Posted on 03/27/2011 5:12:54 AM PDT by kronos77
March 27, 2011 Kosovo's Prime Minister Hashim Thaci sees echoes of his country's own history in the unfolding events in Libya. In an exclusive interview with RFE/RL's Balkan Service correspondent Albana Isufi, Thaci likens NATO's involvement in Libya to its 1999 bombing of Serbia.
RFE/RL: Mr. Prime Minister, 12 years ago, freedom was the most important thing for Kosovo. Today, Kosovo is free, but what are its challenges?
Hashim Thaci: Today, Kosovo is a free, independent, and sovereign state, proud of its powerful, legitimate, democratic, and multiethnic institutions. With a certain Euro-Atlantic perspective it wants to be part of NATO and of the European Union in the near future. Its aims are development and improving social welfare. It has been recognized by 75 world states. And it is a member of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. It is a country of ethnic, civil, and political tolerance, willing to promote close cooperation with all the countries in the region. It aims to promote good neighborly relations between the Republic of Kosovo and Serbia. There will be reciprocal recognition between these two states, but not in the immediate future, in order to bring to an end to all the conflicts that for a century have plagued our region. So, let integration be open to individual states one by one, so that the entire region absorbs into NATO and the EU.
RFE/RL: The NATO intervention in Kosovo has been brought up again after the intervention in Libya. Like then, there is now a debate over whether the decision to intervene in Kosovo at that time and in Libya now was right. What would you say to these skeptics and to the people of Libya?
(Excerpt) Read more at rferl.org ...
I’m sure Bork Obunga will be happy to hear there’s at least one other person in the world who understands the righteousness of his actions...
It seems to me that in both cases the intervention strengthens radical Islam and no one else.
Ding,ding,ding!!
No more calls. please. We have a winner!
Since 1991, every military adventure has been on behalf of Islam.
Why?
What a crock, both of them were wrong.
You forgot the invasion of Haiti.
That helped the Colombian drug dealers get their dope up through Cuba and into South Florida.
Billy Clinton liked his blow.
They do not seem to care. Thanks Hilary.
In 1999, my country Norway and the NATO alliance went to war against Yugoslavia, and in January 2000 the Norwegian government sent me to Kosovo as an army major to represent KFOR as a press officer.
Of course there were reasons for the NATO bombing, but I do not know one single country that would accept the Rambouillet Agreement. However, I cannot take responsibility for the bombing because I was not a part of NATO at that time.
Our job in KFOR, according to the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244 and the Military Technical Agreement was to protect Serbs and non-Albanians from repercussions from the Albanians, but we failed, we failed miserably. Under our watch, 250,000 Serbs and non-Albanians were ethnically cleansed from Kosovo. Of course I do not defend the ethnic cleansing of 800,000 Albanians during the NATO bombing, but the Yugoslav government, not NATO, was responsible for this.
In my view, we made two main errors in KFOR:
1. We should have enforced martial law from the first day we came to Kosovo on June 12. Then there would be no question that we were in charge. Anyone out after dark would be arrested and put in a camp with barbed wire around for a week or two, regardless if it was a Serb, Albanian or something else. We were too concerned about playing the role as liberators for the Albanians.
2. We were too cowardly when we allowed the Kosovo Liberation Army (UÇK) to transform into the Kosovo Protection Corps and later Kosovo Police Service in Аugust 1999. Thus, the criminal elements from UÇK were legitimized into the governing structures in Kosovo. The Serbian government has outlined this very well in the Whitepaper on organized crime and terrorism in Kosovo and Metohija. Among officers in KFOR, there were many who didn’t like this, but we made this choice to protect our own forces from attack from the Albanian extremists. Before I went to Kosovo, I quit my job to study the conditions in Kosovo, and I was therefore prepared for an area where Albanian organized crime was rampant. Still, I was not prepared for the realities on the ground, and while I was working in KFOR, I was not aware that we did not do our job.
However, for a long time I have felt a sense of collective responsibility for not being able to protect Kosovo’s minorities. In September 2010, Norway sent back 70 Kosovo Serb refugees who had applied for political asylum. Norway recognized Kosovo as a separate state in 2008, and now I am ashamed that the Norwegian government is sending the Kosovo Serbs back to Belgrade. We created the refugee problem, and this is how we are dealing with it.
After I met Kosovo refugees in the refugee camp in Resnik close to Rakovica, Belgrade as a journalist, I also got a strong personal reaction. I am not talking about post-traumatic stress disorder, but I felt a sense of personal responsibility, and I cried. But my personal reaction can also be used for something good. I hope to raise a debate in Norway and other NATO countries about the heavy moral responsibility of going to war. Can I change something? I don’t know, but I will try.
As a former NATO officer, I would like to offer my apology to the Serbian people for not being able to protect the minorities in Kosovo.
Kristian Kahrs is a Norwegian journalist and business adviser, living and working in Belgrade, and he was serving in KFOR from January to July 2000.
From wiki....I hope these 76 change their minds and recognize their mistake
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