[Prishtina-E] Milosevic & Terrorism - FW: A-PAL Statement 10/23/01

[kosova at jps.net]

Albanian Prisoner Advocacy (A-PAL)
October 23, 2001


A-PAL STATEMENT

Defining the distressingly overused word "terrorism" is to try to climb a
slippery slope. Who indeed are terrorists? The word Muslim linked to this
label is an example of racial profiling we have absorbed over the years
through our addiction to poorly thought-out news media. Using this
irresponsible type of ethnic stereotyping, Milosevic arrested and tortured
and even killed hundreds of Kosovar Albanians during the NATO war.

220 of these people are still in Serb prisons, sentenced to 10 or 15 or 20
year sentences by the artificial court system that the Serbs transported
from Kosova into Serbia expressly for this purpose.

Despite the fact that Serb officials and UNMIK reached a transfer agreement
in September, 2001, in which these citizens of Kosova would be returned to
the jurisdiction of UNMIK, nothing has happened. The Serb side continues to
use these individuals as political pawns, linking their fate to any number
of ever-changing political gripes with the West and with the cycle of
violence in Kosova (example of the most recent assassinations provided
below). Cleverly, then, the ongoing imprisonment of these men, charged
without evidence as terrorists simply because of their ethnicity, becomes
the "fault" of the West for failing to properly pacify other Serb demands.
Yet no Western leaders have the courage to publicly state that this is what
is happening as the months continue to roll by for these prisoners. Why?
Because it would mean publicly asserting the jurisdiction of UNMIK and Serbs
don't want to hear that.

If the situation were reversed--if the Albanians had taken 2,300 Serbs from
their homes in Serbia (most of the prisoners were arrested at home), took
them across the border into Kosova, tortured them, killed more than 130 and
tried them with artificially created courts, associated with their KLA
enemies--and then detained them year after year while subjecting their
anxious families to supply large bribes for their release--the international
outcry would be enormous. Perhaps, even, Western aid would have been
withdrawn from Kosova by now as punishment. But in Serbia, nothing has
happened because of this situation other than infrequent reprimands and
behind the scenes pressure.

Western officials, Kosovar political leaders, and Serb government officials
in Serbia, all need to adopt a uniform policy towards enforcing human
rights, a policy consistent throughout the Balkans regardless of ethnicity.
Instead, Serb leaders refuse to comment on the assassination of Albanian
journalists. Albanian leaders refuse to comment on the assassination of any
journalists. Western leaders comment usually on violence against Serbs but
tolerate violence against Roma and Albanians. Perpetuating this type of
justice-via-ethnicity philosophy is only to perpetuate a climate of
divisiveness and violence, of reacting too late and too little to ever
create a climate of fairness and tolerance.

It is poverty, war, access to weapons, and crime unpunished that create
"terrorists" (criminals who can act against a government to create an
atmosphere of terror) not ethnicity. These conditions, as pointed out in a
recent article by Misha Glenny, exist in abundance throughout the former
Yugoslavia. And one grotesque example is the continued detention of the 220
Kosovar prisoners--condemned for acts they didn't commit by artificial
courts created for the purpose of condemning them. This would be ludicrous
if it weren't so sad.

****************************************************************************
***
TRANSFER THE REMAINING 220 KOSOVAR PRISONERS TO THE JURISDICTION OF UNMIK
NOW.
CONDEMN THE PREVALENCE OF VIOLENT CRIMES IN ALL PARTS OF THE FORMER
YUGOSLAVIA.
****************************************************************************
***

ALERT - FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA (KOSOVO)
22 October 2001

Journalist killed, another seriously wounded
SOURCE: Reporters sans frontières (RSF), Paris

(RSF/IFEX) - In a letter to Hans Haeckerup, the United Nations'
administrator in Kosovo, RSF expressed its serious concern following the
assassination of Bekim Kastrati, from the Albanian-language daily "Bota
Sot", and the shooting of Rados Radonjic, an employee with the Serbian
television station RTS, in Kosovo. "We ask that you do everything possible
to establish the exact motives for these attacks and to punish those
responsible," stated RSF Secretary-General Robert Ménard.

According to information collected by RSF, Kastrati was killed in an ambush
on 19 October 2001, in the town of Srbica (central Kosovo). Besim Dajaku, a
member of moderate Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova's security detail, was
also killed in the attack, and a third person was wounded. The three men had
just participated in a demonstration in support of the Democratic League of
Kosovo (LDK), which was organised in the context of legislative elections
slated for 17 November. The three men were returning to their homes when
their vehicle was overtaken by a jeep, whose occupants opened fire on them
with machine guns. The daily "Bota Sot" is considered to be close to
Rugova's LDK. Rugova stated that the attack was "politically motivated,"
adding, "we consider this assassination to be an attack against the LDK,
against Kosovo's institutions and against the UNMIK [United Nations Mission
in Kosovo], as well as against press freedom."

A few hours later, Radonjic was shot and seriously wounded at his home. The
incident took place in Devet Jugovica (about ten kilometres north of
Pristina), an isolated Serb village in Albanian territory where many
inter-ethnic conflicts have erupted over the past two years. According to
the Yugoslavian agency Tanjug, the journalist caught unknown individuals
trying to steal his cattle. They opened fire on him as he was trying to
intervene.

For further information, contact Jean-Christophe Menet at RSF, 5, rue
Geoffroy Marie, Paris 75009, France, tel: +33 1 44 83 84 84, fax: +33 1 45
23 11 51, e-mail: europe at rsf.fr, Internet: http://www.rsf.fr

The information contained in this alert is the sole responsibility of RSF.
In citing this material for broadcast or publication, please credit RSF.
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