 |  |  |
| Return to: Left History: a digital archive | Return to: Say no to imperialist wars! | Return to: NATO-Yugoslav War Internet Resources |
| | |
| Return to: Left History: a digital archive | Return to: Say no to imperialist wars! | Return to: NATO-Yugoslav War Internet Resources |
YUGOSLAV PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC RECEIVES JORDAN WRITER KAVAR
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic received on Monday eminent Jordan writer and President of the Writers` Association of Jordan Fahri Kavar, who is participating at the international assembly of writers in Belgrade.
The guest from Jordan, who is very prominent in Arabian cultural and political circles because of his advocating for development of friendship and for affirmation of equal relations between states and peoples, paid a tribute to our country and to President Milosevic for heroic resistance to hegemony and policy of dictatorship and emphasised that greater part of the Arabian world admired Yugoslavia's struggle.
President Milosevic expressed satisfaction for the international assembly of writers being held in Belgrade and underlined that writers` words, especially of those that left a deep mark in the culture of their people and contributed to the variety of the universal cultural heritage, had a huge moral influence on the overall civilisation development, which is again at threshold of the 21st century going through the temptation of totalitarianism and discrimination practice against the states and the peoples that are struggling to preserve their freedom and independence. The works and overall activities of Fehri Kavari represent a form of struggle for the truth and freedom, President Milosevic said.
The reception was also attended by Milenko Kasanin, head of Directorate for international cultural cooperation of the Federal Foreign Ministry.
SERBIAN DEPUTY PM - KLA, SZP ARE NATO'S SPEARHEADS
Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Milovan Bojic said Sunday in Jagodina, central Serbia, that the aggression on Yugoslavia continued unabated.
At a celebration of municipality day and 55th anniversary of the liberation of Jagodina, Bojic said that the NATO infantry had the task of doing what its airforce was unable to do.
Its main spearheads are the self-styled KLA in Kosovo-Metohija and the (opposition) Alliance for Change (SZP) in Serbia, Bojic said.
Among the various plans to that end was the creation of a Stabilization Pact for southeastern Europe. Nothing wrong with the name, but a lot of ill intentions. How can southeastern Europe be stabilized without Serbia and Yugoslavia and with only 250 million dollars. 250 billion dollars would not be enough to that end, whereas war damages in Yugoslavia have been evaluated at 100 billion dollars, Bojic said.
The pact for Serbia's stability was aimed at establishing an interim government, a puppet government that was to accomplish what NATO could not during its aggression on Yugoslavia. The only task of the interim government would have been to bring KFOR from Pristina to Belgrade, Bojic said.
After that attempt failed, street protests and pressures were initiated, but they are not going well either. Their rallies resemble sad funeral processions burying the unfulfilled promises made by US Ambassador Robert Gelbard, Bojic said.
As this failed, too, they now want elections, Bojic said.
"On behalf of the Left and the entire patriotic bloc, I can say that we do not fear elections, but Serbia has other priorities. Serbia was bombed-out, Serbia was flooded, and Serbia is rebuilding", Bojic said.
PEACEKEEPERS CLASH WITH SO-CALLED KOSOVO PROTECTION CORPS
The UN security forces in Serbia's Kosovo and Metohija province recorded several incidents over the weekend which confirm that the climate of violence is gaining momentum and assassinations and acts of revenge are multiplying, media in Brussels warned on Monday.
Reports datelined Pristina gave examples of a drastic increase in the crime rate and violations of the peace agreement, quoting a KFOR report.
The report specified that members of the Kosovo Liberation Army were found in possession of large quantities of arms, as well as some identification documents issued by an alleged Kosovo government. The report also said that peacekeepers had clashed with members of the illegal Kosovo Protection Corps for the first time.
In addition to quoting the KFOR report, Brussels media also warned that the international police would control border crossings with Macedonia and Albanian much more strictly from now on.
UN peacekeepers accused followers of the KLA, whose leaders have signed an agreement on demilitarization, of violating this agreement and causing unrest, media said.
KLA members still possess large quantities of arms and wear uniforms of this ethnic Albanian terrorist organization, media said, also quoting a KFOR announcement that an investigation and necessary measures would be taken and that such conduct would no longer be tolerated.
KFOR BREAKS UP ETHNIC ALBANIAN DEMONSTRATIONS
Strong French and Dutch troops, aided by Italian and French police, broke up at 2 p.m. on Friday a large crowd of ethnic Albanians who had tried for more than four hours to force their way into the northern Serb part of Kosovska Mitrovica.
The peacekeepers used stun grenades and tear gas to disperse the ethnic Albanian demonstrators, so that only a group of some 20 ethnic Albanians remained on the bridge over the Ibar river, in the southern part of the city.
Unofficially, injured were at least four UN soldiers and police and more than a dozen ethnic Albanians.
The demonstrators threw stones on the KFOR troops.
TELEVISION BUILDING IN PRISTINA DESTROYED IN SUSPECTED ARSON
The television building in Pristina, Serbia's Kosovo and Metohija province, was destroyed early Monday in what is suspected to be an act of arson.
Initial reports said the fire first broke out in a store and then spread to the neighbouring television building located in central Pristina.
International force KFOR fire brigades intervened. They said an unknown number of persons had been in the building when the fire broke out, and that it has not been determined yet whether there are any victims.
The fire broke out at about 2 a.m. and it took firemen two hours to localize the flames.
KFOR and international police representatives who are conducting an investigation have not said yet who is suspected of causing the fire, or what are the motives behind this biggest torching so far since they took over responsibility for protecting the population and material goods in this southern Serbian province.
MISSILES FALL ON SERBIAN PART OF KOSOVSKA MITROVICA
In the northern Serbian part of divided Kosovska Mitrovica, exploded Saturday evening around 19,30 three mortar missiles fired from the southern part of the town inhabited by ethnic Albanians, witnesses confirmed to Tanjug this morning.
No one has been injured in the mortar attack among local Serbs or French KFOR members, who jointly secure the bridge on the river Ibar.
Two days ago KFOR prevented a large number of ethnic Albanians in their attempt to cross the bridge and enter by force the Serbian part of town.
BLOCKADE OF ORAHOVAC - JUST A PRETEXT
Serbs and Romanies from Orahovac live in a ghetto, they are arrested for war crimes on tips from ethnic Albanians, while talks about the entry of Russian troops have not made any progress, the Amsterdam daily Parol said Sunday.
Describing the situation in that part of Kosovo-Metohija, the daily said "a blockade is too strong a word for several trucks and tractors left on the northern section towards Malisevo and three wood beams on the eastern section of the road towards Suva Reka."
Parol said that the Dutch, upon arrival in the region, opened in the center of Orahovac an " office for complaints" where everyone can denounce a perpetrator of war crimes. That is how nine Serbs were arrested, on the basis of oral statements, including the former mayor and a local physician, which, Parol considered, has encouraged the local population to resist the entry of Russian troops.
ALBANIAN FOREIGN MINISTER ENDS ILLEGAL VISIT TO KOSOVO-METOHIJA
Albanian Foreign Minister Paskal Milo ended Sunday his two-day illegal visit to Serbia's Kosovo-Metohija province, during which he met the head of the UN civilian mission Bernard Kouchner in Pristina.
Albanian Prime Minister Pandeli Majko had also visited Kosovo-Metohija two months ago.
Milo is the first Albanian foreign minister to come to Kosovo-Metohija in 50 years.
His visit constitutes both a support to ethnic Albanian terrorists in the province and a glaring violation of Yugoslavia's sovereignty.
Milo's appeal to ethnic Albanian terrorists to halt violence demonstrates the hypocrisy of Tirana, which has largely fanned ethnic Albanian terrorism in the province.
Over 200,000 Serbs and other non-ethnic Albanians have been expelled from Kosovo-Metohija in the past weeks.
KFOR ADMITS ETHNIC ALBANIAN TERRORIST KLA NOT DISARMED
It is a fact that NATO, spearheaded by the United States, and the entire west are in connivance with ethnic Albanian terrorists, Chinese papers said in reports about the situation in Serbia's Kosovo and Metohija province, which also specified that the local international force KFOR had admitted for the first time on Sunday that the ethnic Albanian terrorist Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) has not been completely disarmed.
In a report about a rally of ethnic Albanian terrorists in the village Gornje Obrinje on Saturday, the Chinese news agency Xinhua said KFOR had condemned the outlawed KLA for violating the demilitarization agreement and continuing terrorist activities.
The prominent Chinese daily Guangming Ribao said ethnic Albanian terrorists had murdered many Serbs since KFOR's arrival in Kosovo and Metohija, which has caused protests and criticisms from the international community, but without any results.
Many international experts repeatedly warn that ethnic Albanian extremists will continue to be aggressive unless they are placed under control, Guangming Ribao said in its report entitled "Terrorists are not afraid because they enjoy support."
TERRORISTS IN KOSOVO STILL CARRY ARMS, WEAR UNIFORMS
Militant separatists in Serbia's Kosovo and Metohija province continue to violate the agreement banning arms and uniforms of the Kosovo Liberation Army, the Italian news agency ANSA said on Monday.
The agency said representatives of international peace forces in Kosovo and Metohija (KFOR) are directly accusing the ethnic Albanian extremists of violating the demilitarization agreement.
ANSA said the public warning by KFOR to militant separatists was a result of an incident which took place last weekend in Gornje Obrinje, some 50 km west of Pristina, where 15 people present at a memorial service wore KLA uniforms and packed pistols.
The incident is a blatant violation of the agreement on disarming, ANSA said quoting a KFOR statement. International forces will no longer tolerate such actions, and an investigation will be opened regarding the incident in Gornje Obrinje, and adequate measures will be taken, ANSA said.
INDEPENDENCE OF KOSOVO RULED OUT
Serbian national council president for Kosovska Mitrovica district Vuko Antonijevic told Tanjug Friday that UNMIK chief Bernard Kouchner and KFOR commander Klaus Reinhardt, in talks with a council delegation in Pristina, underlined that "there can be no talk of an independent Kosovo."
They promised that KFOR and UNMIK will undertake everything, as they said, "to reduce the number of attacks on Serbs by Albanians in the southern Serbian province and to create conditions for the return of Serbs expelled from Kosovo-Metohija," Antonijevic said following talks with Kouchner and Reinhardt, also attended by the chief administrator of the district, Martin Garrod.
Kouchner and Rainhardt gave assurances to the Serbian representatives that the Kosovo Protection Corps is not a military formation, but that it had the character of a humanitarian organization, Antonijevic said.
RUSSIAN, GERMAN FOREIGN MINISTERS DISCUSS KOSOVO-METOHIJA
The failure to implement the Security Council resolution on Serbia's Kosovo-Metohija province could undermine stability in the Balkans and security throughout Europe, Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov told a press conference he gave jointly in St. Petersburg with his German counterpart Joschka Fischer after their two-day talks in Moscow.
Ivanov said he had expressed Russia's concern over the evident tendency towards Kosovo-Metohija's secession from Yugoslavia. Ivanov said he and Fischer had discussed the situation around Kosovo-Metohija in detail, but did not elaborate.
Observers in Moscow note that Ivanov and Fischer obviously did not reach agreement on many issues, including Kosovo-Metohija, since Ivanov has described the talks only as satisfactory, which means that there were considerable differences.
Ivanov said the talks had focused on the preparations for the OSCE summit next month in Istanbul, which is expected to adopt a charter on European security and an agreement on conventional armaments in Europe.
Ivanov and Fischer also discussed a reform of the UN and the strengthening of its role in preventing and resolving conflicts. The two ministers plan to meet once again this year in Berlin and a Russian-German summit is planned for next March in Germany.
SEVERAL TENS THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE HAVE LEFT KOSOVO AND METOHIJA, MCNAMARA
Special UNHCR envoy for the former Yugoslavia, Dennis McNamara, said in Belgrade on Friday that, despite all efforts, several tens of thousands of people have left Kosovo and Metohija in the past month.
McNamara told reporters that the number of incidents had allegedly dropped but that, according to him, it is still "high and unacceptable."
Speaking about the current situation in Kosovo and Metohija, McNamara said that about 800,000 ethnic Albanians had returned to this province, but that a large number of people (non-Albanians) had left this Serb province.
According to him, Yugoslavia has the biggest number of refugees in Europe - 500,000 from Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia and 200,000 displaced from Kosovo and Metohija. McNamara said that UNHCR had called on the international community to direct its attention on the humanitarian situation in Yugoslavia in order to avoid a humanitarian crisis.
McNamara stated that at today's meeting with Federal Minister for Refugees, Displaced Persons and Humanitarian Aid Bratislava Morina, agreed had been the joint registration of refugees and displaced persons in Yugoslavia, as well as additional efforts for the repatriation of refugees from Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina where about 45,000 people have returned so far.
REGISTRATION OF KOSOVO AND METOHIJA'S DPS BEGINS IN MONTENEGRO
The registration of displaced persons from the Yugoslav republic of Serbia's Kosovo and Metohija province began in Montenegro, Yugoslavia's other republic, Monday.
The registration will be carried out in cooperation between relevant services of the Montenegrin Commissioner for Refugees and Displaced Persons and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
About 45,000 displaced persons, mainly Serbs and Montenegrins, are believed to have fled to Montenegro before the terrorising by ethnic Albanian separatists and terrorists because international peacekeeping forces in the province have failed to ensure their safety. During the registration, displaced persons will be issued with so-called family cards while all over 18 will get special identification papers they are to use in future instead of papers through which they have exercised their social and other rights.
NO BARRICADES IN PRISTINA, BUT ETHNIC HATRED ABOUT TO EXPLODE
Bulgarian citizen Valentin Krumov, a member of the UN civilian mission in Serbia's Kosovo and Metohija province, was brutally murdered by Kosovo Albanian terrorists just a step away from the Pristina Theater where U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright this summer celebrated a victory together with ethnic Albanian separatists and terrorists of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army, the highest-circulation Bulgarian daily Trud said on Monday.
There are no barricades in Pristina, but ethnic hatred is about to explode, chief of Bulgarian police within the UN mission, Col. Balo Draganov told Trud.
Col. Draganov warned that the Chancellery of the University of Pristina, the Serbian Radio Television (RTS) building, and some other public objects in Kosovo and Metohija, in particular in Pristina, are targeted by ethnic Albanian terrorists for arson.
This morning's reports by Bulgarian electronic media and news agencies showed that the colonel's words were well founded. Reports said a fire was planted in one of the RTS buildings in downtown Pristina during the night.
WASHINGTON POST SAYS ANNAN, KOUCHNER HAD DISPUTE OVER KOSOVO-METOHIJA
The UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has strongly criticized his envoy and UN civilian mission in Serbia's Kosovo-Metohija province chief Bernard Kouchner for a series of wrong and inappropriate moves.
Describing the dispute between Annan and Kouchner Thursday in Pristina, the Washington Post practically justifies the view that Kouchner had overstepped his mandate and failed to accomplish his chief task of ensuring safety for all in the province.
Annan had said that the introduction of the German mark as official currency in Kosovo-Metohija violated Yugoslavia's sovereignty, and warned Kouchner to slow down and to consult the UN headquarters more in the future.
The US Ambassador at the UN Richard Holbrooke had given completely different instructions to Kouchner earlier, the daily notes.
Annan clearly stated that the Security Council Resolution 1244 stipulated Kosovo-Metohija's autonomy as part of the territory of sovereign Yugoslavia, and that UNMIK's task was defined by that resolution, the daily writes.
Annan's statement that the UN presence in Kosovo-Metohija was not aimed at preparing the ground for the province's independence is a clear warning to ethnic Albanians demanding secession, the paper notes.
KLA ORGANIZES UNREST IN KOSOVO-METOHIJA - GUARDIAN
Ethnic Albanian extremists and their self-styled KLA are the organizers of the Friday troubles in Kosovska Mitrovica, Serbia's Kosovo-Metohija province, the Guardian writes Saturday.
According to an well-orchestrated scenario, ethnic Albanians begin by demonstrating peacefully, then suddenly bring out Albanian flags and start rioting. After a while, KLA "officials" appear on the scene and everything calms down, the daily says.
The Friday incident in Kosvska Mitrovica thus also ended when five members of the KLA, now called the Kosovo Protection Corps, appeared and the troublemakers went home quietly like lambs, the daily writes.
The self-styled KLA wants to ethnically cleanse the northern, Serb, half of Kosovska Mitrovica, the Guardian notes.
INTER-PARLIAMENTARY UNION ENDS CONFERENCE
The Inter-parliamentary Union ended its 102nd conference Friday evening in Berlin by adopting final documents on the promotion of humanitarian law, peaceful coexistence of minorities in states and modifications of the current global economic model.
Yugoslavia's delegation to the conference was headed by the President of the Yugoslav parliament Chamber of the Republics (upper house) Srdja Bozovic.
The IPU has reaffirmed that minorities, in exercising their rights, must express their loyalty to the states in which they live and respect their sovereignty and territorial integrity, the Yugoslav delegation told Tanjug.
As regards international humanitarian law, the IPU urged governments to refrain from biased policies or double standards in determining alleged violations of the law.
Regarding the need for modifying the global economic model, governments were urged to refrain from unilateral measures undermining economic development of other countries.
The Yugoslav delegation participated actively in all working committees and in the general debate on the world political, economic and social situation.
As regards the situation in Yugoslavia, the majority of participants demonstrated a correct attitude, with the exception of representatives of some neighbouring states who preferred false accusations against Yugoslavia, to which the Yugoslav delegation responded with firm arguments.
YUGOSLAVIA'S MATIC SAYS MONTENEGRIN GOVERNMENT FEARS THE TRUTH
Yugoslavia's information secretary said on Friday that Montenegrin inspectors' shutting down of Podgorica's Radio D showed that all talk of democracy, transition or some new processes in that Yugoslav republic were a joke.
Inspectors of the Montenegrin ministry of the economy shut down the transmitters of Radio D without an explanation on Friday.
Speaking for TANJUG, Secretary Goran Matic said that the Montenegrin government, more than any other, strives that no other voice and no other truth but its own should be heard.
Montenegro's information system should be brought in line with the liberties in Yugoslav society and should simply shed all administrative and police fetters and stop its repression of those who think differently while legally pursuing their jobs of providing information, Matic said.
Although Radio D had broadcast legally after being granted frequencies in a regular procedure, it had operated for barely a few days before being shut down, he said.
"Evidently, the government in Montenegro has a terror of the truth and therefore uses undemocratic methods, repression, methods which do not belong in a society which aspires to be considered as liberal, democratic, in transition or reform, as they are wont to say of themselves," he said.
"I hope that the true democratic forces in Montenegro, led primarily by the Socialist People's Party (SNP) and others, will succeed in implementing the concept of free information," he added.
The SNP, the chief opposition party in Montenegro, is headed by Yugoslav Prime Minister Momir Bulatovic, in whose cabinet Matic is secretary for information.
Matic further said he had for some time been expressing concern about efforts to disrupt Yugoslavia's single information space and about Montenegro's efforts to retain only one kind of media - that which is uncritical and which, contrary to the rules of objective and professional information, supports only the government of the Democratic Party of Socialists, against Yugoslavia's best interests based on a normal flow of information of interest to all citizens of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
CRITICISM OF ANTI-YUGOSLAV SANCTIONS
The European committee for the creation of an international tribunal on the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia, set up by the Berlin-based Society for the Protection of Human and Civil Rights, issued a statement Sunday strongly criticizing the punishing of the people of Yugoslavia and underlining it was contrary to international law.
The European Union leaders are maintaining the anti-Yugoslav sanctions, which were even intensified last May by a ban on the delivery of goods, services or technologies for alleviating the effects of last spring's air strikes in which EU member-states had taken part, the statement says.
This policy is in line with the US plans to proclaim Yugoslavia, excluding Montenegro and Serbia's Kosovo-Metohija province, a "terrorist state", which means the imposition of far-reaching sanctions such as are being exercised against Iraq and Libya, the statement says.
This is clearly a plan for eliminating the defiant Yugoslavia as a political factor through punishing an entire people in a lasting and unlimited manner, the statement says.
The committee notes with indignation that NATO and the EU are using sanctions to do everything they can to deepen the already great suffering of the people of Yugoslavia caused by NATO's terrorist assaults, and to pursue the war against that people with cold and hunger instead of missiles.
The committee demands an immediate lifting of the sanctions, which constitute a violation of international law, the halting of the EU and NATO policy of pressure and an immediate delivery of aid to the victims of aggression.
SERBIA, RUSSIA SIGN ACCORD ON COOPERATION IN SCIENCE
Officials of the ministries of science and technology of Russia and the Yugoslav republic of Serbia have signed an accord on scientific-technical cooperation, a Russian ministry official said on Friday.
The accord envisages for cooperation in fundamental and natural sciences, primarily medicine, said Anatoly Lebedev, deputy head of the ministry's department for international scientific and technical cooperation.
Speaking at a round-table debate at the Russian cultural centre in Belgrade, Lebedev said that subjects and projects were to be defined for future Yugoslav-Russian scientific cooperation.
According to Lebedev, the Russian ministry was set up 50 years ago as a state committee for the utilisation of new technologies, and its job today is to safeguard, promote and apply scientific achievements.
He went on to say that the Russian ministry cooperates with more than 50 states and organisations, notably with Southeast Asian countries and Belarus.
SLOVAKIA WANTS TO COOPERATE WITH YUGOSLAVIA IN SPHERE OF METAL INDUSTRY
A delegation of representatives of Slovakia's foundries and forge departments proposed in a meeting at the Yugoslav Chamber of Commerce on Monday forms of cooperation in the production and marketing of goods and trade with Yugoslav partners.
President of the Chamber's grouping of foundries Nikola Sojic said that Yugoslav foundries required considerable quantities of raw materials produced in Slovakia, saying that Yugoslav partners could pay for raw materials through barter deals.
Vladimir Balin, head of the delegation and president of the 45-member association of Slovakia's foundries and forge departments, said that Slovak foundries and forge departments had extra production capacities and, consequently, wanted to diversify commercial and other forms of cooperation with new partners, those in Yugoslavia included.
Also attending the meeting were directors of the Yugoslav foundries in Surdulica, Backa Palanka, Mladenovac and other towns and representatives of the Zastava foundry of Kragujevac.
OPENING OF 36TH BELGRADE INTERNATIONAL MEETING OF AUTHORS
The 36th Belgrade International Meeting of Authors opened on Friday at the National Library of Serbia in Belgrade.
This event will be attended by some 50 guests from 22 countries and numerous authors from Serbia, Montenegro and Republika Srpska.
Serbian Culture Minister Zeljko Simic expressed satisfaction that this important event will take place in the current difficult circumstances for our people. Simic said that the end of the century was marked by an evil which authors at the start of this century could not have predicted.
Simic spoke about all the horrors of this century such as the gulags, concentration camps and other totalitarian abominations, and said that authors should faithfully record their times and also rise their voice against the evil.
He warned that one should not doubt the power of the written word, which should inform the world that modern civilization is in a crisis.
Simic said he believed that literature, and the overall human spirit, would overcome all cataclysms.
WORLD WRITERS SHOW SOLIDARITY WITH YUGOSLAVS
In defending Yugoslavia's right to decide about its own fate, we believe we are defending freedom in Europe and in the world, we call upon the citizen of NATO member states countries to manifest their opposition to the criminal policies of their governments with respect to Yugoslavia and in particular we ask them to support the indictment of all those responsible for war crimes committed in Yugoslavia, said the Declaration, adopted Sunday at the closing plenary session of the 36th International Writers' Meeting in Belgrade.
The text of the Declaration, submitted at the round table in English by Briton Richard Burns and a guest from Greece, Ioannis Mavros, also said that NATO's one-sided war against Yugoslavia continues to be waged by other means, in the first place by the ethnic cleansing of Serbs in Kosovo, economic sanctions which severely violate human rights, and by using humanitarian and economic aid as a weapon for openly undermining a sovereign state.
World writers condemn the conditioning of any large-scale aid to Yugoslavia by the overthrow of the government, that local authorities are actively encouraged to distance themselves from Belgrade, and that Montenegro is enticed to secede from the federation.
At the closing plenary session of the Meeting, declarations were submitted from round tables in Serbian, English, French and in Russian.