SAFE HAVENS FOR SERB SECURITY
The UN administrator questions whether ethnic
havens are the only way to enable Serbs to remain in Kosovo?
By Denisa Kostovicova
WELCOME TO IWPR'S BALKAN CRISIS REPORT, NO. 69, 25 August 1999 (...)COMMENT: KOSOVO FASCISM, ALBANIANS' SHAME
The systematic intimidation of Kosovo's Serbs brings shame on the province's Albanians and will have far-reaching and long-term consequences.
By Veton Surroi in Pristina
In the past month an old woman has been beaten to death in her bath; a two-year-old boy has been wounded and his mother shot dead; two youths have been killed with a grenade launcher; and a woman dares not speak her name in public for fear that those who attempted to rape her will return. All these victims were Serbs.
Sadly, these are not isolated incidents. Many more of Kosovo's remaining Serbs have locked themselves in their homes, terrified by an atmosphere in which every sound seems threatening and every vehicle that stops might take you away to your death.
Then there is the case of the elderly couple with nothing to eat who are afraid to venture out to buy food because they know their poor Albanian language will be noticed. Their Albanian neighbours cannot give them any food because they have been warned not to "feed Serbs".
I know how Kosovo's remaining Serbs, and indeed Roma, feel, because I, along with nearly 2 million Albanians, was in exactly the same situation only two and a half months ago. I recognise their fear. We learned from the radio that Belgrade had given its units the right to kill at will--even women, children and the old. As a result, every car that stopped was a potential danger; every unusual sound appeared to herald inevitable death. Meanwhile, little or no help could be expected from our Serb neighbours.
This is why I cannot hide my shame to discover that, for the first time in our history, we, Kosovo Albanians, are also capable of such monstrous acts. I have to speak out to make it clear that our moral code, by which women, children and elderly should be left unharmed, has been and is being violated.
I know the obvious excuse, namely that we have been through a barbaric war in which Serbs were responsible for the most heinous crimes and in which the intensity of violence has generated a desire for vengeance among many Albanians. This, however, is no justification.
Those Serbs who carried out Belgrade's orders and committed atrocities against Albanians have already fled, as have others fearing reprisals from relatives of the thousands who are buried in mass graves. Today's violence--more than two months after the arrival of NATO forces--is more than simply an emotional reaction. It is the organised and systematic intimidation of all Serbs simply because they are Serbs and therefore are being held collectively responsible for what happened in Kosovo.
Such attitudes are fascist. Moreover, it was against these very same attitudes that the people of Kosovo stood up and fought, at first peacefully and then with arms, during the past 10 years.
The treatment of Kosovo's Serbs brings shame on all Kosovo Albanians, not just the perpetrators of violence. And it's a burden we will have to bear collectively. It will dishonour us and our own recent suffering which, only a few months ago, was broadcast on television screens throughout the world. And it will dishonour the memory of Kosovo's Albanian victims, those women, children and elderly who were killed simply because of their ethnic origins.
The international community will probably not punish us for failing to defend multi-ethnicity in Kosovo. After all, even before the war, the number of non-Albanians in Kosovo was akin to that of non-Slovenes in Slovenia, yet nobody talks today of a multi-ethnic Slovenia. However, from having been victims of Europe's worst end-of-century persecution, we are ourselves becoming persecutors and have allowed the spectre of fascism to reappear.
Anybody who thinks that the violence will end once the last Serb has been driven out is living an illusion. The violence will simply be directed against other Albanians.
Is this really what we fought for?Veton Surroi is publisher of the Pristina daily Koha Ditore, in which a version of this article has previously appeared.
SAFE HAVENS FOR SERB SECURITY
The UN administrator questions whether ethnic havens are the only way to enable Serbs to remain in Kosovo?
By Denisa Kostovicova
As Serbs who have stayed in Kosovo face on-going intimidation and revenge attacks, the province's UN administrator Bernard Kouchner has suggested creating safe havens to protect them. Though possibly not politically correct, such ethnic segregation may be the only way to preserve what remains of Kosovo's multi-ethnicity. Leaders of the remaining Serbs have already endorsed the concept. At the session of the Transitional Council August 21, Kosovo's UN-created multi-ethnic consultative body, Momcilo Trajkovic, the Serb representative, argued for the formation of Serb cantons in Kosovo.
It is not multi-culturalism. But this Western concept never stood much chance, since Kosovo was multi-ethnic, but never multi-cultural.
The Albanian majority and the Serb, Turkish, Muslim Slav and Roma minorities never mixed to create a Western-style "salad bowl" of multi-culturalism, in which each ingredient preserves its flavour while simultaneously contributing to an overall taste.
Instead, the majority Albanians and the Serbs, Kosovo's biggest minority, lived parallel existences and both cultures sought to dominate the province at the expense of the other. Indeed, ethnic separation was progressing in Kosovo long before the province plunged into crisis in the late 1980s.
Ethnic homogenisation in Kosovo began in the early 1960s. Two decades later, ethnically mixed settlements were already a rarity, as both Serbs and Albanians sought security among their kin in ethnically pure villages and districts.
Ethnic segregation was institutionalised in the early 1990s after the abolition of the province's autonomy. Serbs expelled Albanians from the province's political, economic, social, educational, cultural and even sporting structures. In response, Albanians built their own separate but unequal society.
This separation initially staved off conflict, but in the longer term it created the conditions for animosity to fester and helped make the eventual war even more savage. The absence of contact between communities contributed to a demonisation of the "other" community, while the total marginalisation of the Albanians fuelled their wish to overthrow the Serb constitutional order.
Each community lived in its own political, cultural and spatial cocoon, and even informal contacts across ethnic lines were rare. Inter-ethnic marriage in 1990s' Kosovo prompted excommunication from the Albanian community.
The few mixed marriages date back to the Tito era before ethnic tensions burst into the open. However, the offspring of such unions often deny the roots of one of the parents, preferring to identify with one people or the other.
Isolated Serb hamlets dotting Kosovo provide an identifiable target for Albanians seeking revenge, much like the Albanian villages that were turned to rubble and its inhabitants killed or forced to flee before Serbian special forces. And Serbs living in close proximity with Albanians have fared little better.
NATO-led peace-keepers in Gnjilane, in eastern Kosovo, have registered Serb houses and flats for distribution of identification stickers to help protect them from Albanian revenge attacks. However, in the absence of a 24-hour guard on each dwelling, this strategy may prove counter-productive.
Meanwhile, after Serbs leaving Kosovo under their own steam were abused and killed by Albanians, the UNHCR has intervened to assist others making the trip to Serbia.
By contrast, Serbs in the divided town of Kosovska Mitrovica have taken comfort in their numbers and decided to stay put. It is precisely the division between the predominantly Serb and the predominantly Albanian parts of the town, with the Ibar river marking the demarcation line, that has made Kosovska Mitrovica the place where the largest percentage of Serbs has remained.
For all their good intentions, the peace-keepers have been impotent to halt daily killings of Serbs and the destruction of their houses and flats--and non-Albanians--Serbs, Roma and even Muslim Slavs--continue to leave Kosovo.
In these circumstances, can the establishment of safe havens for Kosovo's Serbs serve not as a prelude to the division of Kosovo but as a way to give remaining Serbs a minimum of dignity? Can they, in short, preserve what remains of the province's multi-ethnicity?
Some kind of ethnic separation may prove beneficial both for Serbs and Albanians. Unlike the separation in the 1990s that stripped Albanians of dignity, this concept is motivated by a desire to restore dignity. For Serbs it could be life-saving; for Albanians it could enable them to maintain international sympathy.
In time, the wounds of war will heal, in which case today's separation may pave the way for future interaction.Denisa Kostovicova, a doctoral candidate at Cambridge University and co-editor of "Kosovo: Myths, Conflict, War" (Keele, UK: Keele European Research Centre, 1999), is a long-time collaborator with IWPR.
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