Prof. Michel Choussuodovsky, Boba Borojevic, Maj-Gen Lewis MacKenize

After giving a brief historic overview on dismemberment of the former Yugoslavia, Maj-Gen Lewis MacKenzie explained the circumstances that led to the so-called “Rambouillet Agreement” and its two clauses that “the drafters – read Madline Alblight - knew Milosevic could never accept: 1) NATO would have total freedom of movement within Yugoslavia and 2) the will of the people of Kosovo could well be the determining factor on the future of Kosovo in three years.” He briefly explained the situation on the ground that led to the Racak “massacre” and the subsequent bombing of Serbia in 1999. MacKenzie echoed his government’s standpoint that there were “substantial negotiations” between Serbs and Albanians before the unilateral declaration of independence by Albanians, although he would question the substantive quality of these “negotiations” and some of the criteria like self-supporting economy. MacKenzie noticed that a very intensive and successful PR campaign by Albanians against Serbia was a determining factor in the realization of the Albanians’ goal.
 
“The Bosniaks success in convincing the West to take up their side was not lost on the terrorist organization (Kosovo Liberation Army - KLA) branded so by the CIA. No one can accuse the Serbs of treating the Kosovo Albanians with kid gloves. Over the decades following World War II,” MacKenzie stated, “Serbs restricted Albanians in getting top jobs in the civil service and universities. These restrictions were ill founded but not brutal. But, the KLA correctly anticipated that if they commenced a campaign of killing Serbian security forces the central government in Belgrade would overreact. Because, this is what governments do. And they were right”, MacKenize added.
 
So, it was not the pass or fail of the qualifying criteria for the UDI that bothered him, but the way that “Kosovars orchestrated their independence” which raises issues about its legitimacy. MacKenzie noted that Canadians should find outrageous the fact that in spite of the UN Resolution 1244 that granted “substantial autonomy” to Kosovo within the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia , tens of thousands of Serbs were expelled, or ethnically cleansed in spite of the presence of NATO peacekeepers. Equally outrageous was the appointment and election of Kosovo [Albanian] leaders. “In 2006 Agim Cheku was appointed Prime Minister” of Kosovo, said MacKenzie and reminded the audience of Cheku’s participation in Croatian army war atrocities in the Medak Pocket “massacre”. Cheku “was also the commanding general during Operation Storm, a US inspired ground offensive down to the Krajina and into Bosnia”, MacKenzie explained.  He also noted that the current Prime Minister Hashim Thachi, “according to open reports has occasionally bragged about orchestrating the Racak massacre.” If the nation is to be judged by the quality of its leaders Kosovo has got a rough future, said General MacKenzie. In sprite of high expectation following the UDI the majority of countries did not rush to recognize Kosovo. “Forty out of 192 countries of the UN have done so”, said MacKenzie, “the leaders of majority of the world’s population have not – Russia , China , India , and Indonesia- the world’s largest Muslim country but Canada unfortunately, did.” It is not easy to find the exact reason for Canada ’s recognition of Kosovo. “Someone has suggested that Canada did so as quid-pro-quo for Americans reinforcing Canada in Southern Afghanistan , although I don’t believe that this is the reason. Perhaps to not recognize the UDI would be to acknowledge that the bombing campaign was a mistake – which it was”, said MacKenzie.

As the result of the brilliant PR campaign, Kosovo of today is “a statelet with a foreign presence, drugs and prostitution as the only sources of income led by individuals directly responsible for war crimes,” concluded Maj-Gen Lewis MacKenize.

H.E. James Bissett was Canadian Ambassador to Yugoslavia from 1990 to 1992. He eye witnessed first hand the Yugoslav tragedy to which he attribute much of the blame on western diplomatic blundering and deliberate scheming. Bissett was very critical of the failure of western democratic countries and later the US, to try and resolve the problem of the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia without violence and bloodshed. Their intervention in 1991 “prolonged the violence that took place in the Balkans and added to and intensified the bloodshed.” He said that the policies and actions of the US led NATO powers in dealing with the former Yugoslavia have been marked by “duplicity, double standards, mismanagement and by cowardness”.  Bissett discussed four of the most serious mistakes made by these powers in dealing with the former Yugoslavia:

1) Premature recognition of Slovenia and Croatia following German demands; 2) The recognition of Izetbegovic’s declaration of independence of Bosnia and the violation by the USA of the arms embargo and by allowing the entry into Bosnia of thousands of Mujihadeen fighters; 3) The illegal bombing of Serbia in March of 1999 and 4) The illegal recognition of UDI by the US and some NATO countries.
 
The Resolution 1244 of the UN that ended the bombing set out, in Bissett’s opinion “parameters for a very reasonable settlement, whereby all of the people of Kosovo had an opportunity of living together in peace and under a democratic government with full rights given to the minorities and return of refugees to Kosovo. The KLA and all other armed groups were to be disarmed and Serbian Holy places were to be guarded by the return to Kosovo of a limited number of Serbian security forces who would also patrol the borders. 1244 also reaffirmed Serbia’s sovereignty over Kosovo. Tragically, none of the provisions of the UN SC 1244 has been implemented and obviously, there was never an intention of doing so,” said Bissett.

In concluding, Bissett, stressed that accepting the independence of Kosovo violated the UN Charter on territorial integrity of a sovereign state and the Helsinki Accords that not only reinforce the principles of the UN Charter but also specify that borders cannot be changed  .It was an illegal act and contrary to international law. He expressed the view that it is unlikely that Kosovo will ever be admitted to the UN since only about 40 of the 192 nations of the UN have accepted its independence. “The bombing of Serbia by the NATO powers in March 1999 without UN approval was an historic turning point,” said Bissett.  He explained that: “Article 1 of NATO Treaty states very clearly that NATO will never, under any circumstances use force or even threatened to use force in the resolution of international disputes and that NATO would always operate in accordance with the principles of the UN Charter. This set a dreadful precedent and threatens the very foundation of peace and security in the nuclear age. It was during the bombing of Serbia in April 1999, on the 50th anniversary of NATO that the American president Bill Clinton announced a new role for NATO. From that date on NATO will have the power to intervene wherever and whenever it decides to do so.”

Bissett, who argues against the illegal recognition of Kosovo doesn’t believe that “the last charter has been written” and hopes that the problem of Kosovo can be resolved in a “much more satisfactory” way.

Scott Taylor tried to put a personal face on the Balkan issue during his presentation by showing slides and telling what he saw in Kosovo during his visits. His eye witness reports of atrocities committed in the name of "humanity" were published in his books that deal with the Kosovo issue: "Inat" and "Diary of an Uncivil war". His first experience with the Balkans started in Croatia in 1992 while reporting about Canadian soldiers involved in peacekeeping operations there. Taylor argued strongly against the NATO bombing of Serbia in 1999, which made him go to Belgrade and spend  28 days there during the NATO campaign. He was critical of reporters, "some 1200 of them" who came to Kosovo immediately after the NATO bombing with only one purpose - to see "the destruction of Serbian army there, the rape camps and mass graves". "In their unsuccessful effort to locate that, they were manufacturing stories" such as the story of Serbs setting the main mosque on fire in Pristina, said Taylor. "Myself and the Swedish guy walk up the hill and saw that mosque was not on fire. The former Serbian brigade headquarter was and Albanians were setting it on fire." Taylor spoke about atrocities committed by Albanians against the Serbs in Kosovo which went unreported and about Albanian intolerance, daily provocations and destructions of Serbian cemeteries, houses and cultural heritage by Albanians. He showed the pictures of banners of former KLA leaders, turned statesmen publicly displayed to intimidate the remaining Serbs in Kosovo. In spite of this, Serbs are determined not to give in. "Serbs in Mitrovica in particular still protest daily against the UDI and are still defiant. Showdown between [Serbs and Albanians] are expected. What happens in Mitrovica is going to determine what happens in the rest of Kosovo," concluded Taylor.
 
Speaking against the UDI in Kosovo, Prof. Sunil Ram pointed out the fact that Kosovo is in danger of becoming not only “a new jihadist,” entity but also the major heroin and drug hub of Europe.  According to him:“Jihadist movements have been able to operate with a certain level of impunity in this region given where the money is coming from and the political groups involved. What we have today is “a circle of money, violence and politics that feeds the region of Kosovo, a region run by the very criminals who were put in power by the international community. What we see essentially in Kosovo is a new jihadist stronghold in Europe ,” said Ram. “The problem is that the western media are ignorant [of the Balkans] as is western academia who never challenge the reality, because they are [more] worried about their tenure than the truth. The same can be said for the majority of western politicians who have their own interests in simply towing the line. The price for this ignorance has been paid by the Serbian people and Serbia ,” Ram had said.
While Prof. Ram had debated the issue of the criminalization of the state, Prof. Michel Choussuodovsky spoke of well documented plans and processes implemented to destabilize and destroy the Yugoslav Federation as a nation. "The process of destabilization of Yugoslavia started in the early 80s," said Choussuodovsky.
 
"It was on two levels. One was the process of economic destabilization, which was implemented under IMF World Bank auspices. In the late 80's it was conducive to the establishment, what the World Bank called the bankruptcy program, which was essentially to trigger the bankruptcy of the whole Yugoslav economy. The process was deliberate and manipulative in order to destroy the basis of institutions and productiveness of the regional economic power, the Yugoslav federation - at that time a multi ethnic and multicultural society", stressed Choussuodovsky.
 
Alongside with the destabilization of the Yugoslav economy, Choussuodovsky discussed the role of the American and Islamic organizations in Kosovo and the Balkans.

 "The same process of financing Islamic Al-Quida insurgences through the CIA by the US since the Soviet Afghan war, was applied first in Bosnia then in Kosovo," he said. The KLA has similar roots. It received training from Al-Quida and from the American mercenary organization called Military Professional Resources INC.
 
 "Wars that characterized Yugoslavia in the course of 1990s were not civil wars. They were US sponsored insurgences with the view to creating divisions coupled with very dramatic and deadly economic reforms which impoverish people, create those divisions and ultimately fracturing the country into a small protectorates," explained Choussuodovsky. According to him "the KLA was supported by the CIA and financed by the drug trade. KLA leaders as well as former and current Prime Ministers of the KLA government in Kosovo, Hasim Tachi and Agim Cheku are on Interpol list as criminals. "Why the so-called International community would want to appoint criminals? He asked and explained that "these criminals are not criminals of last resort. They are the instruments of global capitalism.  Narcotics are a tremendously profitable business, so is prostitution. It is all protected by bona fide financial institutions, the oil companies, military complexes etc." said Choussuodovsky. He criticized those who recognized independent Kosovo and concluded that "we were dealing with a geopolitical dimension and the sheer criminality of the heads of western countries, the UN and NATO in supporting that type of mafia state in Kosovo in violation of international law and of the borders and sovereignty of Serbia."
 
Question and answer period followed the presentations with an active participation of the audience. Mr. Dusan Vujacic, political attaché of the Embassy of Serbia and Rev. Zivorad Subotic of Serbian Orthodox Church Holy Trinity in Montreal were also present.
The forum was well organized and well attended.