KOSOVO: Deja vue!


>Is history going to repeat itself?  This is how it started in Kosovo,
>with KLA attacks against Serbian Security police forces.  When Serbs responded
>to the provocations, they were condemned by the West, yet the US government
>wouldn't tolerate police being attacked in this country. 
>
>Why should the Serbs? 
>
>As the KLA see "independence" slipping through their fingers, it's not
>just the Serbs who are going to be the targets.  Where once they thought of
>KFOR as their liberators, they will look upon them as their oppressors.
>
>Stella
>-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>AP International
>
>                 New Yugoslav Leadership Tested
>
>                 by ALEKSANDAR VASOVIC
>                 Associated Press Writer
>
>                 LUCANE, Yugoslavia (AP) -- Lying on
>                 his belly in the brush, the Serbian police
>                 officer gazed through his binoculars and
>                 pointed at the ethnic Albanian militant on
>                 the opposite hill. He knew the position
>                 well -- it used to be his.
>
>                 Just days after ethnic Albanians seized
>                 Serb police positions in the border region
>                 on the edge of Kosovo, the combatants
>                 have dug in to wait for the situation to be
>                 resolved. Yugoslavia's new leadership
>                 gave NATO peacekeepers a 72-hour
>                 deadline Friday to end an ethnic Albanian
>                 offensive in the buffer zone between the
>                 province and the rest of Serbia.
>
>                 If NATO doesn't act, the Serbs say they
>                 will move in on their own.
>
>                 ''Look at them! Look at them!'' said the
>                 officer who would only give his first
>                 name, Milan, as he watched the insurgents
>                 facing him. ''Now they are around the
>                 outpost. They are walking freely.''
>
>                 So close that they can watch each other's
>                 every move, this fragile front line offers a
>                 test to new President Vojislav Kostunica
>                 and to NATO peacekeepers on the other
>                 side of the boundary line.
>
>                 Under pressure at home to act against the
>                 insurgents, Kostunica is unlikely to
>                 simply stand by while they seize any
>                 ground in Serbia, Yugoslavia's dominant
>                 republic.
>
>                 If he acts too aggressively, however, he'll
>                 risk being compared to ousted President
>                 Slobodan Milosevic, whose belligerent
>                 policies forced Yugoslavia into wars and
>                 a pariah status it has only in recent weeks
>                 begun to shed.
>
>                 A Serb interior minister, Bozo Prelevic,
>                 said that in case NATO fails to prevent
>                 the ethnic Albanian incursions and force
>                 the militants back into Kosovo, Serb
>                 police ''will return to the territory of the
>                 republic of Serbia (in the buffer zone)
>                 with the means that are available.''
>
>                 Prelevic said the countdown starts Friday
>                 at 7.00 p.m. local time, meaning the
>                 deadline would expire Monday.
>
>                 ''We will not fool around,'' Prelevic said.
>                 ''They (NATO) are either incapable or
>                 they will show us the contrary.''
>
>                 The ethnic Albanians, however, have
>                 apparently decided that the moment to act
>                 is now in their goal to win independence
>                 from Serbia. They want to unite the
>                 predominantly ethnic Albanian Presevo
>                 Valley with Kosovo.
>
>                 Still, many Kosovo Albanians have mixed
>                 feelings about the events occurring just
>                 outside their administrative boundaries.
>
>                 Though their political parties sympathize
>                 with the demands by ethnic Albanians
>                 there for greater freedoms, they have been
>                 very careful of the issue of unification.
>                 The political leaders are fearful they
>                 might jeopardize their own dreams of
>                 independence.
>
>                 Even so, the Albanian community has
>                 long discussed the idea of uniting all the
>                 lands where Albanians live, and the
>                 spilling of blood may re-ignite the
>                 nationalistic sentiments.
>
>                 In the middle of all the tensions are tiny
>                 villages like Lucane, 220 miles from
>                 Belgrade.
>
>                 An ethnic Albanian village of about 1,000
>                 people tucked into a little valley,
>                 everyone in Lucane but the elderly have
>                 fled to neighboring villages. Fearing
>                 sniper fire, the elderly are holed up in
>                 their houses, which already bear the
>                 marks of gunfire.
>
>                 ''I remained here to guard the house,'' said
>                 Xavit Bislimi, 77, a local resident. ''The
>                 police didn't harm me or my livestock, but
>                 I am afraid of those armed people on the
>                 hills because they are shooting on the
>                 village every night, during last few days.''
>
>                 Evidence of gunfire is apparent near the
>                 police checkpoints. In the cellar of a
>                 house near the road being used by the
>                 officers, spent casings littered the ground.
>                 The police said that was from that the last
>                 day alone, stemming from attacks
>                 Thursday night and before dawn Friday.
>
>                 No one was injured Friday, but four
>                 police officers have died in the last week
>                 in attacks that gave the rebels control of a
>                 police checkpoint and the main road
>                 leading to Kosovo.
>
>                 Sporadic sniper fire continues, but for the
>                 moment the police have orders not to
>                 respond unless directly attacked.
>
>                 ''We are waiting for political approval
>                 from our state leadership and the
>                 international community,'' said Milan, the
>                 police officer, ''to take care of insurgents
>                 within Serbian territory.''
>

26/11/2000