Kosova Crisis Center
link to alb-net
- Kosova Benefit Album Featuring Black Sabbath, Rage Against The Machine, Korn, Pearl Jam...
- Smrekovnica Concentration Camp Again Filling with Kosovars (KP)
- Desertions and Disorganization among Serb Troops
- Ongoing Battles along the Lushtė-Vaganicė-Pirē-Pantinė Front
- Belgrade Turns Back a Bulgarian Aid Convoy
- A Final Solution (The New Republic)
- American Volunteer Finds Frustrations and Joy at Refugee Clinic (NY Times)
- TRANSCRIPT: DOS BRIEFING ON VIDEOTAPE CONFIRMING KOSOVA MASSACRE
- Gen. Colin L. Powell on Air Strikes
- Letter to Serbian NGOs From the Norwegian Helsinki Committee
Kosova Benefit Album Featuring Black Sabbath, Rage Against The Machine, Korn, Pearl Jam, Neil Young...
An all-star lineup of some of today's biggest rock acts,
including Korn, Alanis Morissette, and Pearl Jam, have contributed songs to No Boundaries,
a compilation due June 15 on Epic Records, which will benefit the refugees of Kosova. In
anticipation of sales of the album, Epic will make an initial donation of $1 million to
organizations to provide assistance to the Kosova refugees.
The 16-track album also includes rare, live, and previously unreleased material from Rage
Against The Machine, Neil Young, Oasis, Black Sabbath, Indigo Girls, Ben Folds Five, Peter
Gabriel, the Wallflowers, Sarah McLachlan, Bush, Tori Amos, and Jamiroquai.
As previously reported (LAUNCH, 4/29), the album will also feature Pearl Jam's cover of
the 1964 Frank Wilson & the Cavaliers hit "Last Kiss," which will be
released as a single on June 8. The album and the single will also include Pearl Jam's
rendition of Arthur Alexander's "Soldier Of Love," which originally appeared as
the B-side of "Last Kiss" on Pearl Jam's 1998 Christmas Fan Club single.
Pearl Jam gives a "Kiss" to Kosova
"Pearl Jam is proud to offer this small contribution to help improve the appalling
conditions of the refugees suffering from this human rights tragedy in Kosova," the
band's manager, Kelly Curtis, said in a statement.
Epic's $1 million donation will be distributed to CARE, OXFAM, and Doctors Without
Borders, which are working to provide food, shelter, medical care, and other supplies to
the Kosova refugees. Epic plans to donate future proceeds from the worldwide sales of No
Boundaries to the organizations as well.
"This album is the first collective response by the international music community to
the crisis in Kosova," said David Glew, chairman of the Epic Records Group, in a
statement. "No Boundaries is an outstanding collection of music, created in support
of a vital cause."
Smrekovnica Concentration Camp
Again Filling with Kosovars
Mitrovicė, May 24 (Kosovapress)
According to recently deported prisoners of Smrekovnica, the organized expulsion of male
captives included more than 2000. Some of those contacted who were tortured by their
captors, report the complex is filling again with civilians previously held at the
Vushtrri sports complex nearby.
Desertions and Disorganization among Serb Troops
Skėnderaj, May 24, (Kosovapress)
It has been observed that disorganization is rampant among Serb forces operating in
Kosova. There have been organized attempts to desert among recruits. On May 19, 17
military trucks coming from the direction of Skėnderaj and filled with soldiers, crashed
through a roadblock set up by Serb police. Only thirty meters beyond the roadblock, the
trucks were fired upon and forced to stop. Upon being questioned, all the passengers of
the trucks, new recruits by and large, descended and proceeded to march along the same
road. Once again they were fired upon, this time by Serb superior officers. After some
five hours, the deserters were violently compelled to return to the trucks and were driven
back to base. A similar scene took place on May 20th elsewhere in the area.
Ongoing Battles along the
Lushtė-Vaganicė-Pirē-Pantinė Front
Shalė, May 24 (Kosovapress)
The KLA units of the Drenica operational zone are engaged in daily battles with
Serb forces near Mitrovicė. On May 22, a unit of the 3rd company of the 3rd Battalion in
the 114th "Fehmi Lladrovci," Brigade attacked a military police base in Tėrnac,
killing four. On May 20, Serb troops began an attack on the village of Koprivė e
Broboniq. The ensuing battle took place in less than 20 meters separating the forces.
Either seven or eight Serb soldiers were killed. On the same day, the units of the company
mentioned above, attacked a Serb support unit, destroying one truck. In Galicė, Duboc and
Polac, Serb forces laid mines as Serb troops left their positions and headed towards
Gllogoc.
Belgrade Turns Back a Bulgarian Aid
Convoy
Brussels May 23, (Kosovapress)
Serb authorities have turned back a Bulgarian humanitarian mission which was headed for
Kosova. According to NATO officials, the humanitarian assistance that came from Bulgaria
was turned away at the border because the organization wanted to distribute the assistance
themselves.
A few days earlier, the NATO spokesperson on humanitarian issues, Colonel Maltinti,
declared that NATO headquarters has no control of the distribution of humanitarian
assistance inside Kosova or Serbia.
Since the beginning of NATO's air campaign, there have been cases when international
organizations (Greek and French) entered Kosova, but only up until Prishtina. In the past
week, Colonel Maltinti, reported that 13 convoys arrived to Prishtina while 12 others
stopped in cities inside of Serbia. In another instance, an Italian aid convoy was
confiscated by Serb forces in Montenegro.
Allied spokesperson, Jamie Shea, stated today that he has no information where this
humanitarian assistance goes and indicated many organizations want to assumethe
distribution of the assistance themselves in order to insure the supplies goes to victims,
especially to the thousands of displaced civilians inside Kosova who for two months have
not received any help from international humanitarian organizations.
Kosovar Women Killed by Serb Forces
Vushtrri, May 24, (Kosovapress)
Yesterday Serb forces, in Studime tė Poshtme murdered the following women: Remzije Sabit
Gėrguri, Lutfije Sabit Gėrguri, Shefkije Isuf Gėrguri, Hysnije Jakup Gėrguri, Ymrane
Mustafė Gėrguri, Mejreme Mustafė Gėrguri (all from the village of Studimja e Epėrme)
and Lumnije Fejzullah Krasniqi (from Zhilivodė).
3 Serb Soldiers Killed
Vushtrri, May 24, (Kosovapress)
Yesterday at around 2:30 in the afternoon, a KLA unit "Rexhep Musa" of the 141st
"Mehė Uka" Brigade confronted Serb forces in Mali i Shefqetit, killing three.
The KLA has warned the local inhabitants of the possibility of Serbs mines planted in
former positions which they have now left.
Battles in Gjakovė and Deēan Reported
Deēan, May 24, (Kosovapress)
On the Gergoc-Kralan front there are reports of sporadic fighting.
Intensive battles are raging today along the Kodrali-Pozhar-Lumbardhė-Llukė e Poshtme
front, where Serb forces have attempted to flank KLA positions but were repulsed by
elements of the 131st "Jusuf Gėrvalla" Brigade.
A Final Solution (The New Republic)
0n June 12, 1990, one of the most important Serbian intellectuals of the twentieth century
was laid to rest in Belgrade. His name was Vasa Cubrilovic, and his funeral was attended
by a who's who of Serbian academia and politics. The dean of Belgrade University's College
of Philosophy and a member of the Serbian presidency, who spoke on behalf of Slobodan
Milosevic's government, gave eulogies. "The work that he left behind marks him as one
of the giants of our era" said one official. "He was a man of understanding and
negotiation. "The front-page obituary in the state-run newspaper Borba said
Cubrilovic's "name will be noted in his- tory as one of the most important people of
this country." President Slobodan Milosevic couldn't attend the funeral, but he did
send a telegram to Cubrilovic's family.
Who was Vasa Cubrilovic to receive all these honors?
Born in 1897, Cubrilovic was a 17-year-old member of the Serbian nationalist group that
staged the 1914 assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand in Sarajevo. Spared execution
because of his age, Cubrilovic spent World War I in prison and then returned to Belgrade
to study and work in the government of what was then the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and
Slovenes. By the 1930s, he was a professor of history at Belgrade University, where he
taught for 40 years, eventually becoming the head of his department and later the director
of the prestigious Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences Institute for Balkan Stud-ies. In
that time, he assembled a body of historical research on Serbian political thought that
has been hailed even by American academics. And Cubrilovic was the author of vicious plans
to rid Yugoslavia of the Kosovar Albanians.
Cubrilovic first presented his ideas to the Serbian Cultural Club, an organization of
Belgrade intellectuals. On March 7,1937, he submitted "The Expulsion of
the Albanians" to the government as a secret memorandum. "From 1918 onwards
it was the task of our present state to destroy the remainder of the Albanian triangle
[Kosova]. It did not do this, Cubrilovic wrote. "The only way and the only means to
cope with them is the brute force of an organized state." Cubrilovic suggested that
Albania and Turkey would be the best places to ship Kosovar Albanians. But, if Tirana
objected to the deportation, "the Albanian Government should be informed that we
shall stop at nothing to achieve our final solution to this question." Cubrilovic
explained that "to bring about the relocation of a whole population, the first
prerequisite is the creation of the suitable psychosis.' This, he said, .can be created in
many ways' "including bribing and threatening the Albanian clergy, propaganda, and
"coercion by the state apparatus," a concept he explained at length:
The law must be enforced to the letter so as to make staying intolerable for the
Albanians: fines, and imprisonment, the ruthless application of all police dispositions,
such as the prohibition of smuggling, cutting forests, damaging agriculture, leaving dogs
unchained, compulsory labor and any other measure that an experienced police force can
contrive. >From the Economic aspect: The refusal to recognize the old land deeds,...
requisitioning of all state and communal pastures,... the withdrawal of permits to
exercise a profession, dismissal from the state, private and communal offices, etc., will
hasten the process of their removal.... When it comes to religion the Albanians are very
touchy, therefore they must be harassed on this score, too. This can be achieved through
ill-treatment of their clergy, the destruction of their clergy, the destruction of their
cemeteries, the prohibition of polygamy, and especially the inflexible application of the
law compelling girls to attend elementary schools, wherever they are .... We should
distribute weapons to our colonists, as need be.... In particular, a tide of Montenegrins
should be launched from the mountain pastures in order to create a large-scale conflict
with the Albanians in [Kosova]. This conflict should be prepared by means of our trusted
people. It should be encouraged and this can be done more easily since, in fact, Albanians
have revolted, while the whole affair should be presented as a conflict between clans and,
if need be, ascribed to economic reasons. Finally, local riots can be incited. These will
be bloodily suppressed with the most effective means.... There remains one more means,
which Serbia employed with great practical effect after 1878, that is, by secretly burning
down villages and city quarters.
"My first thought when I read [Cubrilovic's 1937 memo]," says Charles Jelavich,
a professor emeritus of history at Indiana University and an acquaintance of Cubrilovies
since 1949, "was, my God, I think Milosevic read this and said, "I'm going to
implement this plan." Still, some Slavic studies scholars and former acquaintances of
Cubrilovic argue that, in light of what was happening in Europe and Russia in the 30's,
this ghastly vision was not as extreme as it sounds today. "I think most of these
things should be put in the proper context," says Bosko Spasojevic of the Open
Society Institute in Budapest, who was once a teaching assistant at Belgrade University,
where he knew Cubrilovic. "At that time in Europe things like this were solved in
very radical, cruel ways" Indeed, Cubrilovic wrote: "The world today has grown
used to things much worse than this, and it should not be a cause for concern. At a time
when Germany can expel tens of thousands of Jews and Russia can shift millions of people
from one part of the continent to another, the shifting of a few hundred thousand
Albanians will not lead to the outbreak of a world war."
Although parts of Cubrilovic's plan were put into effect during the 30's, World War II
temporarily interrupted any mass deportation. But, after Soviet troops liberated Belgrade
in late 1944, Cubrilovic, who spent part of the war in a German prison camp, submitted
another plan to Yugoslavia's new Communist leader, Josip Broz Tito. This second document,
"The Minority Problem in the New Yugoslavia," advocated the expulsion of not
just Kosovar Albanians but all of Yugoslavia's minorities. "Yugoslavia can achieve
peace and ensure development only if it becomes ethnically pure" he wrote. The army
should "systematically and without mercy cleanse the minorities of these regions,
which we want to settle with our own national element." He advocated taking advantage
of the war chaos to help "ethnically conquer" Kosova: "That which in
peaceful times takes decades and centuries in time of war will be accomplished in a matter
of months and years." He also called for concentration camps, the development of a
complicated government bureaucracy to conduct ethnic cleansing, and stressed that
"[t]he hatred and irresistible wish of our masses to do away with minorities must be
utilized in a constructive way," for "[i]t may be that we might never again have
such an opportunity in order to make our state ethnically pure."
It tells you something about the sincerity of Tito's "brotherhood and unity"
slogan that he invited Cubrilovic to serve as a federal minister from 1945 to 1951. During
this period, the Tito government did send tens of thousands of Albanians to Turkey and,
according to some estimates, executed tens of thousands more.
Yet some say that, by the time of his death in 1990, Cubrilovic had mellowed and no longer
believed in the brutal solutions he had once advocated. "I think he was afraid of
what [post-Tito nationalism] would unleash, " says Norman Cigar, who is completing a
study of the infamous 1986 Memorandum of the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences, the
intellectuals' manifesto that became the inspiration for Milosevic-era Serbian
nationalism. "He was dead against the memo' "says Cigar. "He said it was
going to lead to bloodshed " However, at the same time Cubrilovic was predicting that
the memorandum would break up Yugoslavia, he also threatened that blood would be spilled
if Kosovar Albanians sought independence.
Whatever intellectual shifts he may have gone through at the end of his life, Cubrilovic
had created an ideological monster he could no longer control. Shortly after his death,
The Collected Historical Studies by Vasa Cubrilovic was trotted out by nationalist Serbs
to bolster the case for the wars that Milosevic later launched.
Confronted today with more than half a million deportees and reports of unspeakable
violence, many in the West wonder at the lack of dissent among Serbian intellectuals. But,
as Cubrilovic's work shows, the historical rationale for ethnic cleansing has been
provided by some of the most respected academics in Serbia. The present generation of
Belgrade scholars is hardly different. As Miranda Vickers, the author of Between Serb and
Albanian, puts it, "The more educated the Serbs are, the more nationalist they
become."
During the Milosevic era, Dusan Batakovic, a Belgrade University historian, has emerged as
the leading advocate for the minority Serb population in Kosova. Like many nationalist
writers, though, his scholarship seems clouded by a wildly chauvinistic reading of Serbian
history. He notes that the Kosovar Albanian intelligentsia consists of
"semi-intellectuals capable of taking in only a limited number of ideas. " He
writes that during World War II some 100,000 Albanians immigrated to Kosova under a secret
Italian resettlement policy. (The Axis powers occupied Albania during the war.) In Kosova:
A Short History, however, Noel Malcolm exposes this assertion as "pure fantasy."
He writes, "No evidence of any such mass migration during the war can be found in any
of the documents of the occupying powers'
Writing about the deportation of Kosovars to Turkey in theories, Batakovic insists that
mainly ethnic Mirks were sent and that the number of Albanians was "negligible.
" He fails to mention that, before the deportation, Albanians were coerced into
declaring themselves as Turks (the number of "Turks" in Kosova increased by
2,500 percent in six years). Today, this spurious "researcher" is a widely
respected historian, and it is said he will likely follow in Cubrilovic's footsteps and be
named director of the Institute for Balkan Studies.
Yet Cubrilovic's true legacy may be what is now happening in Kosova the enactment of his
decades-old blueprint for ethnic cleansing through Milosevic's meticulously planned
Operation Horseshoe. "NATO didn't realize that this 'Cubrilovic syndrome of the 1930s
was still active in the 1990s, says Vickers. "But the Serbs have always said,
"We don't want Albanians living with us". There's no hypocrisy on their
part."
To read the full memorandum of Cubrilovic's "The Expulsion of the Albanians" click here.
American Volunteer Finds
Frustrations and Joy at Refugee Clinic (NY Times)
By DAVID ROHDE
JAZINCE, Macedonia -- There are moments when the pure exhilaration of being here leads Dr.
Jennifer Walser to wish she did not have to return to New York. But there are also moments
when her efforts to alleviate are dwarfed by the sheer scale of the tragedy unfolding
before her.
Late last month, Dr. Walser, a 31-year-old doctor who has been finishing her residency in
a hospital emergency room in the Bronx, left New York to volunteer in refugee camps in
Macedonia. Her spur of the moment decision, which was sparked when she read Elie Wiesel's
invocation of the biblical dictum to "not stand idly by" in a magazine article,
was chronicled in The New York Times on April 27.
Nearly a month later, Dr. Walser is in Macedonia -- more alive, she says, than she has
ever been. And she has extended her stay for two weeks.
"I don't know why everyone doesn't do this," she said, as she gunned a Toyota
Land Cruiser down dirt track covered with goat manure in this remote village a half mile
from the Kosova border. "It's incredible."
Dr. Walser says she is satisfying her desires to help people while experiencing a grand
adventure. She has fallen in love with the people of Kosova and is being exposed to the
joys and frustrations of aid work. It is a craft where the ability to see immediately the
impact of easing pain and suffering can be intoxicating.
She has also learned the limits of her work, the inability to end the cause of the misery.
Even so, Dr. Walser said, the work has been enormously fulfilling. She wants to find a way
to make refugee medical work a regular part of her life.
"My only regret is that I have so many loans that I have to go get a job to pay them
off," she said. "I want to stay here."
Other American doctors volunteering here for the same medical nonprofit group, the
International Medical Corps, said they too had found the work extraordinary.
Dr. Todd Mydler, a 38-year-old pediatrician from Kansas City, Mo., a graduate of Holy
Cross College, said a Jesuit philosophy "to do for others" brought him to
Macedonia. And Dr. James Kleiwer, a 49-year-old family practitioner from Killeen, Texas,
said he was galled to see "the strong taking advantage of the weak" in Kosova
and did not want to live a "a life of excuses."
Dr. Walser, an indefatigable woman with boundless energy, seems well-suited for the work.
Tall and athletic, she is a chatterbox, a whirlwind of sound and motion who -- dressed in
a white physician's vest -- attracts a gaggle of children whenever she walks through a
camp or village. Sometimes, she passes out kites she had her sister ship from the United
States. Other times, she gives a child a sticker.
After less than a month, she speaks surprisingly good Albanian and warmly greets Albanians
teen-agers with the phrase "merdita, baby" -- a combination of the Albanian word
for "good day" and New York slang.
Initially Dr. Walser went to work in the 14,000-person Stenkovec refugee camp five miles
from the Kosova border, a sweltering, dusty maze of tents erected on a former military air
base.
Living with other doctors in an apartment in nearby Skopje, Macedonia's capital, she
worked a 24-hour shift every other day during her first two weeks. Her main activity, and
most haunting experience, was caring for thousands of ill and exhausted refugees flooding
into the camp by bus.
Entering each bus with an interpreter, she typically found a victim of beating, elderly
people been expelled from their homes without their heart or high blood pressure medicine,
and several dehydrated and exhausted people.
She particularly remembers the 10-hour-old baby passed to her by a pale young mother still
bleeding from giving birth. And the boy whose badly broken arm she had to splint with
scrap wood and a bag of rocks. Or a hysterical woman who had seen her husband and father
killed hours before.
The ill and exhausted were taken by stretcher to a medical tent where Dr. Walser and other
doctors stabilized them. Over all, the drugs and equipment here are limited but good, she
said, and she is able to do her job well. She has experienced only one death, an elderly
man who died one night, while sleeping in his tent.
Much of the treatment involves psychology. Calming the woman who said she had witnessed
the killing of her husband and her father, Dr. Walser gave Valium and repeated over and
over, "You are safe, you are safe, you are safe."
The shock and injuries are not as troubling, Dr. Walser said, as separating herself from
her patients. In the Bronx, she distanced herself from shooting victims, for example, by
telling herself that something the person did may have contributed to his fate. While not
necessarily fair or true, this eased the haunting questions that arise when dealing with
illness and death, she said.
But the scale of Kosova's refugee crisis is so great, she said, that it is difficult not
to feel touched by it. In Kosova's Albanians, she sees herself and her own family.
"They're like you and me," she said, "and someone just walks in their house
and shoots someone."
She admires the intense family bonds among the Albanians and the qualities she says are
embodied in a 12-year-old boy she befriended here. The boy, whom she knows only by his
first name, Arian, helped Dr. Walser and other staff erect a new, better equipped field
clinic in Stenkovec. During the project, he worked ceaselessly, digging trenches for water
lines or erecting tents.
As the weeks have passed, Dr. Walser has learned that the work here involves more than
just just helping. It involves making very difficult decisions.
For example, any refugees who can get Dr. Walser to write a diagnosis requiring their
immediate evacuation for medical reasons could be on the way in days with their families
to new lives in Western Europe. Horrified at first by conditions in the camp, Dr. Walser
said she initially wrote diagnoses for whoever wanted to leave.
But after officials complained, Dr. Walser began having to say no. Ugly confrontations
erupted where she, and she alone, had to tell families they would have to wait in the
camp.
"They would come in with their entire family," she said, a drawn look coming
over her usually bright face. "Needless to say, they were very, very upset."
Laura Bowman, an administrator for the International Medical Corps who has been working in
the Balkans since 1994, said those decisions took the highest toll on aid workers.
"When I've cried it's not because I'm doing good," she said. "It's because
I've been forced to make horrible choices."
Those difficult moments, and a slow-down in the number of refugees arriving in Macedonia,
prompted Dr. Walser to volunteer to work in a clinic in Jazince, a remote village near a
border crossing. Here, she has examined refugees who trek over 4,000-foot passes to flee
Kosova, attracted a new gaggle of children, cared for a horse that stepped on a land mine,
and spent her evenings watching NATO bombs explode a few miles away inside Kosova.
The decision to come to Macedonia, Dr. Walser said, was one of the best she ever made.
"The worst part about it, the most frustration and the most likely thing to burn me
out is just the magnitude of the things you see here," she said. "But I also
feel that to a tiny, almost imperceptible extent, I am part of a force helping improve the
situation, albeit a small one."
TRANSCRIPT: DOS BRIEFING ON
VIDEOTAPE CONFIRMING Kosova MASSACRE
(Spokesman says it "conclusively" confirms atrocity report)
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Office of the Spokesman
May 19, 1999
ON-THE-RECORD BRIEFING JAMES P. RUBIN, DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN
VIDEO OF MASSACRE OF KOSOVAR ALBANIANS
May 19, 1999 Washington, D.C.
MR. RUBIN: Let me begin by explaining to you what we're going to try to do today. First of
all, as many of you know, a group of Kosovar National Albanian American Council released a
rather shocking videotape earlier today. We're not going to use those same images because
of the graphic nature of them. We do have some of those tapes available and you all can
get that from the National Albanian American Council.
But what we are going to be able to do -- and this is the first time we've ever been able
to do this -- is to link videotape shot on the ground with overhead imagery that our
national technical means has provided. So we've, in the past, had many refugee accounts of
massacres and we've tried to track those accounts and the details provided by those
refugees with overhead imagery. But this is the first time we've been able to link video
evidence with overhead imagery. We've tried to put this together in a videotape that will
be helpful to all of you. There will be an opportunity for all of you to see it at your
leisure, but I will take this opportunity to walk you through the combination of the
videotape and the overhead imagery on the same screen.
What that combination will show is conclusively that the videotape that was released
earlier today of a massacre of over 100 Albanians in Izbica, Kosovar Albanians, is the
very same location that we were able to release from overhead imagery earlier in the year
on April 17. So let's begin the tape.
If you could stop it there, please. This image may look familiar to all of you. This is an
image of this particular location near Izbica on March 9, and as you can see, this field
is untouched. Here is the image of April 15, and you can see three neat rows of graves
right here in this area.
What I'd like you to be aware of is that on April 18, when we first showed this imagery,
Serb radio and television said there were no graves in Izbica and that Serb forces were
not responsible for mass executions there. Someone on camera even claimed that there is no
killing in Izbica, they are lying.
When the videotape was first shown that we're about to show you matched with the imagery,
the Serb radio and television said that it was an outright forgery -- this combination of
imagery and videotape -- and that the objects seen in the village in this imagery differ
from the videotape, and that obviously this was all taken somewhere else.
What I hope to be able to demonstrate to you all is to conclusively show that the imagery
we're showing you here is the very same location of the videotape. So let's now move to a
wider shot of this location.
What we're going to show in this wider shot that's appearing right now -- if you could
pause the tape -- is that this up here to the right is the graves. These are two fields
where there are burned tractors and burned vehicles and where there is a great deal of
debris on both sides of this road here. Down here where it says tree line is where the
refugee says the actual massacre took place. This is what we can confirm from above.
The way the refugees and media accounts tell the story -- and again, I'm stressing here
this is now media accounts -- is that a group of refugees was traveling along this road
and were stopped by Serb police; that the men were separated -- and elderly men, as you
can see from the tape that was distributed earlier today -- that the men were removed from
these tractors; there was killing that took place along this tree line; and that then
after the Serbs left, Kosovar Albanian villagers came to the location and moved the bodies
from this tree line back up here to the grave sites that they dug themselves.
Before we move, you should be aware that these two buildings right here correspond to the
grave site that was from the previous picture, and these two buildings are going to
display prominently in the videotape. So let's move to the videotape.
This is the videotape that Dr. Losci took that was released earlier today. It's about to
stop and superimpose an overhead imagery right now. If you could stop it there. Now, here
we regard as conclusive proof that this video was taken at the very same location of the
imagery. If you look up here, you'll see darkened lines in the field. If you look over
here, you'll see darkened lines in the field. If you look over here, you'll see these two
buildings; and there you'll see those two very buildings. You even see these three trees
there that correspond to those three trees there.
So in our view, this is an example of conclusive proof that this is the overhead imagery
that corresponds directly to the location of the videotape. Let's continue now.
Now, as the camera moves, you're going to see it stop before a building where these are
the burnt vehicles, these are the debris, this is the road and this is the shot from the
camera to that building right there where the arrow is pointing.
Now we're going to move to the mass burial. This is where the graves were dug; that's
again there. And you'll see that this building, when they move the camera, is the very
same building that's shown in the overhead imagery. Stop right there.
Now, this building, as you can see, has a walled compound around it, which corresponds
identically to that building there, which also has a walled -- a set of walls around it.
Q: (Inaudible.)
RUBIN: Let me work my way through the whole presentation and then take your questions. All
right, let's continue the tape.
You're next going to see a shot of the people digging the graves; and again, you're going
to see that very same building that you can see in the overhead imagery as they go about
digging the graves.
It will now have a wide shot of the three rows of graves, and that very same building that
we referred to earlier is in the upper left-hand corner.
This man told Dr. Losci -- he's one of the survivors -- that he survived by hiding under
the bodies of the other men. He was sitting on the debris field pointing back towards the
hill behind him, where he said the massacres took place. That's this tree line here and
that's this tree line here. That is the orientation of the video camera.
Now you're going to see, as they walked up the hill, again, three cues that demonstrate
that the video and the overhead imagery is the identical location. Please stop there.
Again you see the darkened areas of the fields there and there; you see the three trees
there, there and there; and the two buildings there and there, and the two buildings
there. Again, evidence -- conclusive in our view and in the view of all the analysts in
the U.S. Government -- that this videotape and this imagery come from the same location.
Please continue.
He's walking through and reenacting the location, and that's another cue of the direction
of the videotape.
Finally, if you could stop there. This survivor is now describing to Dr. Losci how the
Serbs lined him and others into four lines. The man had three people in front of him; when
the shooting started, he fell down and people jumped on top of him. When this videotape
was shot, the man pointed to ground that he said still contained blood and pieces of flesh
and bones -- this is the location where the shooting took place -- and that his own
brother was among the victims of this massacre.
The point of all this -- and you can continue and turn it off at this point -- is we
wanted to demonstrate three things. First, that the imagery that NATO released on April 17
and this videotape that was released earlier today are identical locations where these
massacres took place. When you look at this kind of visual record and the conclusive cues
that this is the very same location, I hope it will make it clear to all of you that when
Serb radio and television say that these are forgeries, these are made up, these are
propaganda, that it's the same regime that is telling you that that is responsible for the
Serb police who allegedly committed this massacre.
These kinds of episodes have taken place. This is not the only example, but it is the only
time we've been able to match actual videotape with overhead imagery. It is only a small
part of this story. There are normally not cameras where these massacres take place, and
it will take many, many days and months of hard work by investigators, after NATO has
achieved its objectives, for us to get the whole story.
But clearly, war crimes are being committed; clearly, this is an example of that; and
clearly, the Serb efforts in Belgrade are to try to lie to the world and tell you that
that just didn't happen.
I'd be happy to take some of your questions, and when we're done with that, we do have
some experts from several agencies interspersed in the room who will try to give you some
technical answers if I can't answer them.
Q: (Inaudible) -- related to this because it came up, if you can entertain a couple of
other questions. BBC is reporting, you said, some 500 deserters; BBC evidently is
reporting 2,000. Is there any updating that you'd like to give us?
RUBIN: Well, I said at least 500 because we did have some indication that the number was
larger. But I don't have a specific number to offer you.
Q: Can I ask on a substantive thing and then I'm sure we'll all get to the videos in a
minute. It's second-hand and I hate to ask you from second-hand, but presumably,
reportedly, Strobe Talbott said on Helsinki TV that the fundamental differences between
the U.S. and Russia have been resolved. I didn't hear it, obviously, but I'm going to use
that as a way to ask you if, since the briefing a few hours ago, if there's been any
narrowing --
RUBIN: There's been no development since the briefing.
Q: Okay. Thank you.
Q: Can you tell us exactly on which day this massacre occurred? And what explanation --
did they give any explanation for why -- how you managed to videotape this? And what
happened to the Serbs after the massacre? Did they just abandon the place and leave the
bodies there, or what happened?
RUBIN: I think at the press conference earlier today, those who released the tape may have
been able to make available some of that information, but let me tell you what I know.
What we believe is that this massacre occurred in late March. Some say March 29, but we
can't confirm that; but clearly in late March. That's consistent with the imagery that
shows the field without disturbed earth and no graves in mid-March, and the graves
existing in mid-April.
As far as how this was done, my understanding is that after committing this atrocity, the
Serbs left, and that the Kosovar Albanians discovered the bodies and went through the
painful and tragic job of burying the bodies. As you saw, there were a lot of people, in
response to Roy's question, in this tape because this was an effort by the Kosovar
Albanians to move the bodies from the area where the massacre occurred down by that tree
line in the lower left-hand part of the screen from earlier, all the way to where the
graves were dug. That process was videotaped by Dr. Losci because he felt very strongly
that although all the other massacres may not be recorded for history, that this one ought
to be.
Q: This may be not best directed to you, but toward him - but in the one scene where they
were digging, there is a guy in the foreground who was wearing a green uniform with a gun,
a side-arm.
RUBIN: Right. I wouldn't rule out that the KLA was there. But when you see --
Q: Is that --
RUBIN: That's perfectly possible that there were KLA fighters who were working with the
villagers to bury the dead. But I would urge you, before drawing significant conclusions
from that fact, to take a look at the video that I didn't choose to show because of its
graphic nature. That makes very clear that the people who were killed were elderly men.
Q: Is this particular area under heavy surveillance by you all, that you got a before
-and-an-after picture?
RUBIN: Well, it would be very hard for me to talk about our intelligence capabilities.
Clearly, this is part of the product of that effort; and given what's going on in Kosova
and the preparations that needed to be made, I think it would be fair to say that we train
a lot of our efforts on trying to know what's going on inside of Kosova.
Q: You said that this is evidence that war crimes are being committed. I may have misheard
you, but did you say that this is an example of a crime that the Serbs allegedly
committed? Is there any doubt in your mind that this massacre occurred because of Serb
forces?
RUBIN: Well, again, I try to be very clear in my briefings about what we know, what we
believe to be possible and what we don't know. What I can tell you is that we know that
the graves were dug, that they were dug during that area. We have every reason to believe
that the video that was shot of those men is the very same location on the map where our
imagery took place. The accounts of who did the killing, we don't have overhead imagery of
the event as it took place. But the same refugees who recorded in great detail all of this
information and told investigators and journalists and human rights workers all of the
detail that proved to be exactly accurate when the video came out and when the overhead
imagery came out have said it was Serb police who did this. But we don't have a flat,
independent, overhead shot of that. But given the fact that every other thing -- or nearly
everything -- that was told by the refugees and the survivors was proven to be correct by
things we can prove, we have every reason to believe that they are speaking truthfully
when they said the Serbs are responsible.
Q: To follow up, how did you get this video?
RUBIN: It was provided by the Kosovar Albanians to us some days ago.
Q: The Kosovar Albanians, or the KLA?
RUBIN: Well, I don't think Dr. Losci necessarily considers himself a KLA representative.
Q: Do you have any sort of imagery around that time that would show you where Serb forces
were or anything to back up that they were in the area?
RUBIN: We've shown some imagery, as you may recall, a couple of weeks ago, where we had
actual scenes of Serbs sweeping through fields, seeking refugees or civilians who we
believe were fleeing. We don't have that in this case, to my knowledge; it may exist
somewhere. But again, we just got this tape a few days ago; we tried to put efforts
together to show the link between this videotape and our overhead imagery and provide that
information to the Tribunal. Every single bit of information we may have, we're not always
in a position to release publicly, immediately.
Q: I think on the tape, one of the witnesses said that Yugoslav forces were surrounding
that area, but then the paramilitary came in. Is that your understanding?
RUBIN: I don't have direct information of what I answered to Andrea's first question, I
said that it is our understand that the Serb police, based on the refugee accounts were
responsible for this massacre. But exactly the array of forces in the area on this
particular date, I don't have information I can provide to you.
Q: Is there any evidence of the graves being disturbed since the --
RUBIN: On that subject, I'm not aware there is evidence of these graves being disturbed
but we do believe there is a planned campaign to destroy evidence by Serbian authorities,
including through a variety of means and destroying those who were killed in rather
gruesome ways. We do believe that they recognize the importance of trying to hide
evidence, but I'm not aware that in this case they have made any effort to destroy this
evidence.
The fact of the matter is, we decided to release this combination of video imagery with
overhead imagery so that it won't matter if the Serbs destroy the evidence. This is the
kind of evidence that makes it not necessarily relevant that the investigator goes to that
location. Because if you have refugee accounts, you have a videotape, you have overhead
imagery and you have a whole other set of information, you don't necessarily need the kind
of direct evidence that would be normally needed. The reason why we put this information
-- feel comfortable putting it out is because we have what we need and what we think can
provide a compelling case. Given that the video was released, it's very possible the Serbs
may choose to destroy this evidence. But with the combination of the video and the
overhead imagery, they can't destroy that.
Q: Since you had the KLA present there, is there any concern or fear that maybe there
might have been a clash between the KLA and the Serbs, prior to this?
RUBIN: Have you seen the videotape?
Q: I haven't.
RUBIN: I recommend you take a look at that, because what you'll find is elderly men who
were murdered -- one who looked like a woman to me -- and none of them in anything
resembling military uniforms; all of them elderly men. And the refugee accounts of the
tractors being stopped were civilians who were stopped on that road I showed you, where
the men were taken out and separated from their women and children. The women and children
were allowed to leave -- ended up in Macedonia and Albania. So I wouldn't go looking for
reasons to believe the Serbs in this case, because --
Q: I don't think he's doing that.
Q: The question really is what the KLA were doing there -- what they were doing there
during the time of the massacre, and what happened then subsequent to the massacre? They
got there within --
RUBIN: Again, the point is we know the KLA is operating in Kosova, and I hope it won't be
a surprise to you or anyone else that they're operating in Kosova. A war crime is a crime
against civilians. The fact that the KLA may have assisted in the burial of civilian
victims doesn't change the fact that it was a war crime.
Q: Is this material going to the War Crimes Tribunal?
RUBIN: Yes.
Q: Do you know what happened? You have an eyewitness, somebody who's easily identified,
because we know what he looks like -- the fellow who fell under three bodies -- giving an
on-the-record, televised account of what happened. He went back to live in that village,
with the Serb troops all around ready to cut his throat; is that what you're telling us?
RUBIN: I don't understand your question.
Q: All right. You refer to these people as refugees.
RUBIN: Sometimes I meant civilians, if I said refugees. It's hard to say civilians every
time when you're talking about refugee accounts of this massacre from the women and the
children who - men were taken from them on the road, gave accounts of this massacre and
thus led us to link it to our overhead imagery, and now link it further with the
videotape.
Q: I understand, but refugees is used for people who are on their way out of town --
RUBIN: In Macedonia and Albania.
Q: And people who were just -- if it's not bad enough, but who have lost their homes.
RUBIN: Right.
Q: What I'm driving at is whether that eyewitness and other people that you consider
credible eyewitnesses remained in the area, exposed to retaliation?
RUBIN: Well, I think everyone in Kosova is exposed to Serb retaliation. The whole place
has been exposed to Serb retaliation. Where that gentleman is, I do not know; I will try
to check for you.
Q: And Roy's point, I would put it a different way possibly. Nobody, I don't suppose, I
don't imagine anybody's suggesting that any war crime is justifiable. It has been known in
the Holocaust, for instance, that civilians are massacred as a response, in retribution,
unjustified, of course, for some other action taken against the people --
RUBIN: Right, let me answer that question.
Q: So if the KLA conducted a little campaign and killed a few Serb soldiers and then the
Serbs went out and massacred a lot of old people, that would be dreadful; but it would be
different if, sui sponte, they came in and killed a bunch of old people.
RUBIN: Not to the War Crimes Tribunal it wouldn't be different.
Q: I know it's still a war crime, but do you know the circumstances?
RUBIN: Again, the way I would answer that question is to say a war crime is a war crime.
There is no justification for a war crime. The KLA has been operating in Kosova in
response to the repression that President Milosevic committed against the people of Kosova
for the last ten years. They agreed to a peaceful solution. They made a decision to choose
peace. President Milosevic rejected peace and mounted a massive offensive to eradicate the
KLA. The KLA has been harmed in the course of that offensive by the tens of thousands of
Serb troops who are operating throughout Kosova. As a result of that, they were scattered;
they lost equipment; and they probably had significant losses.
On the other hand, the massive killing of civilians, deportations of women and children
from Kosova created new recruits for the KLA. The KLA continues to operate in Kosova and
engage in hit-and-run operations. There's no secret about that. But regardless of that and
regardless of whether it took place in this area or in some other place in Kosova, it is a
war crime.
Q: Can you tell us who it was that saw the link in the first place between this footage
and the overhead imagery, and when exactly that --
RUBIN: Well, maybe after the formal briefing is over, we'll be in a position to provide
you a little bit more information. But we received a videotape from the Kosovar Albanians,
and we sent it to our experts. Our experts examined it and compared it to information they
had, and we were able to put this tape together.
Who exactly our experts are is -- clearly, they're government experts; they work for the
U.S. Government. I wouldn't be able to be more specific than that.
Q: I don't want their names, but what part --
RUBIN: I wouldn't be able to be more specific than that.
Q: Well, they don't work for the IRS, do they?
RUBIN: You're right about that.
Q: Then can you tell us when exactly whoever it was --
RUBIN: In the last few days.
Q: Yes, but it would be nice to be able to say, look, we got the tape on Monday and on
Tuesday one of our ace workers at some agency said, hey, there's a link here and we --
RUBIN: It took about a day. Most of that time was devoted to carefully studying Dr.
Losci's videotape scene by scene to make sure we could relate it to what we already knew
from imagery and other sources. Putting together this presentation took another day or so.
So it was at the beginning of this week the tape was examined by our experts; it took
about a day for them to conclude that it could be correlated to the overhead imagery; and
then it took about a day or so to match the videotape with the overheard imagery in the
tape you just saw.
Q: What day was it that you actually got the tape?
RUBIN: I think the work began on Monday, really, in earnest. The tape found its way to
Washington before that, but the work began in earnest on Monday.
Q: We have what we need, I think, paraphrasing you, to provide a compelling case.
RUBIN: Right.
Q: Is that a political statement or a legal statement, in terms of war crimes?
RUBIN: Well, the question was about whether they would remove the bodies or their
disturbing the earth. It is our lawyers' judgment that the fact that one has a videotape,
refugee accounts and the overhead imagery provides a compelling case, ultimately that test
will have to be met by the War Crimes Tribunal itself.
Q: Can you tell us a little more how that would work, then? Who would they have a case
against? I mean, if you can't go in and see exactly who did it, is it Milosevic? Who --
RUBIN: Again, if you followed the previous cases in Bosnia, what you'll see is that it
starts with a process where one refugee identifies - or a victim or civilian, to help
Barry's question there - identifies who they think did it. Then the investigators do
interviews and use other information that might be available to try to isolate the unit.
Then over time, one is maybe able to isolate the leader of the unit. Then when one is able
to investigate and move closer, one may be able to get to the individuals themselves who
might have committed the atrocity.
The point I was making is that the videotape plus the overhead imagery plus the refugee
and eye witness accounts limit the damaging effect of any Serb attempt to disturb the
earth and hide the evidence that are in these mass graves. That's the only point I was
making.
Q: I'd like to ask you two questions. First, to follow-up Barry's, is there any witness
protection program? It seems to me a little bit disturbing if the person who witnessed a
massacre, is still in Kosova. And secondly, obviously this is a message to Belgrade; but
according to the situation in Bosnia, is it fair to say that having Mladic and Karadzic at
large, after Srbrenica and after everything what happened in Bosnia, that Belgrade is not
going to get -- the perpetrators are not going to get the right message?
RUBIN: On the first question, arrangements can be made for dealing with witnesses. I
wouldn't be in a position to detail those arrangements; those would be done by the War
Crimes Tribunal or others.
With respect to the second question, this is a subject that has been addressed before in
this briefing room and my answer is the same as before; and that is there are a number of
people who were indicted - roughly half of those indicted -- who have either voluntarily
surrendered under pressure from the West or have been captured. So the fact that some did
not yet face justice in The Hague should not mask the fact that many have. The fact also
is that there is no statute of limitations on war crimes, and that Karadzic and Mladic
will have their day, and people in Belgrade, as we know from their effort to hide the
evidence and their concentrated effort to hide evidence, are concerned about this and
that's why they go to some considerable lengths to hide the evidence.
Would it have been better if Mladic and Karadzic had faced justice? I think that's a
question for historians to debate. The fact is that many have faced justice; there are
many in prison; there are many in the dock; and there are many indictees who were
submitted to the justice of The Hague.
Q: Just one other question. At the top you said your decision not to show some of the very
graphic images -- you decided they were too graphic -- but don't you think that by showing
them it presents more evidence of what --
RUBIN: Well, we're going to make that videotape available. We'll have some copies for you,
and news organizations can make that judgment for themselves. We thought our job here was
to make the case as compellingly as we could of why our overhead imagery about this place
matched directly the videotape that was shown, of which I only showed some selected
excerpts. The full videotape has been released by the group at the Foreign Press Center,
and we do have some copies. All of you can make that judgment for yourselves.
We thought that the right role for the United States here was to make clear that when the
Serbs tell all of you that this is a fabrication, that this is a lie, that they are lying.
I hope that any fair-minded person, having seen this videotape, and having an opportunity
to look at some of the stills when we're done, will know that the Serbs have lied to the
world about what happened in Izbica.
Q: Can I have one more try? Would you not want to, for the sake of just making this
comprehensible, give the context in which this massacre occurred? I mean, what kind of
operations were going on in the area at that time; who was involved; things that you know?
Because I'm sure you can reconstruct a lot of that from your own data.
RUBIN: Well, when we have more information to provide on this, I will be happy to provide
it to you. This information comes very quickly. I was just asked how quickly we got it. We
did move very fast to try to create this videotape and make it available to you. And as
additional information about Izbica becomes available, we will provide it.
Q: Thank you.
(end transcript)
Gen. Colin L. Powell on Air Strikes
Full Text COPYRIGHT 1999 Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service
WASHINGTON
Offering his first critical remarks about the war in Kosova, retired Gen. Colin L. Powell
said he would have ``argued strongly'' against the Clinton administration's decision to
take the threat of ground troops off the table.
The lack of such a threat has left the initiative to cease fighting with the enemy, he
said.
``If I had been part of the decision process, I would have argued strongly not to tell him
(Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic) what we might or might not do with ground
troops,'' said Powell. ``Why tell him?''
The former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who directed military strategy during
the Persian Gulf War, said that the ``single dimension'' NATO campaign has permitted
Milosevic to anticipate the damage to his forces while waiting for a break in the
political will of the NATO coalition.
``He's watching what's happening in Russia and Germany and elsewhere,'' said Powell. ``The
Serbians clearly believe it is a vital interest of theirs to continue to accept this
punishment. With this kind of pounding, one would think there's a point beyond which the
Serbs would have to change their position, but I don't know where that point is and,
unfortunately, neither does NATO.''
Powell, 62, made his comments during an interview on the eve of a speech here to
commemorate the second anniversary of ``America's Promise,'' the nonprofit organization he
heads that is dedicated to improving the lives of disadvantaged youth.
Following a 35-year career in the U.S. Army, culminating in the top military job from 1989
to 1993, the Bronx, N.Y., native has been loath to inject himself into the discussions of
NATO military strategy in Kosova.
But Powell, author of the doctrine that prescribes overwhelming force as the best way to
achieve military objectives, said prior to the Gulf War that limiting the use of force
only to air power was a strategy ``designed to hope to win, not designed to win.''
Kosova, where NATO commanders hoped a bombing campaign would serve as sufficient
persuasion, is now Exhibit A for Powell's theories.
``For political reasons we have decided that we can only use one component of our military
power, and that's air power,'' he said. ``We're bombing every day and Mr. Milosevic and
the Serbians are suffering greatly as a result of this, but its up to Mr. Milosevic to
decide when he has had more than he can bear. And he has not reached that point.''
Letter to Serbian NGOs From the
Norwegian Helsinki Committee
Letter to Serbian non-governmental organizations regarding the Appeal of 6 April by
Belgrade NGOs from the Norwegian Helsinki Committee and the International Helsinki
Federation for Human Rights Oslo, Vienna 18 May 1999
Dear friends and colleagues,
As human rights organizations devoted to the protection of civil society, and after having
cooperated with some of you for many years, the Norwegian Helsinki Committee and the
International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights take your Appeal of 6 April with utmost
seriousness. The Executive Committee of the IHF, which met in New York on 8.-9. May,
discussed your Appeal at length. It should be mentioned that the protection of human
rights defenders and civic activists in Serbia are one of our main messages to decision
makers and media in Europe, and that we have initiated support campaigns and letters for
Serbian independents and intellectuals.
However, we are deeply disturbed that the Appeal of 6 April -- and subsequent open letters
and appeals from intellectuals in Belgrade -- reflects a view of the Kosova crisis to
which we cannot subscribe, and we feel a need to clarify our position on these issues. The
Kosova Albanians who have arrived in Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro have been
extensively interviewed by members of various Helsinki committees, as well as by news
media. Their stories confirm beyond any reasonable doubt that they were driven from their
homes by Serbian police and paramilitary forces; that seemingly thousands have been
systematically killed, maimed, raped and robbed. This is ethnic cleansing on a horrific
scale. Neither the NATO bombing campaign nor military actions by the Kosova Liberation
Army are responsible for the "unprecedented exodus" which you describe. Based on
the extensive information we have collected about the catastrophe in Kosova, we consider
it intellectualy and morally unsound to equate these campaigns.
We respect your lonely and courageous struggle for democratization in the Federal Republic
of Yugoslavia, a struggle we have supported for years. But unfortunately -- and we would
very much like to be mistaken in this -- it seems to us that hardly any of your fellow
citizens have supported a just settlement to the Kosova issue, and that the crisis has
been caught in a downward spiral of radicalization for many years. Thus when you say that
"NATO military intervention has undermined all results we have achieved,"one
must ask if these results were of such a scope and significance to bring hope that the
plight of Kosova could be relieved by peaceful means.
As the Rambouillet negotiations came to a close, it seemed clear to us that there was no
such hope of a political settlement. The regime scorned international -- and domestic --
pressure aimed at a peaceful solution, and went ahead with the preparations for the
campaign which is currently unfolding in Kosova. Faced with preparations for grave crimes,
how should one respond? That was the dilemma faced by the international community in
March, and in our view you also should recognize -- even though you do not support it --
that, in principle, the NATO intervention was not an arbitrary act of aggression.
We are in sympathy with your extremely difficult situation, but we cannot agree with the
conclusions you have drawn as to who bears primary responsibility for improving it. It is
our view that your appeal should properly be addressed to the FRY and Serbian authorities
which bear the responsibility for systematic and grave crimes of war and crimes against
humanity in Kosova, and for the dangers you, as members of the civil sector in Serbia, are
currently facing.
We express our solidarity with you. Also, we acknowledge the sacrifices you must make, and
the dilemmas and paradoxes you are faced with as victims of a government whose policies
you cannot support, and bearing the costs attached to efforts to make that government act
in accordance with civilized standards. It is our hope and aim that the enormous
responsibility the NATO states have taken on by initiating the military intervention, will
entail a far more whole-hearted support of the civil sector in the Serbian society, which
more than ever, is crucial to Serbia's restoration into Europe. Unless the western states
recognize the need for this kind of policy, it will be difficult to describe the current
NATO actions as a humanitarian intervention.
We will soon face new challenges. This letter is meant to open a dialogue on what we can
do together to preserve the independent forces in the Serbian society in order that they
may resurface after the war. We would very much welcome your recommendations as to how we,
from the outside, should address the new situation and how we can continue to support you
in your current plight.
Bjorn Engesland
Secretary General
The Norwegian Helsinki Committee
Aaron Rhodes
Executive Director
on behalf of the
Executive Committee of the IHF:
Ludmilla Alexeyeva
Ulrich Fischer
Stein-Ivar Aarsaether
Sonja Biserko
Holly Cartner
Bjorn Emgesland
Krassimir Kanev
Andrzej Rzeplinski