KOSOVO EXPLOSION, 1998

                THE BRITISH HELSINKI HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP
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                        KOSOVO EXPLOSION, 1998

     For many years now observers of Balkan affairs have been predicting an explosion in
the ethnically Albanian Yugoslav province of Kosovo. However, while being deprived of its
autonomy by the nationalist Serb government of Slobodan Milosevic in 1991 and
relegated to a limbo-land by the international community, events in Kosovo were
overshadowed by the cruel wars of independence in Bosnia and Croatia. Under its leader,
Ibrahim Rugova, Kosovo opted for passive resistance setting up a semi-underground
state apparat that ran independently of the authorities in Belgrade. With its own schools,
hospitals and universities funded by local tax authorities and monies sent by Kosovars
abroad the province under Rugova and his party the Democratic League of Kosovo
heeded the warnings of the international community and relied on passive resistance.
     Things began to change in 1996 when some journalists began to write about the
activities of a shadowy terrorist group known as the Kosovo Liberation Army. It was
reputed to be stock-piling arms and launching hit-and-run attacks on local Serbian police
and collaborators. During 1997 more reports began to circulate about the activities of this
group although some commentators continued to doubt its existence. One theory was that
the KLA was a Serbian ruse aimed at provoking the Albanian population into confrontation
and justifying any subsequent repression. The violent events that engulfed neighbouring
Albania in 1997 flooded the region with large quantities of weapons some of which
reached Kosovo and the rebel army. By late summer 1997 its existence seemed to be in
no doubt.
     The problem of what to do about the KLA became more acute as the year wore on.
During 1997 it became abundantly clear that the West's reliance on Milosevic as a
guarantor of the Dayton Peace Accords was in retreat. New faces had appeared: Milo
Djukanaovic the new president of Montenegro, and Bijilana Plavsic and Milorad Dodik in
Bosnia were the West's new "golden boys (and girls)". Milosevic seemed to have become
a marginal figure in the new Balkan policy of Washington, London and Brussels. This was
probably reflected in the cat-and-mouse game that ensued over Kosovo.
     For, whatever may be said about the ill-treatment of Albanians it was Serbs (in
particular, Serb policemen) who were being killed by the KLA in Kosovo, as well as
Albanians perceived as being loyal to the Belgrade government. As the year drew to a
close, the pressure from local Serbs to flush out KLA strongholds grew. At the same time
Belgrade probably sensed that there was a ploy to provoke its armed forces into an
operation in Kosovo that would be condemned by the international community thus giving
it more leeway to isolate the Milosevic regime. This has finally taken place in the week
beginning 3rd March 1998. The responses of the USA and the European Union under its
British presidency have matched this scenario.
     Meanwhile the situation poses dangers for the Albanian leadership in Kosovo. The
international community has spoken to Rugova with forked tongues: refusing to endorse
the desires of ordinary Kosovars for independence but also failing to properly apportion
blame for the latest violence to the provocative guerrilla tactics of the KLA. Should the
KLA's "armed struggle" make it a serious player in the region's politics the democratically
legitimate line of Ibrahim Rugova and his party could be sidelined.
     In Albania itself, the leader of the Democratic Party Sali Berisha, has put aside
domestic political rivalries to form a common front with the Socialist government in blaming
the Serbs for the violence in Kosovo. This, too, could back-fire on him both with his own
supporters and in the world of international politics if the situation in Kosovo got out-of-
hand.
     The KLA has also carried out attacks on Macedonian state institutions, though these
have been less widely reported outside former Yugoslavia. In Macedonia events in
Kosovo have been the occasion for demonstrations by ethnic Albanians against the
minority policies of the government in Skopje. The very existence of the Macedonian state
could be threatened by these developments.

It is time to take stock:

     The Kosovo Liberation Army should be recognised for what it is: a violent, Hoxha-ite
organization with links to extreme left-wing Albanian emigre groups in Germany and
Switzerland as well as funding from alleged mafia sources there. (Many Westerners fail to
recognise the links between the black market and the left in ex-Communist countries, but
this linkage can be found across the ethnic and religious divisions of the Balkans.)
     Until the Serbian para-military offensive of the last week, the majority of violent deaths
in Kosovo had been people killed by the KLA -- Serbs or Albanians loyal to the
government in Belgrade. However reprehensible the policies of Belgrade may have been,
no state should either condone or ignore the development of KLA violence, particularly as
its inevitable consequence is civilian casualties among Kosovar Albanians, given the
predictable Serbian response. Reports of such casualties have filtered out in the last few
days.
     The line taken by President Rugova over the past ten years should be endorsed.
Rugova and the DLK have obeyed the West's dictum by promoting non-violence. They
stand to be side-lined if the KLA should become major players in any negotiations over
Kosovo's future. This would amount to a massive betrayal of those who have acted in
accordance with Western values. It is, of course, very understandable that many Kosovar
Albanians are deeply frustrated by years of impasse over their struggle for full democratic
rights, including self-determination, but their human rights situation might not necessarily
improve if "armed struggle" according to the classic Maoist/Hoxha formula is to be the
basis either of their "liberation" or an internationally-supervised "peace process".
     Politicians in Albania itself would be wise to articulate public disquiet over the Kosovo
situation in ways which avoid inflaming the situation. Today, the international community
may seem remarkably favourable to Albanian nationalist aspirations, but both the USA and
EU states have shown themselves very changeable in their policies. Their recurrent
emphasis on geopolitical stability at the expense of democratic rights might yet reappear
and isolate the opposition in Albania which has experienced for itself in 1997 how the
international community puts "stability" before democratic legitimacy. Dr Berisha and
Ibrahim Rugova stood firm in the past against a violent solution for Kosovo. This should
remain their goal.

                                -end-

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