Tagesnachrichten 14. August 1998
von ALBANEWS und anderen
weitere Presse-Meldungen
further press news
Tagesnachrichten 14. August 1998
Thursday, August 13, 1998; Page A20
MORE THAN FIVE months have passed since Secretary
of State Madeleine Albright flatly warned Serb strongman Slobodan Milosevic
that the United States would not tolerate ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. "We
are not going to stand by and watch the Serbian authorities do in Kosovo
what they can no longer get away with doing in Bosnia," Secretary Albright
declared.
Now tens of thousands of Kosovo civilians are
living like hunted animals in the woods, their homes bombed and burned
out by Mr. Milosevic's troops, their livestock slaughtered, their
crops destroyed. More than 300,000 civilians, some 15 percent of
Kosovo's total population, have been forced from their homes. Ethnic cleansing-a
"scorched-earth policy," as U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan put it-is
in full swing. And the United States is . . . standing by and watching.
Kosovo is a province of Serbia, which is in turn
the major portion of what remains of Yugoslavia. Ninety percent of Kosovo's
2 million people are ethnic Albanians, and only about 10 percent are Serbs,
but since 1989 Mr. Milosevic has denied the Albanian majority any
semblance of self-determination. As a result, an independence movement
has gained strength. Ostensibly to defeat the military arm of that movement,
Mr. Milosevic has unleashed his troops in the province. All evidence suggests,
however, that his true target is not just pro-independence guerrillas but
the entire civilian population of Albanian ethnicity.
Much of what is taking place in Mr. Milosevic's
latest war, it must be said, is not known. Having learned some lessons
from the war crimes they committed in Bosnia, Serb forces are working hard
to keep journalists, relief workers and human rights monitors away from
any evidence. One German journalist who reported on mass graves of civilians
has been expelled. But even the sketchy information emerging from the Serb
onslaught provides a clear enough picture: An 85-year-old woman shot and
slashed in her bed. An 11-year-old boy shot by a sniper while tending his
family's cattle. Truckloads of bodies driven out of captured villages.
More than 300 villages destroyed. Yesterday the target was the town of
Junik, where more than 1,000 civilians were "confined in the worst conditions,"
according to the president of the European Union Council.
So there can be little confusion about what a
State Department spokesman acknowledged is "a humanitarian catastrophe"
in the making. Yet the West responds much as it did for so long as war
crimes took place in Bosnia- threatening and cluck-clucking, wringing hands
and urging restraint.
NATO intervention, frets German Foreign Minister
Klaus Kinkel, would be "enormously complicated." And Secretary Albright?
She sent Mr. Milosevic "a very forceful message," her spokesman said, "in
which the Secretary expressed her shock and dismay over the effects of
the ongoing Serb military offensive in Kosovo . . ."
Shock and dismay? Please. The time is long past
for sending messages and for feigning surprise at Mr. Milosevic's long-established
villainy. If President Clinton and the West are not prepared to act, they
should at least have the decency to retreat into shamed silence.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
_______________________________________________________________________
Betreff:
[ALBANEWS] Press: The Washington Post (August 13, 1998)
Datum:
Thu, 13 Aug 1998 15:25:49 -0400
Von:
Qeme Lumi <qlumi@CIVS.COM>
Editorial
'Shock and Dismay'
Thursday, August 13, 1998; Page A20
MORE THAN FIVE months have passed since Secretary
of State Madeleine Albright flatly warned Serb strongman Slobodan Milosevic
that the United States would not tolerate ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. "We
are not going to stand by and watch the Serbian authorities do in Kosovo
what they can no longer get away with doing in Bosnia," Secretary Albright
declared.
Now tens of thousands of Kosovo civilians are
living like hunted animals in the woods, their homes bombed and burned
out by Mr. Milosevic's troops, their livestock slaughtered, their
crops destroyed. More than 300,000 civilians, some 15 percent of
Kosovo's total population, have been forced from their homes. Ethnic cleansing-a
"scorched-earth policy," as U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan put it-is
in full swing. And the United States is . . . standing by and watching.
Kosovo is a province of Serbia, which is in turn
the major portion of what remains of Yugoslavia. Ninety percent of Kosovo's
2 million people are ethnic Albanians, and only about 10 percent are Serbs,
but since 1989 Mr. Milosevic has denied the Albanian majority any
semblance of self-determination. As a result, an independence movement
has gained strength. Ostensibly to defeat the military arm of that movement,
Mr. Milosevic has unleashed his troops in the province. All evidence suggests,
however, that his true target is not just pro-independence guerrillas but
the entire civilian population of Albanian ethnicity.
Much of what is taking place in Mr. Milosevic's
latest war, it must be said, is not known. Having learned some lessons
from the war crimes they committed in Bosnia, Serb forces are working hard
to keep journalists, relief workers and human rights monitors away from
any evidence. One German journalist who reported on mass graves of civilians
has been expelled. But even the sketchy information emerging from the Serb
onslaught provides a clear enough picture: An 85-year-old woman shot and
slashed in her bed. An 11-year-old boy shot by a sniper while tending his
family's cattle. Truckloads of bodies driven out of captured villages.
More than 300 villages destroyed. Yesterday the target was the town of
Junik, where more than 1,000 civilians were "confined in the worst conditions,"
according to the president of the European Union Council.
So there can be little confusion about what a
State Department spokesman acknowledged is "a humanitarian catastrophe"
in the making. Yet the West responds much as it did for so long as war
crimes took place in Bosnia- threatening and cluck-clucking, wringing hands
and urging restraint.
NATO intervention, frets German Foreign Minister
Klaus Kinkel, would be "enormously complicated." And Secretary Albright?
She sent Mr. Milosevic "a very forceful message," her spokesman said, "in
which the Secretary expressed her shock and dismay over the effects of
the ongoing Serb military offensive in Kosovo . . ."
Shock and dismay? Please. The time is long past
for sending messages and for feigning surprise at Mr. Milosevic's long-established
villainy. If President Clinton and the West are not prepared to act, they
should at least have the decency to retreat into shamed silence.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
14 August 1998
TRANSCRIPT: SPECIAL STATE DEPARTMENT BRIEFING
AUGUST 13
EXCERPTS.
(US embassies, Kosovo, N. Korea, Burma) (5860)
State Department Deputy Spokesman James Foley
briefed.
.....
KOSOVO -- The decision by the Kosovar Albanians
to form a negotiating team to talk to the Serbs is welcomed by the United
States, Foley said.
But he added that "the
continuing Serb offensive and the effect that Serb military action is having
on civilians in Kosovo runs counter to (Yugoslav) President (Slobodan)
Milosevic's professed desire and professed commitment to sit down at the
negotiating table."
Asked about the significance
of the fact that the Kosovar Albanian negotiating team does not include
members of the Kosovo Liberation Army, Foley responded: "We expect that
the negotiating team will enjoy the broad support of the ethnic Albanian
population of Kosovo who want to resume their normal lives and see the
political process move forward. And we certainly hope and expect that the
UCK (another acronym for the Kosovo Liberation Army) and other armed factions
will also see that a political solution is the only answer."
....
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Office of the Spokesman
SPECIAL BRIEFING ON THE RECORD, OFF CAMERA BY DEPUTY SPOKESMAN JAMES B. FOLEY AND DIRECTOR OF THE PRESS OFFICE LEE McCLENNY
Washington, D.C. August 13, 1998
....
Q: Could I ask you a couple of questions about Kosovo? I saw the statement about the all-party executive. But it looks like the situation on the ground is going from bad to worse, with the Serbs wiping out villages and starting what appears to be another offensive. Are you planning anything in response to that?
FOLEY: I think probably I should start by just
talking about our understanding of what the situation on the ground is.
Heavy fighting continues in the Decani area today. After several days of
fighting, the town of Drenica is quiet. Although there is no definitive
information, reports indicate that 13 Albanians were killed there Kosovar
Albanians. The town of Likovac, which was taken by Serb forces and then
abandoned, is also reported to be calm.
Let me add that we are
outraged at the ongoing attack in Junik. The town of Junik has been under
siege by Serb forces for over a week, and is now reported to be under heavy
attack.
Q: What town is that?
FOLEY: J-u-n-i-k. The Kosovo diplomatic observer
mission teams have been denied access to this area. We expect Serb authorities
to grant full access to this area. Reports indicate that the Serbs have
mined paths around the village and refugees from the Junik area, and entering
Albania and have been treated for injuries consistent with anti-personnel
land mines. Refugees also report that up to 1,000 civilians remain in the
town of Junik, which is under heavy fire from surrounding Serb forces.
The United States strongly
condemns the indiscriminate use of force by Serb forces against the town
of Junik and the mining of civilian areas.
Let me update you on
the humanitarian situation, too and then I'll get to your question. The
humanitarian situation remains dire, with many thousands of displaced persons
still unable to return to their homes or areas accessible to aid agencies.
Internally displaced persons will not come out of the woods and areas of
refuge until there are secure conditions for their return. While there
are reports of continuing returns, the pace is far too slow. We will continue
to measure progress by actual events on the ground.
At the same time, we
condemn action that produces additional refugees and internally displaced
persons -- which is occurring even while Milosevic makes promises to facilitate
their return. We condemn any actions, including food blockades, denied
access for humanitarian organizations and violence against civilians, that
jeopardizes the well-being of civilians and further exacerbates the humanitarian
crisis. The Kosovo diplomatic observer mission is monitoring the welfare
of displaced persons in conjunction with humanitarian and assistance organizations.
We expect the Serbs
to provide full access for the Kosovo diplomatic observer mission and other
groups assisting internally displaced persons. Time is running out to avert
an even greater humanitarian disaster in Kosovo. Immediate action is needed
by Serb officials to stop the growth in the numbers of internally displaced
persons and create safe conditions for their return.
Now, in answer to your
specific question, you've seen the statement that we've put out in which
we welcomed the announcement by Dr. Rugova today of the formation of the
Kosovar Albanian negotiating team. We think this is an important development,
but clearly the continuing Serb offensive and the effect that Serb military
action is having on civilians in Kosovo runs counter to President Milosevic's
professed desire and professed commitment to sit down at the negotiating
table.
Q: At what point does NATO move?
FOLEY: We believe that the fact that Dr. Rugova
has been able today to announce the formation of a Kosovar negotiating
team puts President Milosevic in a position where his willingness to negotiate
will now be fully tested. Until this point, while efforts were under way
to put together a Kosovar Albanian negotiating team, the prospect of negotiations
was one that was hypothetical. Now we have a Kosovar Albanian negotiating
team on the one hand; we have Milosevic's stated willingness to negotiate
on the other hand; and the time for testing is now upon us -- we need to
move to negotiations. Clearly, in order for them to prosper and succeed,
there has to be peaceful conditions. So the entire focus of the international
community, and NATO nations notably, will be on President Milosevic. So
we expect to see him show a willingness not only to negotiate, but to create
the conditions necessary to make negotiations succeed.
As you know, I'd refer
you to NATO itself I believe Secretary General Solana issued a statement
I think it was yesterday, was it indicating NATO's resolve; and we know
that military planning has, in some areas, been completed. There's ongoing
military planning for different operations and different contingencies;
I'd refer you to them as to the status of the planning. But that moves
forward. We hope that it's possible to achieve a negotiated solution, a
diplomatic solution, to this conflict and that the use of force will not
be necessary. But the onus now is on President Milosevic.
Q: Jim, the negotiating team announced by Rugova doesn't contain any KLA people. So is it going to be able --
Q: (Inaudible.)
Q: Is it going to be able to represent the ethnic Albanians?
FOLEY: We expect that the negotiating team will enjoy the broad support of the ethnic Albanian population of Kosovo who want to resume their normal lives and see the political process move forward. And we certainly hope and expect that the UCK and other armed factions will also see that a political solution is the only answer. But, as I indicated, we realize that the formation of this Kosovar Albanian negotiating team and the resumption of talks are only the beginning. The process will not be easy as long as violence continues. So it is essential now that both sides sit down at the negotiating table and accept responsibility for ending the violence in Kosovo.
Q: It seems to me there's a lack of urgency here. When the violence started at the end of February there was a foreign ministers' meeting of the Contact Group within nine or ten days; and there was a real sense of urgency in those days. The situation has deteriorated dramatically over the past six months. And you see editorials quoting what the Secretary was saying back in March Milosevic won't be able to do in Kosovo what he can no longer do in Bosnia and so forth. I'm just wondering, what happened to the urgency of March?
FOLEY: Our sense of urgency has not diminished;
but I think you'll acknowledge that our efforts in recent weeks have been
focused on getting negotiations started. We have not abandoned hope for
getting negotiations started. On the contrary, we have bit of good news
today. We do not want to have to use force if diplomacy can prevail. I
think that's generally true around the world. But clearly, diplomacy that's
not backed by force is less effective, and we've indicated that the ongoing
Serb offensive increases the chances of NATO military intervention.
We think that President
Milosevic himself has to understand that there is no military solution
to this conflict. It is true that Serb forces have scored victories in
the last weeks against the UCK at horrendous human costs; and there is
concern that that may foster illusions on President Milosevic's part. We
believe that continued military action will only further radicalize the
situation and make it all the harder to achieve a negotiated solution which
is, in fact, in the FRY's interest. We think they ought to halt that Milosevic
ought to halt it immediately and we'll be looking to that in the days to
come.
.....
NEWS: KOSOVA UPDATE, AUGUST 14, 1998/B
Taken without permission, for fair use only.
- Hundreds Flee Kosovo Fighting
Albania on Brink of Retaliation
for 1st Time
As Yugoslav Soldiers Fire Across
Border
Washington Post, August 14, 1998;
- Kosovo Rebels May Revert to Tactic That Won
Early Gains
The Christian Science Monitor, August 14, 1998;
- KLA guerrillas elect to stay out of Kosovan
talks
The Irish Times, August 14, 1998;
- Mixed messages from opposing sides blurs Kosovo
peace talks
MSNBC, August 14, 1998;
- Kosovo Albanians: Serbs must halt attacks to
talk
Reuters, August 14, 1998;
- Kosovo Negotiators Lack Support
AP, August 14, 1998;
___________________________________
Hundreds Flee Kosovo Fighting
Albania on Brink of Retaliation for 1st Time As Yugoslav Soldiers Fire Across Border
By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, August 14, 1998; Page A27
TIRANA, Albania, Aug. 13—As many as 560 soldiers
of the Kosovo Liberation Army and roughly 240 ethnic Albanian civilians
from embattled Kosovo province of Serbia eluded pursuing Yugoslav army
and Interior Ministry troops and made their way to sanctuary in northern
Albania today, according to senior Albanian officials and international
aid workers.
The exodus from Kosovo,
one of the largest in recent months, provoked a brief firefight at the
border between Yugoslav troops who fired into Albanian territory and a
number of guerrillas and local residents who fired back. The Albanian army
responded by evacuating farmers and rushing troops to the border from a
nearby garrison, the officials said. But no wider conflict ensued.
Aid workers described
the clash as highly dangerous, not only because of the firing from Yugoslavia
but also because those shots enraged the Albanians, who generally have
supported the independence aspirations of their ethnic kin to the north
in Kosovo but have avoided direct involvement in the conflict there. They
said an emissary of the Albanian government had to intervene to calm the
fighters and the local populace to avoid additional fighting.
Although a few shots
have been exchanged previously by the two nations' border guards, the incident
was the first to threaten a direct confrontation between members of their
respective military forces. Most officials here previously had described
the likelihood of a direct clash as extremely low because the mountainous
border between the two countries inhibits direct contact.
"Serb forces shot at
Albanians," said Albanian President Rexhep Meidani in an interview late
today. He added that "it was the first time that the [Albanian] army was
ready to give a response." The Albanians present "wanted to attack from
our border" but fired a volley that lasted for only "some minutes."
He predicted, however,
that "the situation is going to be worse" in the coming weeks and months
because of the concentration of Yugoslav troops and heavy weaponry near
the Albanian border and unconfirmed reports that several thousand more
people are gathered near the frontier in an effort to reach Albania.
An estimated 15,000
ethnic Albanians have fled to Albania since late February, when the Yugoslav
government launched an offensive against the Kosovo Liberation Army. The
guerrilla group has been fighting for Kosovo's independence from Serbia,
Yugoslavia's most important republic, but recently it has experienced major
military setbacks.
Aid workers and officials
said that those fleeing Kosovo today were from four villages near Junik,
a town in southwestern Kosovo five miles from the Albanian border, and
possibly from the town itself. A longtime rebel stronghold, the town has
been under siege for several weeks, provoking international expressions
of concern about the fate of hundreds of civilians who are believed trapped
there along with a hard-core group of guerrillas.
Some ethnic Albanians
crossing the border reportedly said the town had fallen to the Serbs today,
according to Timothy Isles, deputy head of the Albania office of the Organization
for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which has deployed 22 monitors
at seven locations along the border with Yugoslavia. "It looks apparent
to us, based on preliminary reports, that Junik has fallen," he said.
But the Serb-run Media
Information Center in Pristina, Kosovo's capital, denied the Yugoslav military
had achieved a victory. Meidani said he understood that Serbian forces
"created a corridor" from the area to facilitate the exodus, until they
fired on fleeing guerrillas. Twenty-five people were wounded in the exchange,
and two Albanian army helicopters promptly ferried four of them to hospitals
here in the capital.
In Pristina today, U.S.
and allied countries gave their blessing to a new team of ethnic Albanians
that will try to negotiate a cease-fire with the Yugoslav government. The
team was created by the elected head of Kosovo's ethnic Albanian community,
Ibrahim Rugova, but it lacks representation from dissident political leaders
who are considered close to the Kosovo Liberation Army.
"The idea is to see
if they can start showing some success" in talks with Belgrade, which will
provoke other ethnic Albanian leaders to join the effort later, a U.S.
official said.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
___________________________________
FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, 1998
INTERNATIONAL
Kosovo Rebels May Revert to Tactic That Won Early Gains
• A guerrilla fight may be last hope versus Serbs, who now appear to be pushing for a rout before any talks.
Justin Brown
Special to The Christian Science Monitor
BELGRADE, YUGOSLAVIA
In an ongoing offensive aimed at crushing separatist
rebels, Serbian forces rolled through central and western Kosovo this week,
dimming the hopes for peace talks.
The month-old operation
has pushed the ethnic Albanian Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) from many of
its strongholds and flooded the region with internal refugees, of which
international monitors now estimate there are 240,000.
In the attacks, Serbian
forces have burned villages, destroyed crops, and killed livestock - an
apparent attempt to dissuade ethnic Albanians civilians from supporting
the KLA, observers say.
As heavy fighting continued
near the border with Albania, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan
this week called the military tactics of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic
a "scorched-earth policy."
Diplomats say the crucial
question now is how the battered guerrilla force will react to the Serbian
offensive.
A KLA statement issued
this week says the Serbian attacks have "only strengthened our resolve
to bravely continue on the road to freedom."
But military analysts
say it is more likely that the KLA will regroup and go back to the more
traditional guerrilla tactics it used successfully at the early stages
of the conflict.
In the spring the KLA
made steady gains by hiding in the hills and launching hit-and-run attacks
on isolated Serbian police patrols. The Serbs appeared lost as they gave
chase and fell into one trap after another.
But with each success,
the KLA grew bolder, parading for the press, capturing towns and even overrunning
a crucial coal mine just miles away from the provincial capital of Pristina.
When it came time to
defend their newly acquired land, the KLA was no match for Serbian tanks
and mortar shells.
Now they struggle to
keep their few remaining strongholds and have the added burden of caring
for internal refugees.
The Serbs have regained
their bargaining position, but do not seem ready to go to the table until
the rebels have been routed.
Meanwhile, the international
community continues to map out contingency plans for military action if
the violence continues to escalate.
Those plans took on
added weight this week when Russia, once considered the main opposition
to using force against the Serbs, said it may send troops to join NATO
exercises near Kosovo - a signal that Moscow may reconsider its stance.
The UN is weighing airstrikes
against Serbian military bases as well as implementing a force on the Yugoslav-Albanian
border to stem the flow of arms between the two countries. Nevertheless,
diplomats have made firm distinctions between Kosovo and the war in Bosnia,
in which airstrikes against the Bosnian Serbs were a precursor to peace
talks. Shoring up support for armed intervention in Kosovo would be a major
undertaking, diplomats say.
With both sides resisting
peace talks, international powers have had to refocus their strategy in
Serbia's southern province, where decades of tension erupted into fighting
Feb. 28.
Western diplomats have
expressed frustration at trying to negotiate with the KLA guerrillas. The
KLA has fractured the ethnic Albanian political front and put increasing
pressure on Ibrahim Rugova, a US-backed pacifist elected overwhelmingly
by ethnic Albanians in underground elections in 1992 and again this year.
Both Mr. Rugova and
the KLA want independence for Kosovo, where ethnic Albanians are 90 percent
of the population. But Rugova is perceived as being more willing to settle
for broad autonomy - the position favored by the international community.
The US, which is spearheading
attempts at mediation, has sought to create a united front between the
KLA and Rugova. Those efforts have been foiled, however, by the KLA's apparent
unwillingness to negotiate.
"Some of these [KLA]
voices don't amount to much," says a diplomatic source in the Balkans.
"So we have to go with people who can produce, like Rugova."
The source says Rugova
is close to announcing a new negotiating team to possibly meet with the
Serbs. Previous talks were cut off early this summer when the Serbs launched
a major attack in western Kosovo and the Albanians said they could not
negotiate "with a gun to our heads."
___________________________________
IRISH TIMES
WORLDFriday, August 14, 1998
KLA guerrillas elect to stay out of Kosovan talks
Kosovo: Separatist Albanians yesterday named a
team to conduct peace talks in Kosovo as western envoys urged the Yugoslav
authorities to join in negotiations to end the conflict.
Ethnic Albanian political
leaders were, however, unable to coax representatives of the hard-line
Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) into the negotiating team, raising doubts
about the prospects of an early settlement.
Six months of fighting
between the KLA and Serbian security forces have killed over 500 people
and forced more than 200,000 people to flee into the hills. With winter
just two months away, talks must start soon to avert a humanitarian disaster.
Mr Ibrahim Rugova, the
leader of Kosovo's biggest party, the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK),
announced his team in the company of the big power Contact Group envoys,
representatives of the European Union presidency and the current chairman
of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
"The situation in Kosovo
is very dangerous and very grave, so we must move into a negotiating process.
We want to have a climate for negotiations that will eventually take the
people under protection," Mr Rugova said.
"I have appointed a
negotiating team which encloses representatives of the political parties
represented in the parliament of Kosovo," he said. The assembly was elected
last March in a vote unrecognised by Yugoslav authorities who for a decade
have maintained harsh police rule in Kosovo, a province of Serbia whose
1.8 million population is 90 per cent ethnic Albanian.
"We appeal to the Yugoslav
side to take this chance and enter into a substantial dialogue," said the
Austrian ambassador, Mr Wolfgang Petritsch, representing the EU.
Mr Rugova named five
Kosovar party chiefs as negotiators, but will not himself be on the team,
a gesture to Western mediators anxious to bypass objections to his lofty
leadership style.
Western diplomats said
Mr Adem Demaqi, a former political prisoner regarded by some as the Nelson
Mandela of Kosovo, had rejected a role in negotiations. Earlier, sources
at the ethnic Albanian Koha Ditore daily newspaper said the KLA had named
Mr Demaqi as its envoy on the talks team. Mr Rugova's relations with the
KLA have been poor to non-existent and the guerrillas, funded by right-wing
emigré Albanian groups, have resisted political control.
The US special envoy,
Mr Chris Hill, told reporters: "With the formation of this team, Albanians
are demonstrating their readiness to engage in meaningful negotiation.
The other [Yugoslav] side must do the same ... " Ethnic Albanians demand
complete independence from Yugoslavia, while Belgrade is prepared to discuss
only as yet undefined forms of autonomy.
Meanwhile, in Tirana,
Albania has branded Serb attacks on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo and military
violations of its border as intolerable. In its second protest in three
days, the Albanian foreign ministry said violations of its border by Serb
troops fighting rebels of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) looked like
becoming routine.
"Every delay in solving
the Kosovo conflict increases the size of the bloodshed and the humanitarian
catastrophe there as well as the danger of it spreading to the rest of
the region," the foreign ministry statement said.
___________________________________
Friday August 14 11:03 AM ET
Mixed messages from opposing sides blurs Kosovo peace talks
PRISTINA, Yugoslavia - Kosovo's main Albanian
leader said he has formed a team to enter peace talks with the Yugoslav
government, though rebels fighting for independence won't join the discussions.
His announcement came shortly after reports suggested the rebels might
appoint a team, leaving observers wondering if the contradictory information
reflects a split among ethic Albanian leaders.
Ibrahim Rugova said
the Kosovo Liberation Army declined his offer to participate, as did two
leading politicians with close links to the guerrillas, raising doubts
about the prospects of the peace effort.
"There are open seats
for other representatives and politicians to be included," Rugova said
at a news conference.
There was no immediate
response from the Yugoslav government, which has offered to discuss restoring
self-rule to Kosovo, which President Slobodan Milosevic withdrew in 1989.
Milosevic's offer of
autonomy, supported by the United States and the Europeans, falls short
of the KLA's goal of complete independence from Serbia, the largest of
two republics that form Yugoslavia. Ethnic Albanians form 90 percent of
Kosovo's 2 million population, and most favor independence.
U.S. envoy Christopher
Hill and other representatives of the so-called Contact Group - the United
States, Russia, Britain, France, Germany and Italy - were on hand for the
announcement to show their support for Rugova. The ethnic Albanian leader
also supports independence but has renounced violence.
Rugova and Western powers
had hoped for a broad-based delegation to represent the Albanian community.
But the KLA, as well
as politicians Adem Demaci and Mehmet Hajrizi, declined to join, possibly
handicapping the peace efforts.
Western diplomats, speaking
on condition of anonymity, said Rugova decided to go ahead without the
others to move the negotiating process off dead center. The diplomats said
they hoped that if the talks showed signs of progress, the others might
join.
But Albanian sources,
also speaking on condition of anonymity, said Demaci may be moving to establish
a political wing of the KLA, which could challenge Rugova's credentials
as the leader of the Albanian community.
In a statement distributed
earlier to ethnic Albanian journalists, the KLA said they had designed
their own seven-member team to represent them in any talks. Demaci was
designated as head of the team on condition he would give up his position
in his Parliamentary Party.
Rugova's position among
Albanians has been seriously undermined since his moderate approach failed
to halt both the five-month Serb crackdown on Albanian extremists or achieve
goals of self-rule.
The rebels have remained
firm despite recent setbacks on the battlefield.
The government's Tanjug
news agency said Serb police Wednesday fought their way into the former
rebel stronghold of Glodjane following two days of fierce fighting.
Meanwhile fighting continued
in western Kosovo where Serbian forces are trying to stamp out the last
pockets of ethnic Albanian rebels.
Relief agencies have
warned that Kosovo would suffer a humanitarian disaster unless the tens
of thousands of people displaced by six months of fighting are re-settled
in their homes before the weather starts to turn cold, which in the hill
districts can happen as soon as next month.
Some refugees have started
to trickle home even thought they don't know if their villages or livestock
have survived.
___________________________________
Kosovo Albanians: Serbs must halt attacks to talk
11:18 a.m. Aug 14, 1998 Eastern
By Mark Heinrich
PRISTINA, Serbia (Reuters) - Serb security forces
must stop attacks on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo before peace talks begin,
the main Kosovo Albanian leader said on Friday.
"The Serb offensive
has to stop first," Ibrahim Rugova, president of Kosovo's ethnic Albanians,
told a news conference.
"There has to be an
appropriate climate for meaningful dialogue. And that is indispensable,"
he told reporters, a day after naming a five-person delegation to restart
suspended peace talks with the Serb authorities in Belgrade.
In the course of a three-week
offensive, the Serbs have ejected ethnic Albanian separatist guerrillas
of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) from most of the towns and villages
they took during a six-month campaign.
Serb sources said fighting
in Serbia's southernmost province had come to a virtual halt after sporadic
clashes throughout the week. But Rugova said the Serb offensive to rout
the KLA was continuing, and the humanitarian situation of displaced Kosovo
Albanians "is especially grave and desperate."
Rugova is at odds with
the KLA in advocating passive resistance to Serbian rule in Kosovo. But
both seek independence for the province, whose population of about two
million people is 90 percent ethnic Albanian.
Rugova, elected president
of an ethnic Albanian government not recognized by Belgrade and Western
powers, agreed under intense pressure from the United States to resume
negotiations, which the Albanians boycotted in March and suspended in June.
Relief agencies have
predicted a humanitarian disaster in Kosovo if an estimated 200,000 people
displaced from their homes and farms by the fighting are not resettled
before the onset of cold weather in about two months' time.
Rugova said Serb forces
were preventing people from returning to their homes in towns like Malisevo,
which was totally emptied during the Serb offensive.
"The return of displaced
persons to Malisevo and other villages is being obstructed by the Serbian
police," he said.
Rugova said the process
of return should be monitored by the international community and added:
"We urge NATO, the United Nations and the European Union to take the people
of Kosovo under their protection."
He reiterated his position
in favor of Kosovo's independence.
"We stress that the
best solution for Kosovo is independence with guarantees for the local
Serbs and international protectorate status in the interim," he said.
Independence has been
rejected by the West and by Belgrade, which has nevertheless agreed to
resume talks.
Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
___________________________________
Friday August 14 7:19 AM EDT
Kosovo Negotiators Lack Support
ISMET HAJDARI Associated Press Writer
PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (AP) - Kosovo's leading Albanian
politician said today peace talks with the Serbian government cannot begin
until fighting in the province stops. Another influential Albanian said
foreign troops may be needed to guarantee a cease-fire.
On Thursday, Ibrahim
Rugova announced he had formed a delegation to begin talks with the government
of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic on the future of the rebellious
Serbian province. But Rugova failed to convince the rebel Kosovo Liberation
Army to join the team.
Rugova told a news conference
today that the government must first halt its military offensive against
the KLA "in order to create a favorable atmosphere for the start of the
dialogue."
Another influential
Kosovo Albanian leader, Mahmut Bakalli, was more explicit.
"I think we are no closer
to real talks," said Bakalli, who took part in talks which broke down in
May. "We must first have a cease-fire on the ground and enable thousands
of refugees return to their homes."
He said those were "essential
conditions" which "cannot be fulfilled without a direct international military
and political intervention."
The KLA is fighting
for independence for Kosovo, a province in southern Serbia whose population
of 2 million is 90 percent ethnic Albanian. Serbia is the dominant of two
republics remaining in Yugoslavia.
The Americans and Europeans
have drawn back from taking a decision on sending troops to Kosovo, partly
because of Russian opposition and also because they do not want to be drawn
into a Balkan war.
But Pentagon spokesman
Kenneth Bacon said the United States would "strongly consider some sort
of participation" in a NATO-led peacekeeping force, if talks between the
Albanians and the government create the right conditions.
But the failure of Rugova
and his international backers to convince secessionist rebels to join the
talks raises doubts of whether a cease-fire can be arranged.
Milosevic has offered
to negotiate autonomy but not independence, a position supported by the
United States and the Europeans.
In Germany, Defense
Minister Volker Ruehe said the time had come for "a serious discussion
of an active intervention" by NATO in Kosovo. "We must now finally go on
the offensive with the political debate," Ruehe told Bild newspaper.
U.S. envoy Christopher
Hill, who for weeks has been struggling to persuade ethnic Albanian rebels
and politicians to stop squabbling and join forces, said the ongoing violence
in Kosovo made it imperative to start talks immediately - with or without
the rebels.
The ethnic Albanians'
five-member team includes mainly disciples of Rugova, a pacifist supported
by one branch of the KLA and despised by others.
Rugova, Hill and European
diplomats hope the rebels and other ethnic Albanian politicians will join
negotiations with Milosevic if they see progress is being made toward autonomy
for Kosovo.
"There are open seats
for other representatives and politicians to be included" in talks, Rugova
said Thursday after announcing his team.
Vice President Nikola
Sainovic said a Serb delegation has been ready for months to resume talks.
Milosevic has offered
to discuss restoring a version of the self-rule he revoked from Kosovo
in 1989. But it remains unclear how much autonomy Milosevic is willing
to grant the province, which some Serbs consider the medieval cradle of
their national identity.
Austrian Foreign Minister
Wolfgang Schuessel, speaking as the current European Union president, welcomed
the announcement of an ethnic Albanian negotiating team as "a first step
in the right direction."
The Russian government
also hailed the move.
Since 1991, ethnic Albanians
have sought independence from what they call the oppression of the Milosevic
regime. The Albanians have declared a self-styled "Republic of Kosovo"
and elected Rugova as president.
(Iraq, Kosovo, Russia, India-Pakistan) (970)
White House Press Secretary Mike McCurry and Deputy Press Secretary Colonel P.J. Crowley answered reporters' questions at an afternoon briefing.
EXCERPTS
US AWAITS RESPONSE FROM PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC ON KOSOVO TALKS
Crowley said that "through the hard work" in Kosovo
of Chris Hill, the US Ambassador to the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia,
Albanian Kosovar leader Ibrahim Rugova "has formed his negotiating team,
and we await a similar response from President Milosevic," President of
the "Federal Republic of Yugoslavia," regarding discussions on the future
of embattled Kosovo province.
...
(Supports new negotiating authority for Kosovo Albanians) (670)
Pristina, Kosovo, "Federal Republic of Yugoslavia"
-- Christopher Hill, U.S. ambassador to the Former Yugoslav Republic of
Macedonia, expressed "full support" for the new Kosovar Albanian negotiating
team announced by Dr. Ibrahim Rugova August 13.
Hill said that representatives
of the Contact Group, the European Union presidency, and the chairman-in-office
of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) also
support the negotiating team, which is "prepared to resume the process
of negotiations despite the fact that violence is continuing on the ground.
It is precisely because of the violence that it is so important to restart
negotiations."
To the Albanians in
Kosovo, Hill said, "We hope and expect that all elements of your community
will come to support this [negotiating] process. To those who for whatever
reason do not, I ask that they reserve their judgment and allow the process
to go forward."
He added that the United
States "will remain an active partner in finding a resolution to the Kosovo
problem. We will not abandon the search. Together with our colleagues in
the Contact Group, we will do all we can to encourage the peace process."
Following is the text of the statement:
(Begin text)
STATEMENT OF AMBASSADOR CHRISTOPHER R. HILL
Pristina, August 13, 1998
I am here, together with representatives of the
Contact Group, the EU Presidency, and the OSCE Chairman-in-Office to express
our full support for the new negotiating team that has been announced today.
This team is prepared to resume the process of negotiations despite the
fact that violence is continuing on the ground. It is precisely because
of the violence that it is so important to restart negotiations.
With the formation of
this team, Albanians are demonstrating their readiness to engage in meaningful
negotiations. The other side must do the same. Without negotiations, the
people of Kosovo will continue to suffer. With negotiations, we can end
the conflict and allow people to resume their lives and build a new future.
I know that the international
press corps is here today in large numbers, but for a moment I want to
speak through the local press to the Albanians in Kosovo. This negotiating
team has been created to represent your interests. It is responsible to
you. This team will have the critical task of negotiating agreements that
end the violence, foster democracy, and establish the basis for a fair
solution to the overall problem of Kosovo.
These are tasks that
cannot wait even one more day, because with every passing day, people lose
hope that Kosovo can be a safe and secure place in which to live. We must
restore this hope and look to Kosovo's future.
Let me be very clear
-- the violence must stop, and it must stop immediately. There is no military
solution to Kosovo. The only result of continued fighting will be continued
suffering. Sadly, it is ordinary people -- the residents of each town and
village -- who suffer the most from this conflict. They don't deserve this.
Those who are displaced deserve to come home in safety and security. They
deserve a political negotiation that will quickly yield concrete results.
We hope and expect that
all elements of your community will come to support this process. To those
who for whatever reason do not, I ask that they reserve their judgment
and allow the process to go forward.
The U.S. will remain
an active partner in finding a resolution to the Kosovo problem. We will
not abandon the search. Together with our colleagues in the Contact Group,
we will do all we can to encourage the peace process. In the coming days,
we will work hand-in-hand with the negotiating teams to push ahead. Anyone
who has spent any time in Kosovo over the recent weeks and months understands
that there is simply no alternative.
(End text)
(Welcomes new negotiating team; urges Serbs to negotiate) (300)
Washington -- Deputy State Department spokesman
James Foley said August 13 that the United States "welcomes Dr. Ibrahim
Rugova's announcement today of the formation of a Kosovar Albanian negotiating
team."
He added, "By taking
this step, the leadership of the Kosovar Albanian community has demonstrated
its readiness to engage in a meaningful negotiation. The Serbian authorities
must now do the same."
Following is the State Department announcement:
(Begin text):
US DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Office of the Spokesman
August 13, 1998
STATEMENT BY JAMES B. FOLEY, DEPUTY SPOKESMAN
KOSOVAR ALBANIAN NEGOTIATING TEAM
The United States Government welcomes Dr. Ibrahim
Rugova's announcement today of the formation of a Kosovar Albanian negotiating
team. Ambassador Chris Hill, Charge Richard Miles, and other representatives
of the Contact Group were present at the announcement in Pristina. The
United States applauds this important step forward. By taking this step,
the leadership of the Kosovar Albanian community has demonstrated its readiness
to engage in a meaningful negotiation. The Serbian authorities must now
do the same.
Resolution of the crisis
in Kosovo can only be reached through a process of negotiation. Formation
of this Kosovar Albanian negotiating team marks the beginning of a process,
a new and promising one, but there is much more to be done to reach settlement.
The process will not be easy, especially while violence continues. The
United States calls for a halt to current offensive actions, particularly
in the Decani and Junik areas. It is critical that both sides sit down
at the negotiating table and accept responsibility for ending this conflict.
The United States and other Contact Group countries will immediately consult
with the new Kosovar Albanian team in preparation for resumption of talks
with Serbian authorities.
(End text)
Taken without permission, for fair use only.
-U.S. Mulls NATO Support in Kosovo
AP, August 14, 1998
-Kosovo Negotiators Face Drawback
AP, August 14, 1998
-Albanian turmoil as Serbs capture key Kosovo
towns
The Times. London, August 14, 1998
-KLA left out of peace team
BBC Online, August 14, 1998
-Serbs must halt attacks to talk - Kosovo Albanians
Reuters, August 14, 1998,
-Without rebel role, Kosovo peace process is
shaky
Reuters, August 14, 1998,
-Ethnic Kosovo Chief Picks Negotiators, Excluding
Rebels
The NY Times, August 14, 1998.
___________________________________
Friday August 14 3:24 AM EDT
U.S. Mulls NATO Support in Kosovo
WASHINGTON (AP) - If a diplomatic solution can
be found to the crisis in Kosovo, the United States would "strongly consider
some sort of participation" in a NATO-led peacekeeping force, the Pentagon's
spokesman said.
The NATO alliance is
preparing "plans for both air and ground operations" in the province, Defense
Department spokesman Kenneth Bacon told reporters Thursday.
Bacon greeted the move
Thursday by Kosovar Albanians, who have formed a team to enter peace talks
with the Yugoslav government. However, the rebels seeking independence
for Kosovo have not agreed to participate.
The spokesman noted
that any decision on participation in a NATO force would be up to President
Clinton, and one he would make only after consulting with military leaders
and Congress.
The goal of U.S. policy
is a diplomatic settlement, he added.
But in the meantime,
NATO's top military officer, Gen. Wesley Clark, is informally querying
alliance members on whether they could contribute air forces in the event
an air operation or exercise might be needed in the region - should diplomacy
fail, Bacon said.
That could range from
a "show of force to significant military action," he added. "Right now
the primary consideration is on putting together a possible air force,
if necessary."
If a cease-fire or peace
agreement were reached, NATO could shift to putting together a ground force
to support such an effort, he said.
"NATO hasn't reached
that stage yet. I think it's fair to say that the United States would strongly
consider some sort of participation ... in a force to enforce a cease-fire
or a peace agreement," Bacon said.
The U.N. High Commissioner
for Refugees estimates that up to 240,000 people have been displaced by
the fighting. Tens of thousands are hiding in forests and hills of Kosovo,
fearful of reprisals if they return home.
___________________________________
Friday August 14 4:56 AM EDT
Kosovo Negotiators Face Drawback
ANNE THOMPSON Associated Press Writer
PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (AP) - A team of Kosovo's
ethnic Albanians chosen to negotiate peace with the Serbian government
faces a serious drawback: a lack of support from the rebel army fighting
for the province's independence.
Ibrahim Rugova, Kosovo's
leading ethnic Albanian politician, announced Thursday the composition
of his negotiating team, but he failed to win the backing of the underground
Kosovo Liberation Army.
Representatives of Secretary
of State Madeleine Albright were scheduled to meet today with the team
to hammer out a platform for negotiations with the Serbian government.
But the failure to obtain
KLA support is a serious drawback because sustained negotiations are inconceivable
without a stable cease-fire. So is any peace settlement without the rebel
force's approval.
The KLA is fighting
for independence for Kosovo, a province in southern Serbia whose population
of 2 million is 90 percent ethnic Albanian. Serbia is the dominant of two
republics remaining in Yugoslavia.
U.S. envoy Christopher
Hill, who for weeks has been struggling to persuade ethnic Albanian rebels
and politicians to stop squabbling and join forces, said the ongoing violence
in Kosovo made it imperative to start talks immediately - with or without
the rebels.
The ethnic Albanians'
five-member team comprises mainly disciples of Rugova, a pacifist supported
by one branch of the KLA and despised by others.
Rugova, Hill and European
diplomats hope the rebels and other ethnic Albanian politicians will join
negotiations with Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic if they see progress
is being made toward autonomy for Kosovo.
"There are open seats
for other representatives and politicians to be included" in talks, Rugova
said. He was surrounded by Hill and representatives of the so-called Contact
Group - the United States, Russia, Britain, France, Germany and Italy.
Vice President Nikola
Sainovic said a Serb delegation has been ready for months to resume talks,
which broke off in May.
Austrian Foreign Minister
Wolfgang Schuessel, speaking as the current European Union president, welcomed
the announcement of an ethnic Albanian negotiating team as "a first step
in the right direction."
The Russian government
also hailed the move, calling on both sides "to begin talks immediately
and without any preconditions."
Milosevic has offered
to discuss restoring a version of the self-rule he revoked from Kosovo
in 1989. But it remains unclear how much autonomy Milosevic is willing
to grant the province, which some Serbs consider the medieval cradle of
their national identity.
Since 1991, ethnic Albanians
have sought independence from what they call the oppression of the Milosevic
regime. The Albanians have declared a self-styled "Republic of Kosovo"
and elected Rugova as president.
___________________________________
The Times
August 14 1998
Albanian turmoil as Serbs capture key Kosovo towns
FROM TOM WALKER IN BELGRADE
KOSOVO'S ethnic Albanians appeared in political
and military turmoil yesterday as a new cross-party negotiating team fell
apart. Rumours grew of a bloody feud between factions of the Kosovo Liberation
Army (KLA) as it struggled to defend its western headquarters against a
Serb offensive.
Christopher Hill, America's
envoy in the region, spent the day cajoling the Albanians towards announcing
a five-member team for peace talks with Belgrade. But by midway through
the afternoon the KLA had issued a statement from its unidentified "general
staff", possibly in Switzerland, offering five different names to represent
the guerrillas. Compromise between the rival Albanians seemed impossible.
The Foreign Office in
London reflected the view of the six-nation Contact Group which believed
that the announcement of a new negotiating team, even without the KLA,
was a positive step. But on the military front, the Albanians' position
seemed even more hopeless.
Serb police and paramilitaries
overran the village of Glodjane, the KLA's main forward base in the Decane
region, and began the systematic destruction of nearby Prilep, a village
that they had obviously tired of taking and retaking from the guerrillas
for the past three months.
Several other villages
in the area were also under attack, and aid agencies feared another refugee
exodus. At least eight Albanians and a similar number of Serb police were
said to have died in the attack on Glodjane.
The remaining obstacle
in the way of the police and the Yugoslav Army is the border town of Junik,
a sprawling settlement with a long rebel tradition and the main conduit
for the weapons trade in this conflict between Albania and the Kosovo interior.
___________________________________
BBC
Friday, August 14, 1998 Published at 07:47 GMT
08:47 UK
KLA left out of peace team
Political leaders in Kosovo have named a team
of peace negotiators in a bid to kick-start the stalled process.
The panel, led by ethnic
Albanian politician Ibrahim Rugova, is due to meet US representatives on
Friday to discuss possible peace talks with the Yugoslav authorities.
But the delegation does
not include any members of the warring Kosovo Liberation Army.
Correspondents say that
unless Mr Rugova can attract KLA spokesmen into any peace talks, it will
be impossible to achieve a stable ceasefire.
Mr Rugova said: "There
are open seats for other representatives and politicians to be included."
'Talk is vital'
US envoy Christopher Hill has been trying to persuade
ethnic Albanian rebels and politicians to join forces.
He said the continuing
fighting in Kosovo made it imperative to start talks immediately - with
or without the KLA.
Mr Hill said: "The violence
must stop and it must stop now.
"There is no military
solution in Kosovo. The only result of continuing fighting is continuing
suffering."
Mr Hill and European
diplomats hope eventually to get Mr Rugova, KLA representatives and the
Yugoslav President, Slobodan Milosevic, together for talks on the future
of Kosovo.
First step
The ethnic Albanians' decision to try to make
headway towards a negotiated autonomy was welcomed by western powers.
Austrian Foreign Minister
Wolfgang Schüssel, speaking in his country's capacity as the current
European Union president, said it was "a first step in the right direction".
He urged the government
in Belgrade to start negotiations immediately.
Yugoslav Vice President
Nikola Sainovic said a Serb delegation had been ready for months to resume
talks, which broke off in May.
The conflict in Kosovo
has escalated with Serb forces advancing on opposition territory.
_________________________________
Serbs must halt attacks to talk - Kosovo Albanians
05:47 a.m. Aug 14, 1998 Eastern
By Mark Heinrich
PRISTINA, Serbia, Aug 14 (Reuters) - Serb security
forces must stop attacks on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo before peace talks
begin, the main Kosovo Albanian leader said on Friday.
"The Serb offensive
has to stop first," Ibrahim Rugova, president of Kosovo's ethnic Albanians,
told a news conference.
"There has to be an
appropriate climate for meaningful dialogue. And that is indispensable,"
he told reporters, a day after naming a five-person delegation to re-start
suspended peace talks with the Serb authorities in Belgrade.
In the course of a three-week
offensive, the Serbs have ejected ethnic Albanian separatist guerrillas
of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) from most of the towns and villages
they took during a six-month campaign.
Serb sources said fighting
in Serbia's southernmost province had come to a virtual halt after sporadic
clashes throughout the week. But Rugova said the Serb offensive to rout
the KLA was continuing, and the humanitarian situation of displaced Kosovo
Albanians "is especially grave and desperate."
Rugova is at odds with
the KLA in advocating passive resistance to Serbian rule in Kosovo. But
both seek independence for the province, whose population of about two
million people is 90 percent ethnic Albanian.
Rugova, elected president
of an ethnic Albanian government not recognised by Belgrade and Western
powers, agreed under intense pressure from the United States to resume
negotiations, which the Albanians boycotted in March and suspended in June.
Relief agencies have
predicted a humanitarian disaster in Kosovo if an estimated 200,000 people
displaced from their homes and farms by the fighting are not re-settled
before the onset of cold weather in about two months' time.
Rugova said Serb forces
were preventing people from returning to their homes in towns like Malisevo,
which was totally emptied during the Serb offensive.
"The return of displaced
persons to Malisevo and other villages is being obstructed by the Serbian
police," he said.
Rugova said the process
of return should be monitored by the international community and added:
"We urge NATO, the United Nations and the European Union to take the people
of Kosovo under their protection."
He reiterated his position
in favour of Kosovo's independence.
"We stress that the
best solution for Kosovo is independence with guarantees for the local
Serbs and international protectorate status in the interim," he said.
Independence has been
rejected by the West and by Belgrade, which has nevertheless agreed to
resume talks.
Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
___________________________________
Without rebel role, Kosovo peace process is shaky
06:29 a.m. Aug 14, 1998 Eastern
By Mark Heinrich
PRISTINA, Serbia, Aug 14 (Reuters) - Separatist
guerrillas have boycotted a peace talks team unveiled by Kosovo Albanian
political leaders, undermining the credibility of the initiative before
negotiations have even begun.
And Ibrahim Rugova,
the main ethnic Albanian leader, said on Friday no talks could begin until
the Serbs bring to a halt a three-week-long offensive that has forced tens
of thousands of Albanians from their homes.
"The Serb offensive
has to stop first," Ibrahim Rugova, president of Kosovo's ethnic Albanians,
told a news conference.
But Western envoys struggling
to cobble together a coherent Albanian negotiating front for talks with
Serbian authorities to end Kosovo's war before winter descends say they
could wait no longer for an ideal broad coalition to emerge.
"The original idea was
to have people on the team with a degree of control over the Kosovo Liberation
Army (KLA)," said a senior Western diplomat close to mediation efforts
in the Albanian majority province of Serbia.
"We found no one with
that power. We tried very hard to get as broad a representation as possible
but we came to a point where we simply couldn't wait any longer. We had
to move," he said, alluding to a sharpening humanitarian crisis in Kosovo.
"The question also arose
as to whether the KLA can control the KLA on the ground," he said. The
guerrillas seem to have no authoritative public leader or cohesive command
structure.
"The KLA's worst problem
(from a negotiating point of view) is that it still has no telephone number,"
the senior envoy said in a briefing with reporters.
Recent KLA statements
faxed from unknown locations to Kosovo Albanian newspapers have confusingly
mixed support for a rebel role in peace talks with strident calls to Albanians
living worldwide to fight for final victory in Kosovo.
On Thursday, Albanian
media sources said the KLA had faxed the newspaper Koha Ditore announcing
it had chosen Adem Demaqi, a former long-time political prisoner, as their
negotiating delegate.
But Western envoys involved
in shepherding the fractious main Kosovar political parties into a peace
front said Demaqi had declined an invitation to join it.
Further muddying prospects
for talks is that any negotiating team, including KLA representatives,
could well be rebuffed by Belgrade which says it will not deal with "terrorists."
A negotiating team presented
on Thursday by Rugova, the bookish leader of the biggest ethnic Albanian
party, the Democratic League of Kosovo, represents three of the province's
parliamentary parties including the LDK.
Diplomats attributed
the KLA's no-show to resentment of Rugova for his long campaign of passive
resistance to Serbian police rule in Kosovo which failed to extract any
concessions from Belgrade.
Indeed, Albanian in-fighting
played a large part in weeks of delay in announcing a peace delegation.
"The negotiating team
we got is not representative because it does not cover the whole spectrum,"
said Veton Surroi, a Kosovar newspaper editor.
"I fear that if negotiations
actually begin this team will be a lame duck."
A month ago, Rugova
lacked the political clout to proclaim a team for peace talks because the
KLA had eclipsed his credo of non-violence with dizzying advances on the
battlefield.
But a fierce counter
offensive by Yugoslav army and Serbian military police forces has chased
the KLA back into a few isolated hill enclaves along with some 200,000
refugees, many of whose abandoned homes had been blown up.
The KLA's disastrous
reverses have partly rebuilt Rugova's stature but also forced Kosovar political
leaders to climb down from their lofty refusal to talk until Serbian security
forces withdrew from Kosovo.
Belgrade had always
rejected that demand as tantamount to caving in to ethnic Albanian demands
for greater sovereignty over Kosovo. Now, it will be able to negotiate
from a renewed position of strength.
But without the KLA
on board, it will be an uphill struggle to prevent any peace process from
being sabotaged by fresh outbreaks of fighting.
Foreign peace brokers
see no alternative to dialogue, however flawed the framework may look now.
Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
___________________________________
August 14, 1998
Ethnic Kosovo Chief Picks Negotiators, Excluding Rebels
By MIKE O'CONNOR
PRISTINA, Yugoslavia -- In a serious setback for
Western governments hoping to end the war in Kosovo through negotiations,
the ethnic Albanian leader, Ibrahim Rugova, Thursday named a team to negotiate
peace with the Serbs that does not have the ingredient that diplomats consider
essential to success: representatives of all ethnic Albanian political
forces.
It lacks any representatives
of the rebel army fighting Serbia's rule of Kosovo, meaning its authority
to reach agreements binding on the rebels is doubtful. Many rebel leaders
are openly contemptuous of ethnic Albanian politicians, whom they consider
to be stooges of the government.
Perhaps even more devastating
to the Western diplomatic strategy, Rugova's chief aide predicted that
the negotiating team would unquestionably fail because Western governments
insist it cannot negotiate independence for Kosovo, which almost all ethnic
Albanians demand.
Instead of a negotiating
team that could lead to the end of the war, the announcement seemed to
confirm the deep divisions among Kosovo's Albanians that will make the
war continue.
"It's not good," a Western
diplomat said. "But it is the best we can do.
The hope is the Yugoslav government will want
to have negotiations succeed and will give this team some tangible concessions
that will bring it the legitimacy it doesn't have now."
"I know that isn't much,
but there is no alternative because the Albanian politicians are too divided,"
the diplomat said, insisting on anonymity. "Everyone wants to be in charge."
Other diplomats said
the concessions hoped for included withdrawal of government forces from
parts of Kosovo or limited self-rule for the ethnic Albanians.
But there was not much
optimism among either diplomats or Albanian political leaders in Pristina,
Kosovo's capital.
Five hours before the
announcement of the negotiating team, which U.S. Ambassador Christopher
Hill helped put together, Rugova's chief aide, Alush Gashi, said the team
had no chance to succeed.
"These diplomats threaten
us by saying, 'If you don't do this, you will be on your own, the West
will go."' Gashi said. "Ambassador Hill is blaming us for not uniting.
But we can't unite for anything less than independence, without that the
war will continue."
Thursday, Hill called
for the Yugoslav government to start talks with the team announced by Rugova.
The West's position
is that granting independence to ethnic Albanians in Kosovo would fortify
the hopes of ethnic Albanians in Macedonia for independence. That would
destabilize one of the most fragile states in Europe's volatile southeast.
Changing the borders of Yugoslavia -- which now consists of Serbia and
Montenegro -- could also unravel the Dayton peace accord that stitched
Bosnia together after its three-and-a-half-year war.
In Kosovo, the deepest
divisions among ethnic Albanians are between its feuding politicians and
many of the rebels. In the countryside, peasant farmers who are bound to
a very traditional way of life and make up most of the rebel forces often
accuse political leaders of being the source of their problems with the
Serbian authorities.
"They are not Albanians,"
charged a rebel commander with the nom de guerre of Lion. "They are collaborators
with Albanian names. They are tools of the Serbs, and without them the
Serbs couldn't rule us. They are traitors to their people."
U.S. diplomats say they
recognized late last year that while they had assumed that Rugova represented
all ethnic Albanians in Kosovo, there was a large and growing split between
him and rural ethnic Albanians who thought his philosophy of nonviolence
was not working.
After Kosovo exploded
into war this year, much of the diplomatic effort has been to reduce the
differences between Rugova, along with the other political leaders in the
provincial capital of Pristina, and the hard-core guerrilla leaders.
Thursday's announcement
of a negotiating committee that does not include the guerrillas seems to
show that the diplomats have failed. Although a substantial number of rebels
say they still respect Rugova, and he could possibly win their support
for a deal with the government, many others favor war over negotiations.
In his stronghold in
mountains southeast of Pristina, the rebel commander called Lion wore traditional
Albanian costume -- with two modern additions. He had the traditional tall,
brimless white felt cap, the white vest with black embroidery and the baggy
homespun wool trousers. But on one side of the sash that wrapped his middle
and extended to one knee, he had stuffed a semiautomatic pistol. On the
other side hung a two-way radio.
Sitting on the carpeted
floor of the village house where he was born, he described how he and others
had worked to create the Kosovo Liberation Army and today's rebellion,
and why they hated the political leaders now named to negotiate a peace.
"It began in 1990 when
we saw that Yugoslavia could not hold together and we had a chance to make
our own country," he said. "We worked clandestinely starting cells in all
the villages around here. We were preparing ourselves and the people psychologically
and physically for a guerrilla war. We were preparing for what we have
today."
He said that until 1993
he worked full time as an organizer, financed by ethnic Albanians in his
region and abroad. During that time, he said, he made several trips to
Albania for training.
"The police were looking
for me here, but I was living in the forests, and they could not find me
because I had the support of the people," he said. "The proof that I am
a patriot and Rugova is a collaborator is that I was considered an enemy
of the state and had to hide, while Rugova lived freely in Pristina."
The rebel commander,
who is in his late 30s, said he was only one of the latest leaders of an
Albanian independence movement that he traces to a revolt against the Ottoman
Empire in 1878. "I had teachers I could follow," he said.
"Those politicians who
call themselves Albanians were making business deals and political deals
with the Serbs," he said. "They became the local representatives of the
occupiers. They got rich and we suffered. To them independence for Kosovo
is a threat to their power, and we will never trust them."
Albanian turmoil as Serbs capture key Kosovo towns
FROM TOM WALKER IN BELGRADE
KOSOVO'S ethnic Albanians appeared in political
and military turmoil yesterday as a new cross-party negotiating team fell
apart. Rumours grew of a bloody feud between factions of the Kosovo Liberation
Army (KLA) as it struggled to defend its western headquarters against a
Serb offensive.
Christopher Hill, America's envoy in the region,
spent the day cajoling the Albanians towards announcing a five-member team
for peace talks with Belgrade. But by midway through the afternoon the
KLA had issued a statement from its unidentified "general staff", possibly
in Switzerland, offering five different names to represent the guerrillas.
Compromise between the rival Albanians seemed
impossible.
The Foreign Office in London reflected the view
of the six-nation Contact Group which believed that the announcement of
a new negotiating team, even without the KLA, was a positive step. But
on the military front, the Albanians' position seemed even more hopeless.
Serb police and paramilitaries overran the village
of Glodjane, the KLA's main forward base in the Decane region, and began
the systematic destruction of nearby Prilep, a village that they had obviously
tired of taking and retaking from the guerrillas for the past three months.
Several other villages in the area were also
under attack, and aid agencies feared another refugee exodus. At least
eight Albanians and a similar number of Serb police were said to have died
in the attack on Glodjane.
The remaining obstacle in the way of the police
and the Yugoslav Army is the border town of Junik, a sprawling settlement
with a long rebel tradition and the main conduit for the weapons trade
in this conflict between Albania and the Kosovo interior.
The Independent
Kosovo edges towards talks
By Paul Wood in Pristina
One of the Kosovo Liberation Army's commanders
sat under the shade of a tree this week, his Kalashnikov rifle resting
on his crossed legs, and offered the first glimmer of hope for a negotiated
end to the war in Serbia's southern province.
Commander Besniku, a nom de guerre meaning "faithful",
insisted the armed struggle had not been weakened by Serbia's recent victories,
but said international proposals based on autonomy might be acceptable
"for the time being".
Perhaps he was getting closer to the position
of the ethnic Albanian civilian leader, Ibrahim Rugova, who yesterday named
a team for peace talks to try to end the Kosovo war and called on Serb
authorities to negotiate. "We need a climate for negotiations to protect
our people," Mr Rugova told a news conference in Pristina.
The Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, congratulated
Mr Rugova and called on the Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic to quickly draft
plans for "genuine self-administration in Kosovo."
The ethnic Albanian newspaper Koha Ditore, known
to have close links to KLA, said it received a KLA fax naming Adem Demaqi
as its representative for talks with Belgrade.
Mr Demaqi is a legendary figure among Albanians.
His 28 years in Serb jail have earned him a reputation as the "the Nelson
Mandela of Kosovo". For months the international community, led by the
United States, has been trying to reach out to the KLA and bring the rebels
into negotiations with the Serb authorities.
Besniku, a lawyer and human rights campaigner
before he took up arms, was one of those contacted by the American envoy
Christopher Hill.
"It depends what kind of autonomy," he said.
"Not the kind they can take away whenever they want. I would accept for
the time being the kind of autonomy which would give us control."
But no one is expecting a rapid end to the war.
Yesterday, Serbian forces were reported to be "mopping up" the remaining
pockets of Albanian resistance around the south-western village of Junik,
where more than 1,000 civilians are trapped by the fighting. The EU has
condemned the Serb assault.
Besniku's own command post is a charred ruin,
but the Serb forces have left after occupying it briefly and his troops,
smartly dressed in clean uniforms, appeared motivated. "My family fought
the Serbs in the rebellions of 1918 and 1944," one of the KLA volunteers
said. "I have been in the KLA for four years and we are not going to stop
now."
Western diplomats say their first problem in
dealing with the KLA is to know who has authority in what remains a secretive
organisation. One official said: "Even if the ones we're talking to sign
up to a deal we expect a substantial faction will keep on fighting."
The KLA has also begun moves to co-ordinate its
actions with those of the mainstream ethnic Albanian political parties.
"This is vital if Kosovo is not going to turn into Afghanistan," said Mahmud
Bakalli, the province's ethnic-Albanian administrator under Yugoslavia's
former president Tito, and now an influential voice in the campaign for
independence.
Mr Bakalli said only an international peace-keeping
force could bring about a negotiated settlement. "It is urgent we get an
outside force here," he said. "The Serbs will never succeed in ending resistance;
there will be an everlasting fire, which will threaten the whole region."
The Guardian
Villagers return to lives ruined by Serb hands
By Jonathan Steele in Nepolje
Friday August 14, 1998
The old man wearing a white felt hat stood, uncomprehending,
beside the grey ash heaps that were once haystacks. The shape of his traditional
headgear provided a ghostly echo of the useless remains of the harvest.
It was clear that a match or other kindling had been deliberately aimed
at the hay. The same invisible hands had turned to the two-storey house
nearby, this time presumably armed also with petrol. The windows were blackened,
the interior was wrecked, and a huge hole gaped through the roof. Shattered
tiles lay all around.
Pjeter Krasniqi had no doubt who the perpetrators
were. Before he and his neighbours ran into the nearby woods, he saw the
Serbian police enter the village.
Three weeks ago the police destroyed a huge swath
of villages in central Kosovo, then days later moved into Drenica - the
first area in the Serb- controlled province the independence fighters of
the Kosovo Liberation Army thought they had freed.
Now the police are moving through western Kosovo,
looting and destroying undefended villages.
In Mr Krasniqi's village of Nepolje, 37 of the
houses were gutted by fire. As well as the haystacks, the Serbs struck
at their cattle. The stench of rotting flesh from slaughtered cows hangs
heavy in the air.
The women and children are still hiding in the
woods, too traumatised to come out. The men take it in turns to make the
four-hour trek with water and food for them.
In Glodjane, two miles away, the Serbs chose
their targets more selectively. They hit only two houses, one of them the
village's biggest, a three-storey building in a large family compound.
It is owned by Rok Berisha, a leading member of the Democratic League of
Kosovo, the main ethnic Albanian party.
When the Serbs came, he and his family hid in
the Roman Catholic church next door. For two nights, he says, he watched
as the police slept in his house, then loaded TV sets, videos and carpets
into his lorry.
"I walked into the compound, saying I wanted
to check on the cows," his 74-year-old mother Ziza said yesterday. "I saw
them pouring petrol and setting light to the house."
She took us through the charred and blackened
shell. The ash-covered stairs to the top floor were open to the sky. Standing
in the rubble of the kitchen, Mr Berisha put his arms around his children's
shoulders. "If the KLA can't defend us, someone else must," he said. "But
whatever happens, the Serbs cannot get rid of us. We will stay here, however
terrible things get. My children will enjoy freedom even if we don't."
The vandalised villages of Nepolje and Glodjane
are in the triangle between the main east-west road from the capital Pristina
to Pec and the southward road from Pec to Djakovica. The Serbs are concentrating
their main fire on other villages a few miles further south where large
groups of KLA fighters were once based. In recent weeks the KLA has ambushed
Serbs several times along the main road.
KLA fighters retreating from Rznic, a village
captured by the Serbs on Wednesday, were tense and confused. A commander
from another group defending territory further back said 15 KLA fighters
had been killed and 20 wounded in the defeat.
We saw columns of refugees on the move. One man,
sweating as he carried his three-year-old son on his shoulders, said they
were hoping to reach Montenegro. After two months going from village to
village after his own home was destroyed, he and his family now wanted
safety beyond the borders of Kosovo.
Under heavy pressure from the United States,
Kosovo's ethnic Albanians yesterday announced a new team to negotiate with
the Serbs. It did not include representatives of the KLA.
BBC News
Friday, August 14, 1998 Published at 07:47 GMT
08:47 UK
KLA left out of peace team
Political leaders in Kosovo have named a team
of peace negotiators in a bid to kick-start the stalled process.
The panel, led by ethnic Albanian politician
Ibrahim Rugova, is due to meet US representatives on Friday to discuss
possible peace talks with the Yugoslav authorities.
But the delegation does not include any members
of the warring Kosovo Liberation Army.
Correspondents say that unless Mr Rugova can
attract KLA spokesmen into any peace talks, it will be impossible to achieve
a stable ceasefire.
Mr Rugova said: "There are open seats for other
representatives and politicians to be included."
'Talk is vital'
US envoy Christopher Hill has been trying to persuade
ethnic Albanian rebels and politicians to join forces.
He said the continuing fighting in Kosovo made
it imperative to start talks immediately - with or without the KLA.
Mr Hill said: "The violence must stop and it
must stop now. "There is no military solution in Kosovo. The only result
of continuing fighting is continuing suffering."
Mr Hill and European diplomats hope eventually
to get Mr Rugova, KLA representatives and the Yugoslav President, Slobodan
Milosevic, together for talks on the future of Kosovo.
First step
The ethnic Albanians' decision to try to make
headway towards a negotiated autonomy was welcomed by western powers.
Austrian Foreign Minister Wolfgang Schüssel,
speaking in his country's capacity as the current European Union president,
said it was "a first step in the right direction".
He urged the government in Belgrade to start
negotiations immediately.
Yugoslav Vice President Nikola Sainovic said
a Serb delegation had been ready for months to resume talks, which broke
off in May.
The conflict in Kosovo has escalated with Serb
forces advancing on opposition territory.
--
Kosova Information Centre - London
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