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Pastimes : Kosovo -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MNI who wrote (14886)	10/11/1999 1:41:00 PM
From: George Papadopoulos	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 17770

>Once in the play-offs, prospects would have been bleak for Russia nonetheless: with England, Scotland, Turkey, Ireland, Denmark - this is a collection of European top-teams I would not call Turkey, Ireland, and surprising Israel top European teams...the Russians had a very good chance to qualify...Remember, the Russians have a very good team, it's just the goalie who screwed up with a horrendous mistake...it also seemed to me a very suspicious "error" but we'll let the conspiracy theories pass, Russians sure don't need anymore of them<g> Now back to the main topic...Milo rebuilding at missile speed without anyone's help Serbia Rebuilding At Missile Speed-Milosevic By Dragan Stankovic LESKOVAC, Serbia (Reuters) - President Slobodan Milosevic launched a public relations offensive Monday, denouncing his domestic foes as ``bootlickers' and saying Serbia was recovering from NATO's air strikes at the speed of the missiles which destroyed it. Addressing a cheering crowd, a confident-looking Milosevic also accused the international community of ``genocide' of Serbs and other non-Albanians in Kosovo and his political opponents of trying to come to power by provoking civil war. ``If the citizens think that, despite all the misfortune we have undergone, there are people who can secure a better life for the majority faster, let the people vote for them at the next elections,' said the reclusive president, making a second appearance in two weeks which encouraged talk of an early poll. ``The citizens should not be fooled that the country's renewal and development can be undertaken by those who, allegedly in the name of progress, drag along the streets of our towns in the evenings,' he said, referring to daily protests against him launched by opposition parties three weeks ago. ``These are mainly cowards and bootlickers...they are threatening to destroy what we have defended from NATO and rebuilt after NATO destroyed it. The only thing they want is to push the country into a civil war.' Milosevic Fights Back Against Protests Milosevic was speaking to a specially assembled crowd in the small southeastern town of Leskovac, where he opened a newly built railway station. He earlier Monday reopened a highway 90 km (55 miles) south of Belgrade damaged in the air strikes. Two weeks ago, the president, who normally stays firmly behind the scenes, reopened an oil refinery in the northern town of Pancevo damaged by the air strikes, which were launched over his repression of Kosovo's Albanian majority. ``Small and wounded Serbia is rebuilding at the pace of the missiles which destroyed it...' Milosevic said in Leskovac. Zoran Djindjic, leader of the opposition Democratic Party, said Milosevic's appearances looked like a response to the protests, possibly with elections in mind, although he did not comment on whether Milosevic might call an early poll. Local and Yugoslav-wide federal elections are due next year, while Serbian elections are not due until 2001, when a parliamentary vote for a new Yugoslav president also falls due. ``It's probably some kind of pre-election campaign or an attempt to return the pendulum to the other side because three months after the bombing we have managed to make the main topic not the bombing but his resignation,' Djindjic told Reuters. ``Everything he did during the war was an election campaign without elections and after the war he tried to impose a political discourse in which the question of his responsibility cannot be posed,' he added. Appearances Aimed At Winning Hearts And Minds Milosevic's previous foray into public life took place in June, soon after he agreed to withdraw all Yugoslav forces from Kosovo and allow in NATO-led peacekeepers after almost three months of NATO bombing begun over his rejection of the troops. The withdrawal led to an exodus of Kosovo Serbs, who feared reprisals, and helped spark protests across Serbia by citizens fed up with declining living standards after almost a decade of conflicts and international sanctions. Monday Milosevic acknowledged the hardships and pledged to review the work of his officials, saying there was ``a lot of negligence.' ``Life in Serbia is difficult but you do not need CNN or Deutsche Welle (German radio) to tell you. I, your president, am telling you,' Milosevic told more than 10,000 people in Leskovac, some bused in from nearby villages and others allowed off work or school. ``This is because we are conducting this successful and swift reconstruction without any help from abroad, so how can standards of living be high?' he added. Milosevic earlier toured a bridge he said was the fifth to be rebuilt since the air strikes ended and told another cheering crowd Serbia was a bridge to the whole Balkans region. The West has isolated Serbia since 1992 for its role in the conflicts which have torn up former Yugoslavia and says it will get no reconstruction aid while Milosevic, indicted by a U.N. tribunal for alleged war crimes in Kosovo, remains in power.

To: MNI who wrote (14886)	10/11/1999 2:03:00 PM
From: MNI	Respond to of 17770

PS: Concerning Joan's concerns, I seem to remember that I have posted some time in July or August the British numbers, as published by BBC (also somehow 'official') on Serb military losses. Here, the numbers were very similar to George's and John's. Sadly we have to acknowledge that NATO succeeded much better in bombing civilians (and civilian infrastructure) than soldiers (and military equipment). It seems that fighting individual tanks with high-precision bombs out of heights like several tens of thousands of feet is not a very efficient tactical choice. Also it may well be that a tank is cheaper than the bomb ... but that would only be interesting, if two comparable powers were facing each other.