[ALBSA-Info] Kadare backs foreign peace efforts in Balkans

[Gazhebo at aol.com]

Kadare backs foreign peace efforts in Balkans

By Benet Koleka

  
TIRANA, July 10 (Reuters) - Dismissing Western fears about Albanian 
nationalism, Albanian novelist Ismail Kadare says the Balkan countries should 
make the most of international arbitration efforts and seek a better future 
together. 

Kadare, Albania's most distinguished writer told Reuters that while not all 
people in the region welcomed foreign intervention in the wake of last year's 
Kosovo conflict, most Albanians understood it as an opportunity to move 
towards political stability and economic prosperity. 

``Not everyone in the Balkans loves it, but at least we Albanians want it and 
this is our chance. We are not troubled by international arbitration in the 
Balkans,'' said 64-year-old Kadare, who lives in Paris and has often acted as 
a spokesman for his country in the Western media. 

Serb repression of ethnic Albanians in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo and 
NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia last year led to the establishment of a de facto 
international protectorate in Kosovo under U.N. administration. 

Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic staunchly opposes the involvement of 
the international community in the region, but Kadare said most countries 
were glad of the support as they struggled with the difficult transition from 
communism to democracy. 

``Until now, the Balkans have only known foreign rule, be it from the 
Habsburgs, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Ottomans or the Soviet Union,'' 
Kadare told Reuters in an interview. 

``Now for the first time we have arbitration that is in harmony with the 
interests of the Balkans.'' 

The European Union has pledged billions of dollars to southeast Europe to 
help stabilise economies and aid reconstruction following the Kosovo war. 

GREATER ALBANIA A PHANTOM 

Kadare said European concern about a possible push for a Greater Albania 
linking Albania with ethnic Albanian populations in Kosovo and Macedonia were 
unfounded. 

``That is an artificial bogeyman,'' Kadare said, describing fears about 
spreading Albanian nationalism as a misunderstanding on the part of Europe. 

Kadare said it was normal that neighbours who had been cut off from each 
other for decades by political divides wanted to link up. He urged Europe to 
view such communication with less suspicion. 

``What is bad about the natural and harmonious tendency of a people to have 
cultural and economic ties? But this natural tendency is being interpreted as 
a hidden project for a Greater Albania,'' Kadare said. 

He warned of building new walls in the region just as it was opening up. 

``The walls that are being torn down everywhere in Europe risk being erected 
between the Albanian people -- spiritual, cultural, physical and economic 
ones,'' Kadare said. 

BALKAN COUNTRIES MUST GET OVER CONFLICTS 

Looking at Kosovo one year after NATO moved in, Kadare said accusations that 
Kosovo Albanians were co-ordinating revenge attacks against the minority 
Serbs were unfounded. 

He said the Albanians as a whole were being ``cynically blamed'' for the 
actions of individuals. 

``The so-called Albanian revenge has been nothing else but the personal 
reaction of traumatised people. This big drama has not been 
institutionalised.'' 

Thousands of Serbs have left Kosovo in fear of reprisals, and there have been 
frequent attacks on Serb civilians in the under-policed province. 

``Before NATO intervened, killing was a monopoly of the Serbs. Now both sides 
are doing it,'' Kadare said. 

Kadare -- whose most recent work ``Three Elegies for Kosovo'' centres on the 
events surrounding the 14th century Battle of Kosovo when a Christian 
alliance was routed by the Turks -- said it was time that people living in 
the Balkans overcame old enmities. 

``I think that just as the Balkan peoples faced catastrophes together many 
centuries ago, they should now move towards salvation,'' he said.