively, NATO bombing. Far from being an "aggressor" in its own historic province, Serbia was the victim of a major two-pronged foreign invasion.
America's disposable puppets
NATO could not have waged a ground war against Serbian forces without suffering casualties. So it waged a 78-day air war, ravaging Serbia's infrastructure. To save his country from threatened annihilation, Milosevic gave in. For its ground force, the United States chose the KLA. The KLA was no match for Serbian forces on the ground, but it aided the United States/NATO war in peculiar ways.
The United States provided KLA fighters on the ground with GPS devices and satellite telephones to enable them to spot Serb targets for bombing (very inefficiently, as the NATO bombs missed almost all their military targets). The KLA in some places ordered Kosovo Albanian civilians to flee across the border to Albania or to ethnic Albanian parts of Macedonia, where photographers were waiting to enrich the imagery of a population persecuted by Serb "ethnic cleansing" – an enormous propaganda success. And crucially, before the NATO bombing, the KLA pursued a strategy of provocation, murdering policemen and civilians, including disobedient Albanians, designed to commit acts of repression that could be used as a pretext for NATO intervention. Thaci even boasted subsequently of the success of this strategy.
Thaci has played the role assigned to him by the empire. Still, considering the history of American disposal of collaborators who have outlived their usefulness (Ngo Dinh Diem, Noriega, Saddam Hussein…), he has reasons to be uneasy.
Thaci's uneasiness could be sharpened by a recent trip to the region by William Walker, the U.S. agent who in 1999 created the main pretext for the NATO bombing campaign by inflating casualties from a battle between Serb police and KLA fighters in the village of Racak into a massacre of civilians, "a crime against humanity" perpetrated by "people with no value for human life". Walker, whose main professional experience was in Central America during the Reagan administration's bloody fight against revolutionary movements in Nicaragua and El Salvador, had been imposed by the United States as head of a European mission ostensibly mandated to monitor a cease-fire between Serb forces and the KLA. But in fact, he and his British deputy used the mission to establish close contacts with the KLA in preparation for joint war against the Serbs. The grateful gangster regime has named a street in Pristina after him;
In between receiving a decoration in Kosovo and honorary citizenship in Albania, Walker took political positions that could make both Thaci and EULEX nervous. Walker expressed support for Albin Kurti, the young leader of the radical nationalist "Self-Determination" movement (Vetëvendosje), which is gaining support with its advocacy of independence from EU governance as well as in favor of "natural Albania", meaning a Greater Albania composed of Albania, Kosovo and parts of southern Serbia, much of Macedonia, a piece of Montenegro and even northern Greece. Was Walker on a talent-scouting mission in view of replacing the increasingly disgraced Thaci? If Kurti is the new favorite, a U.S.-chosen replacement could cause even more trouble in the troubled Balkans.
The West, that is, the United States, the European Union and NATO, may be able to agree on a "curse on both their houses" approach, concluding that the Serbs they persecuted and the Albanians they helped are all barbarians, unworthy of their benevolent intervention. What they will never admit is that they chose, and to a large extent created, the wrong side in a war for which they bear criminal responsibility. And whose devastating consequences continue to be borne by the unfortunate inhabitants of the region, whatever their linguistic and cultural identity.
Diana Johnstone is author of Fools'Crusade: Yugoslavia, NATO and Western Delusions.
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