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

To: Broken_Clock who wrote (3953)	4/15/1999 11:20:00 PM
From: George Papadopoulos	Respond to of 17770

Former Irish Prime Minister criticizes NATO bombing From Irish Echo newspaper (April 7, 1999) DUBLIN-- An immediate aid package of 2 million Irish pounds to those fleeing ethnic cleansing in Kosovo has been authorized by the Irish government. Ireland also plans to give shelter to refugees if the need arises. The move comes as Fine Gael Leader John Bruton strongly criticizes British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook's claim that nobody could have predicted the refugee flood. The former Taoiseach (Prime Minister) said Cook was not telling the truth when he claimed the calamity was a surprise. "They should have known that by bombing, while saying that they would not put in ground troops, they were guaranteeing that there would be this number of refugees", Bruton said. "They were told this advance because I was at a meeting in Berlin in association with the EU summit where the former EU mediator in Bosnia Carl Bildt told us that if the bombing went ahead there would be one million refugees within a forthnight. I have no doubt that the same advice was offered to NATO. "It was therefore highly irresponsible of them not to make provisions for the reception of the refugees", Bruton said. He described the NATO bombardment as an "ill-considered military operation" where the obvious consequences had not been considered in advanced. Bruton propsed a four day truce in the NATO bombing during the Orthodox Easter holiday to allow an internationally appointed mediator such as former Swedish Prime Minister Bildt to seek a negotiated settlement. He suggested that UN ground troops would also go in to assist in keeping the sides apart, allowing the refugees to return and help set aside conflicting claims on the region for a period of 5 to 10 years. Bruton said every effort should be made to get the Kosovo refugees home again in safety and temporary resettlement abroad should only take place if it was ncessary to save lives. The Irish Justice Minister John O'Donoghue said Irish people were deeply conscious of their international and humanitarian obligations regarding refugees, and there was a tradition of taking in refugees when the necessity arose. He would not discuss the numbers that might be taken in but said: "We will not be found wanting in honouring what we view as our obligations. Overall in reaction in Ireland has been one of great horror and everybody recognizes this is an apalling human tragedy. The Irish peopleare anxious to help in whatever way we possibly can, and we are ready, willing, and able to do that." Irish Foreign Minister David Andrews said government departments and local authorities were drawing up contingency plans. Andrews and Minister of State Liz O' Donnell will be meeting with Irish aid agencies to discuss how best the aid will be distributed.

To: Broken_Clock who wrote (3953)	4/15/1999 11:25:00 PM
From: George Papadopoulos	Respond to of 17770

The view from Belgrade news.bbc.co.uk 8340.stm[Older link does not work....sorry I am catching up just finished the final tax season of the century!!!!] Serbs in anti Nato demo outside the Yugoslav Federal Parliament By Mike Williams in Belgrade Time and time again in the last twenty days I have been asked to describe the mood in Belgrade. Time and time again I have given an answer in thirty seconds or so, a summary of the anger, the defiance and the fear. Belgrade though is a city of some two million people, as complex as any living organism with all that that comparison implies - fragility, the will to survive, and the capacity to sustain damage, yet continue to function. Mike Williams: "Belgrade is as complex as any living organism" There is the public face. Popular demonstrations of defiance are held at the nightly concert for the human shields on Belgrade's bridges. And there is the official line. State controlled television reports the names of the latest pilots decorated for valour in defence of Yugoslavia. But the complex of opinions, emotions and propaganda is constructed of individual hopes and fears, loves, hates and ambitions. Perhaps a few case studies illuminate more clearly than journalistic precis. Arkan: Leader of the Tigers "I am going to accuse Bill Clinton and Blair of terrible war crimes with the bombing, the Nato force bombing of Yugoslavia" says the man known in this city and throughout the Balkans as Arkan. His real name is Zeljko Raznjatovic, the leader of The Tigers, a paramilitary group which ran through ethnically-cleansed Bosnia like a fury. Indicted as a war criminal here, he is a folk hero who is feared by almost everyone. A Serb woman waves a scarf with the printed peace symbol He says: "I think that all the people, all nations - Serbs, Albanians, Turks, Gypsies - they're running away from Kosovo because of the bombing, because they've launched so many bombs that, if they launched at London, half of London would be on their knees." Yugoslavia claims that the refugees are lying about the stories of atrocities from Serb security forces. I asked Arkan if he really believed that they all got together and agreed a story before they left, to three different countries. "No" he said, "but I know that the reporters from Albania are doing a very good job, which has been prepared by the CIA." Protesting quietly Just over two years ago, a young Serb woman and her friends joined other student demonstrators to protest on the streets of Belgrade. There was a hope then of democratic reform. Now such protests would be unacceptable. Opposition to the government does exist, but it is voiced quietly. She says that Milosevic is now like God: "Serbs are all together, with the Yugoslav army and of course with President Mr Milosevic. So now you're not able to find anyone to tell you he is a bad guy." A young Belgrader holds up the three-finger Serbian nationalist symbol One Serb man had some hopes for a life from the west, but that has changed: "I am Serb and they are bombing my country and my people. I cannot believe in all the things the western media say about the Serbian army because I know some of the people that are in the army and in the police and I know them as normal people, not insane murderers who do such things." "I don't see any way out" says another Serb man, "because two weeks ago we reached the point of no return. Now it only has to be total destruction or obedience and a pullback from Kosovo, which will never happen. People are getting more and more fed up by the day." They are liberal, well-educated cosmopolitans. But the pressure waves from Nato's bombs are felt by them in a way that perhaps the Alliance had not expected, forcing them to turn away from the western European and American lifestyles they craved, to discover now a Serbian identity. Young people were once thought to be the foundations of some future Yugoslavia, a modern democratic country which would value their opinions. Th eir views may not be popular in the Nato countries, but they are genuinely and widely held: "My country, right or wrong."

To: Broken_Clock who wrote (3953)	4/15/1999 11:51:00 PM
From: D. Long	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 17770

<<Then why didn't our pilots refuse to carpet bomb civilians in Hamburg, for example, during WWII? Because they were brainwashed into believing that the only good German was a dead one. Read George's post and become educated rather than reactionary. A reactionary, such as yourself, is easily "turned" in whatever direction the controlling power finds convenient. You are displaying anger because your logic is flawed and anger is a typical response rather than humility, i.e., admitting one's error in judgement. I will ask you some questions: Upon what do you base your value of right or wrong? Is there ultimate truth?>> Why didnt we just roll over and play dead and hope the German blitzkreig would pass us by? WWII wasnt some limited war like you and I are accustomed to seeing. WWII was total war, Germany and Japan were as nations, one gigantic war machine. Civilians in the industrial heartland were as much a part of that war machine as a munitions factory. The same tactics would be used in any clash between major powers today: total war to destroy a nations ability to both keep fighting and the willingness to do so. That is ugly. But that is how it was. The real question should have been, why didnt US troops engage in slaughter and rape and pillage of civilians in occupied territory, like their Russian comrades did? They were no longer a piece of the German war puzzle. Dont be obtuse. A reactionary? Maybe, if what is meant by reactionary is defending what you believe to be right. What about yourself? You refuse to accept anything that does not contain anti-US rhetoric. Your thinking has thus far failed to show any pattern of consistency except what may be construed to be revisionist, apologist, hogwash. I suppose you believe we should pay reparations for our "crimes" against Germany and Japan? That would certainly fit into your thinking. As to my anger, yes I am angry at your simpleton response to my post when any half-wit could have comprehended the answer to your reply was in the original post which you obviously did not read with your thinking cap on. My flawed logic? You have yet to point out any flaw in my logic. What you have pointed out is your uncanny ability to draw conclusions from unsupporting premises. As to my philosophy, to state it in brief, I paraphrase Kant: "treat others always as ends, and never as mere means." Is there ultimate truth? Depends on what kind of truth you want. Is there objective facts independent of the mind and capable of being discovered through the use of reason? Yes. Is all truth knowable? In all probability, no. Good enough?