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First it came loudly and clearly through the State Department when on May 15 in Moscow, after meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said, "Kosovo will never again be a part of Serbia." Then, in late May, George Bush himself came out in favor of the so-called Ahtisaari Plan for the Serbian province of Kosovo, named after its creator, Martti Ahtisaari, the former president of Finland, by which that province is to gain independence under "international supervision," a view he has now restated at the G-8 Summit of the world's leading industrial states in Germany....

THE HAGUE -- The International Court of Justice today decides on Bosnia’s genocide lawsuit against FRY. The lawsuit, brought against the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) in 1993, claims that FRY was responsible for alleged genocide that took place during the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia. The United Nation’s highest court’s ruling in the case will be presented to the public on February 26, by Judge Rosaline Higgins, on behalf of a panel of 15 judges. Belgrade daily Blic reports today quoting from sources close to the court that Serbia will not be found guilty of having committed genocide against...

BELGRADE: Kosovo Serbs and the influential Serbian Orthodox Church on Tuesday urged the government in Belgrade to reject a UN plan for Kosovo, saying it opens the way for secession of the southern province. The government of Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica immediately convened to adopt a “resolution” that would serve as Serbia’s official response to the recently presented UN plan on Kosovo’s future. The plan by UN envoy Martti Ahtisaari envisages internationally supervised statehood for the disputed territory. The Serbian National Council, which represents some 100,000 Serbs still living in the province amid an overwhelming majority of independence-seeking ethnic Albanians,...

from Christopher Walker, Jerusalem About 40 Israeli volunteers have been fighting alongside the Serbs as a gesture of gratitude for Serb support for Yugoslav Jews against the Nazis in the Second World War. The existence of the Israeli fighters - they do not like the term mercenaries - was revealed by Ron Ben Yishai, an Israeli war correspondent who was injured by Kosovo Liberation Army sniper fire this week while reporting from the province for the Tel Aviv daily Yediot Aharonot. The paper said that all the Israeli fighters had emigrated to the Jewish state from the former Soviet Union...

Kosovo Prime Minister Agim Ceku has warned Kosovo Serbs not to try to break away from the rest of the province out of anger at a draft UN plan that would set it on a path to independence from Serbia. Ceku said no one was fully satisfied with the plan, which falls short of Kosovo Albanian demands for full sovereignty, but any bid by Serbs in the north to split the territory in two would not work. "They have to understand that this is not 1991. They cannot do what the Croatian Serbs did," he told Reuters in an interview....

The United Nations emissary of Finnish and Common Market origins has yesterday reported back. He has in effect made Kosovo an independent state and separated it forever from Serbia. From now on it will be a crime to be a Serb, a Jew, or a Romany in Kosovo. Kosovo will be ruled by a Fascist, Islamist and brutal regime and the future for Muslim Kosovons will be more destitution, more brutality and the complete imprisonment of the mind by the “ideas” of Islamofascism. What a future the US cum EU Empiricists have managed to map out for this once beautiful...

“The independence of Kosovo is a reality, so we demand recognition of Kosovo’s international subjectivity without any delays,” said Agim Ceku, its Prime Minister. The main parties in the elections are opposed to independence for Kosovo, regarded as the cradle of Serb history and culture. Russia, Serbia’s traditional Orthodox Christian ally, has made it clear that it would not support any plan for Kosovo that went against Belgrade’s wishes. “Russia believes it is unacceptable that a decision on the status of Kosovo be imposed from the outside,” said President Putin on Sunday. As a permanent member of the UN Security...

The trial of the former leader of the rebel Serb authorities in Croatia Milan Martic this week heard testimony from a witness who accused the UN of favouring the Croats over the Serbs and claimed that the US and Germany were instrumental in providing Croatian troops with weapons during the bloody Balkan wars. Patrick Bariot, a former UN Protection Force, UNPROFOR, soldier, strongly defended Martic and the Serbs, portraying the Serb population in the self-proclaimed Serbian Autonomous District of Krajina, SAO Krajina, as victims of an aggressive Croatian government and military and an international community that intentionally ignored their pleas...

A decision to make the Serb province independent is near. Will Serbia and Russia obstruct it? THE SERBIAN parliament formally adopted a new national constitution on Wednesday, following its narrow approval by voters in a referendum last month. The document was a necessary replacement of the previous charter, which was adopted during the rule of nationalist warlord Slobodan Milosevic. But it may have won acceptance only because it included a preamble that would have warmed Mr. Milosevic's heart: a declaration that the province of Kosovo, which Serbia in effect lost seven years ago, is an "integral" and "inalienable" part of...

The Belgrade-based Center for Free Elections and Democracy said their sample count after polls closed in the two-day vote indicated the draft charter secured a 51.6 percent of voters' support. Related news Serbia votes to keep breakaway Kosovo Serbian voters narrowly approved a new constitution reasserting Serbia's claim over the breakaway Kosovo province, according to independent observers. The Belgrade-based Center for Free Elections and Democracy said their sample count after polls closed in the two-day vote indicated the draft charter secured a 51.6 percent of voters' support. The group estimated the turnout among Serbia's 6.6 million electorate was 53.5 -...

Summary The United States said it will push for Croatia to be admitted to NATO in 2008. Meanwhile, the United Nations signaled it will delay a decision on independence from Kosovo until after Serbian elections, to allow Belgrade the stability needed to join the European Union. These events, which are part of a move by the West to offer Balkan countries incentives to democratize, highlight problems with encouraging longtime rivals Croatia and Serbia both to join NATO and the European Union. If Croatia joins NATO, it can dictate the terms of any attempt by Serbia to secure membership itself via...

Remember that non-practicing, “nominally” Muslim province over which we bombed Christian children in their beds and dismantled multi-ethnic Yugoslavia? Yeah — Kosovo. Except get used to the trendier, Islamic/Clintonite pronunciation Kosova for when it officially becomes an Islamic state in a few months (with U.S. approval). Because that’s what we sold out our World War II Serbian allies for. And it gave us such a warm, fuzzy feeling to Balkanize the Balkans on behalf of Muslims who only hate us more now — that we’re still too verklemped to talk about it. Here was the schedule for Kosovo’s highly Europeanized,...

But Kosovo -- a Serbian province of 2 million people that experienced a NATO bombing campaign in 1999 -- is on the brink of bursting onto the world stage once again. With the United States and the European Union pressing for resolution of Kosovo's final status this year, it once looked like independence was assured. But now Serbia is trying to put that decision off, which could reawaken Balkan unrest. After seven years of United Nations control, the majority Albanian and Muslim population is clamoring for independence. But the Serbian, largely Christian, minority is campaigning to remain attached to Serbia....

SERBIA remains firmly stuck in the past, paying little attention to the changes taking place all around it. The country has presented a serious challenge to the UN and world community by adopting a new constitution that claims Kosovo as its own. Now Kosovo is currently being administered by the United Nations. The UN was forced to enter Kosovo in the 1990s when the marauding Serb army (then Yugoslavian army) unleashed what has come to be known as the ethnic cleansing against the ethnic Albanian people of Kosovo. Tens of thousands of ethnic Albanians were hunted and killed like animals....

Example of use of appropriate wording (interpretation) : In the following list, there are two different ways to describe the SAME FACT. Note that whatever formula is chosen, it can perfectly be inverted from pro- to anti-, and there is no way to be accused of lying or even distorting the truth. - Serbs are killed, Albanians are massacred or assassinated. - Serbs dig mass graves, Albanians dig tombs or communal graves. - A Serbian soldier with a Kalashnikov is a sniper, a KLA soldier with a Kalashnikov is a freedom fighter. - Serbian corpses have battlefield wounds; Albanian corpses...

BELGRADE, Serbia — Serbia toughened its stand on Kosovo Tuesday as parliament decided that a planned new constitution would refer to the disputed province as an "integral" part of Serbia, regardless of U.N.-led negotiations on whether to grant it independence. The parliamentary vote effectively ruled out Belgrade's consent if the international talks decide in favor of the majority ethnic Albanians who want the province to be independent. The talks began this year to try to resolve the future of Kosovo _ a province about the size of Connecticut that has been run by the United Nations since NATO launched a...

Since World War Two you have had three major conflicts in the Balkans involving Orthodox Christian communities and Islamic communities; this applies to Cyprus, Bosnia and Kosovo respectively. On all three occasions the United States supported the followers of Islam and maybe one day the same will happen to Orthodox Christians in Macedonia? Yet unlike the large Christian communities of Bosnia and Cyprus, it is the land of Kosovo which is being Islamized and Albanianized under NATO, the UN, and other international institutions who are meant to be neutral. The media in the West is once more turning a 'blind...

"The main goal of the symposium is to shed light on how Islam spread in these territories based on undisputed historic facts," professor Morina told IOL. PRISHTINA — The Islamic Community of Kosova (ICK) and the Faculty of Islamic Studies in Prishtina (FIS) will co-organize on September 16-17 an international symposium celebrating 600 years of Islam among Albanians. "The main goal of the symposium is to shed light on how Islam spread in these territories based on undisputed historic facts," professor Qemajl Morina, one of the organizers, told IslamOnline.net. Debates about this issue and the role of Islam among Albanians...

Ahtisaari said that a group of experts will visit Belgrade shortly and he hopes that they in Belgrade will show a positive attitude to these proposals. During the press conference, Ahtisaari dismissed the charges of the Serbian delegation that during his Aug 8 with them he told them that the Serbs are guilty as a nation.” Particularly, Ahtisaari said that the Belgrade authorities should understand that the Milosevic policy (historical legacy) should be taken into consideration during the determination of Kosovo status and that “each nation in the world has its guilt and must pay for it.” The Serbian side...

30 August 2006 | 14:52 | FOCUS News Agency Banja Luka. USA military forces started preparing for their pullout of the Eagle base near Tuzla, Serbian agency TANJUG informs citing Bosnian newspaper Oslobojdenje. The news of the pullout of the American troops has caused concern among Sarajevo political circles. Citing reliable sources the Bosnian newspaper announced the Americans will leave the base by the end of the year as they will be replaced by a Dutch battalion. The chair of the Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Presidency Sulejman Tihic could not confirm definitely the news of the pullout of the US troops...