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Kosovo Crisis eMagazine http://www.memail.com
____________________________________________________________________
May 14 1999
Index
---------------> HRW on Cluster Bombs & Other NATO Violations
---------------------> Watson on Cluster Bombs in Playground
--------------------------------------> China and the Bombing
------------------------> Was A Diplomatic Solution Rejected?
--------------------------------> Free B92 Netcast on 5-15-99
--------------------> Koha Ditore, Kosovar Albanian Newspaper
-----------------------------------------> Report from Kosovo
--------------------------------> Overlooked News: East Timor
-------------------------------------------------> Commentary
------------------------------------> MoJo Wire Kosovo Update
--------------------------------------------------> Headlines
Human Rights Watch on Cluster Bombs & Other NATO Violations
-----------------------------------------------------------
Human Rights Watch sent a strong letter to NATO Secretary General
Javier Solana listing concerns about civilian casualties and
violations of the laws of war. HRW Executive director
Kenneth Roth said, "NATO says it is fighting a war on behalf of
human rights. If so, then it's absolutely essential for NATO to
scrupulously respect human rights in its conduct of this war.
NATO must do everything feasible to avoid hitting civilians."
Earlier, HRW issued a statement critical of NATO's use of cluster
bombs and a detailed background report on the weapon.
Also: NPR reports on the Pentagon's response... Media critic
Norman Solomon's column looks at media coverage of cluster
bombs..
As this newsletter goes out, there are reports that
cluster bombs killed as many as 100 Kosovar Albanians in
a village in Kosovo. Journalists have described the scene
as one of "sheer horror." If NATO had responded to Human Rights
Watch call and stopped using cluster bombs, this might
not have happened.
Growing Concern About NATO Violating the Laws of War (5-13-99)
http://www.hrw.org/press/1999/may/nato0512.htm
HRW Letter to Javier Solana (5-13-99)
http://www.hrw.org/hrw/campaigns/kosovo98/solana.htm
NATO Use of Cluster Bombs Must Stop (5-11-99)
http://www.hrw.org/press/1999/may/cluspress.htm
NATO's Use of Cluster Munitions in Yugoslavia
Human Rights Watch Background Report (5-11-99)
http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/arms/clus0511.htm
The Pentagon Defends Use of Cluster Bombs
by Steve Inskeep, All Things Considered (5-13-99)
http://www.npr.org/ramfiles/atc/19990513.atc.15.ram
(This report is in real audio and lasts 3 minutes 30 seconds.)
Message from a cluster bomb
by Norman Solomon (5-13-99)
http://www.msnbc.com/news/269027.asp
Belgrade says 100 civilians dead in NATO attack on village
Agence France-Presse (5-14-99)
http://asia.yahoo.com/headlines/140599/world/926687880-90514131800.newsworld.html
Watson on Cluster Bombs in Playground
--------------------------------------
In a May 12th dispatch that begins with an analysis of the KLA,
Paul Watson of the Los Angeles Times writes about the aftermath
of cluster bombs hitting a park and playground in a village
in Kosovo:
As Serbs slept in the prosperous farming village of Staro Gracko,
NATO said, several "bomblets" from a cluster bomb exploded beside
three houses about 1:15 a.m.
The airstrike apparently was aimed at military forces that may have
been deployed in a large park and playground, where most of the
bomblets fell.
The words "Bomb Frag." were printed in black on the side of one
yellow canister, along with the designation BLU-97 A/B, the
standard ammunition in a U.S.-made CBU-87 cluster bomb.
At least three of the unexploded bomblets lay in the playground,
where three empty bunkers suggested that soldiers may have been
based there. But there were no signs of damage to any military
vehicles Tuesday morning.
Instead, 4-year-old Dragan Dimic was dead, along with the boy's
neighbors, Bosko Jankovic, 60, and his wife, Jevrosima, 59.
Their bodies lay smeared with dried blood where they fell at
the edge of their small front patio.
The couple's dog died too, and its body was surrounded by small
cluster bomb craters in a yard where chickens clucked and pecked
for insects in the freshly turned earth.
A couple of hundred yards away, Milan Seslija was pouring buckets
of water on the smoldering roof of his parents' farmhouse to douse
the last embers.
His 70-year-old father, Okica, was fighting for his life in a
hospital, with severe burns and shrapnel wounds. He fell into a
blazing pile of hay when one of the cluster bomblets exploded
outside the house.
"There was an explosion and he said, 'I have to go free the
cattle,' " said Okica Seslija's wife, Stana, 63. "I told him, '
Who cares about the cattle now?' "Then there was another
explosion and suddenly a fire. I started to scream and Milan
came and dragged him out of the fire. He was all bloody."
Despite NATO Rhetoric, Rebels May Be Ultimate Beneficiaries
by Paul Watson, Los Angeles Times (5-12-99)
http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/REPORTS/YUGO/DISPATCH/t000042699.html
China and the Bombing
---------------------
Robert Weil is author of Red Cat, White Cat: China and the
Contradictions of "Market Socialism." He says:
The anger in China is widespread and is no doubt very genuine.
Either it will stiffen the Chinese government reaction to the
U.S., which would have its own serious consequences; or they
won't stand up to the U.S., which might result in a domestic
backlash. There's widespread feeling in China that the U.S. is
bullying them, practicing gunboat diplomacy and this may be a final
straw. There's already a lot of political discontent about the
economic situation -- the increased class polarization, unemployment,
corruption and crime. The government might tap into the reaction to
the embassy bombing, but will be nervous about protests going
too far. But the domestic discontent could fuse with a sense of
China being weakened internationally. Such feelings in the past
in China have led to radical movements for social change.
This news release quoting Weil, with additional views, is
from the Institute for Public Accuracy:
http://www.accuracy.org/press_releases/PR051299.htm
Was A Diplomatic Solution Rejected?
----------------------------------
Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting and Jason Vest of the Village
Voice write about media coverage of the Rambouillet process. Seth
Ackerman of FAIR begins:
Since the beginning of the NATO attack on Yugoslavia, the war has
been presented by the media as the consequence of Yugoslavia's
stubborn refusal to settle for any reasonable peace plan--in
particular its rejection of plans for an international security
force to implement a peace plan in Kosovo.
An article in the April 14 New York Times stated that
Yugoslavian President Milosevic "has absolutely refused to
entertain an outside force in Kosovo, arguing that the province
is sovereign territory of Serbia and Yugoslavia."
Negotiations between the Serb and Albanian delegations at the
Rambouillet meeting in France ended with Yugoslavia's rejection
of the document that had been adopted, after much prodding, by
the Kosovo Albanian party.
But is that the whole story?
Was a Peaceful Kosovo Solution Rejected by the U.S.?
by Seth Akerman, FAIR (5-14-99)
http://www.fair.org/press-releases/kosovo-solution.html
The Real Rambouillet
by Jason Vest, Village Voice (5-12-99)
http://www.villagevoice.com/columns/9919/vest.shtml
Free B92 Netcast on 5-15-99
---------------------------
NetAid, a 24-hour webcast celebrating the 10th Anniversary of B92,
the independent Belgrade radio station shut down by the Serbian
government, will take place on Saturday, May 15th. Bands and
artists from around the world will take part, including Sonic
Youth and Mike Watt. Also, Aidan White, president of the
Federation of Journalists, is interviewed about his fact-
finding mission in Belgrade on the state of independent
media in Yugoslavia.
Information on NetAid
http://www.freeb92.net/netaid/index.html
Interview with Aidan White (5-99)
http://www.freeb92.net/days/day45/white.html
Koha Ditore, Kosovar Albanian Newspaper
---------------------------------------
Koha Ditore, Kosovo's leading Albanian-language daily paper, has
started to publish again in Macedonia. There is a long piece
on the paper in the May 17th New Yorker (which isn't available
online), Editor in Exile, by Elizabeth Rubin. A shorter piece
on the journalists who are putting out the paper is in the
Independent. Also, an NPR story about the paper.
You only live twice
by Steve Boggan, Independent (5-11-99)
http://www.independent.co.uk/med/990511me/M1105905.html
Koha Ditore
by Anne Garrels, All Things Considered (5-13-99)
http://www.npr.org/ramfiles/atc/19990513.atc.03.ram
(This report is in real audio and lasts 5 minutes 38 seconds.)
Report from Kosovo
------------------
New York Times reporter Steven Erlanger spent six days
reporting from Kosovo. One of the last stories he filed
from there is a profile of Meli, a 21-year-old Kosovar
Albanian who has remained in Pristina. The other is a
"Reporter's Notebook" with brief items (including one
on why Paul Watson was allowed to remain in Kosovo when
most other reporters were expelled).
In One Kosovo Woman, an Emblem of Suffering
by Steven Erlanger, New York Times (5-12-99)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/051299kosovo-pristina.html
Bombed Villagers Ask, 'Why Are We Guilty?'
by Steven Erlanger, New York Times (5-13-99)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/051399kosovo-belgrade.html
Since he returned to Belgrade, Erlanger has given a number of
interviews. There is a transcript and real audio from an interview
on the NewsHour on PBS and real audio of an interview on NPR.
Portions of a transcript of the NPR interview follow.
Interview with Steven Erlanger
by Elizabeth Farnsworth, NewsHour (5-12-99)
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/europe/jan-june99/kosovo_5-12.html
Interview with Steven Erlanger
by Bob Edwards, Morning Edition (5-11-99)
http://www.npr.org/ramfiles/me/19990511.me.03.ram
(This report is in real audio and lasts 7 minutes 30 seconds.)
Bob Edwards: Now tell me about the ethnic Albanians still living in
Kosovo. What shape are they are in?
Steven Erlanger: Well, there are quite a lot of them. I mean, even
under UNHCR figures, there are still probably 1.2 million Albanians
inside Kosovo. Some of them are displaced. Some of them have
gone back to their homes. Some of them have never left. They're
just kind of living as quietly as possible. There's a great deal
of fear and anxiety. One should never underestimate that. The first
two, three weeks of this campaign were truly horrible and many evil
things happened. But there was also a great deal of mass panic. I
think the Serbs did manipulate that panic and stampeded lots of
people, but you talk to a lot of Albanians who remain, who say
that no one ever came to their door, they were never threatened,
but they heard lots of stories. And many of the people who heard
those stories left.
So now what you have, because I think the Serbs are preparing the
world for some sort of settlement--you have a kind of impression of
normality in Pristina itself, and it's the fake normality but
I think the storm there has essentially passed. It's not necessarily
true of other parts of Kosovo, particularly the city of Prizren where
Albanians are still being pushed out to the Albanian border
which is only about 10 miles away. And it is also true that a lot of
Albanians also ave a fear of the bombing. NATO keeps insisting that,
you know, the bombing which goes on all the time down there
and the noise of the planes which are like drilled in your brain,
have no effect on anyone whatsoever which is clearly nonsense.
I talked to a lot of Albanians who were fleeing, in part because
their neighborhood had been bombed. Most Albanians I've spoke to
are just very eager to have it over. They're very eager to
have an international force there to protect them and they're
rather less discerning about whether it's run by a NATO general or
run by somebody else. They just want somebody there between them
and the Serbs and if possible very soon.
Edwards: What evidence did you see of the NATO bombing and of
the destruction the Serbs brought?
Erlanger: Well, you see massive examples of both. Let's start with
the Serbs. Thousands of houses have been torched and burned. Whole
villages have been depopulated. There are packs of wild dogs
roaming the villages, there are dead animals lining the sides of
the roads. In most of the big cities, the Albanian commercial areas
have been trashed and looted. You see spray-painted signs on
shops and houses that try to protect them that say Serbia' or
say Gypsy House,' and in a town, let's say, like Pec, every house
that isn't so spray-painted has been burned or destroyed.
So you see a massive revenge against the Albanians who were the
majority in the province and remain so, and one really feels
that the Serbs set out to cut back Albanian wealth and power and
influence, and there was a real feeling, particularly I think
in the first two weeks, of a lot of revenge.
There was also, one must say, you know, the KLA was trying to
run Kosovo. I mean, there was a war there also and some of the
damage you see comes from firefights with the KLA early in this,
you know, bombing campaign. However, the effort to clean out the
KLA and its supporters has had extraordinary consequences and, as
I say, I think a lot of evil has happened, particularly in the
villages, where there's a very strong smell of death and where,
every once in a while, you run into a Yugoslav army checkpoint.
You don't really know what's behind it. It could be a bunch of
soldiers; it could be something else, but you know, you do feel
there the kind of eerie sense of death. On the NATO side, you know,
they're bombing all the time. I mean, almost every bridge has been
hulled, it's--highways have been smashed. Almost all the petrol, the
gasoline facilities in the province are gone, the airport has been
destroyed. A lot of fixed targets have been hit. You also see,
obviously, examples of NATO's collateral damage of bombs that go
astray or hit the wrong target. It's a place that feels a little
bit out of hell.
Overlooked News: East Timor
---------------------------
Coverage of the war with Yugoslavia has dominated the shrinking
newshole in the United States for international news. Important
stories such as the recent massacres in East Timor aren't getting
the amount of coverage they should.
Allan Nairn and Amy Goodman made an award winning radio documentary
on the 1991 Dili massacre East Timor. While covering it, they were
attacked and Nairn had his skull fractured. Last year, he was
arrested while reporting in Indonesia and threatened with six
years in prison before being deported.
Nairn has gone back to report on the massacres despite the
risk. He writes in the Nation about a secret 'accord' the
Indonesian army has made with the militias which "authorizes
them to 'attack homes, interrogate and kill members of the CNRT
[the National Council of Timorese Resistance, the nonpartisan,
pro-independence umbrella group] and Fretilin [a left-leaning
pro-independence party],' as long as the militias refrain from
common crimes like 'car theft and stealing food.'"
Amy Goodman interviewed Nairn from Jakarta, the capital of
Indonesia, on Democracy Now.
License to Kill in Timor
by Allan Nairn, The Nation (5-31-99)
http://www.thenation.com/issue/990531/0531nairn.shtml
Democracy Now (5-13-99)
http://www.webactive.com/webactive/pacifica/demnow/dn990513.html
Commentary
----------
What is the point of Nato?
by Robert Fisk, Independent (5-13-99)
http://www.zoran.net/afp/text/independent/what_is_the_point_of_nato.htm
Protest the War
Editorial, The Nation (5-31-99)
http://www.thenation.com/issue/990531/0531editors1.shtml
Humanitarian, All Too Humanitarian
by Katha Pollit, The Nation (5-31-99)
http://www.thenation.com/issue/990531/0531pollitt.shtml
International Law May Halt the Bombing
by Jonathan M. Miller, Los Angeles Times (5-11-99)
http://www.latimes.com/CNS_DAYS/990511/t000042180.html
Use More Common Sense, Less Faulty Intelligence
by Alexander Cockburn, Los Angeles Times (5-14-99)
http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/COMMENT/t000043297.html
Crossroads in Kosovo
by Jesse Jackson, LA Times Syndicate (5-11-99)
http://www.wald.com/opinion/columnists/jackson051199.cfm
The ethics of virtue vs the ethics of justice
by Brenda Arnold, Independent (5-14-99)
http://www.independent.co.uk/stories/C1405922.html
MoJo Wire Kosovo Update
-----------------------
Mother Jones' online site, Mojo Wire, has been providing excellent
coverage of the war. They have a daily email update that
includes the new material on their site and two stories or sites
worth looking at elsewhere on the net.
Here are some excerpts from the 5-13-99 edition of MoJo wire's daily
email, Kosovo Update:
F E A T U R E __________________________________________________
*The China Syndrome?* - Loral says the NATO embargo obliged it to
sever Yugoslavian ISPs' satellite feeds. But is there a China
missle-secrets connection?
http://www.motherjones.com/total_coverage/kosovo/internet.html
A L T E R N A T I V E N E W S _________________________________
The MoJo Wire's picks of insightful news and analysis of the
Kosovo crisis.
http://www.motherjones.com/total_coverage/kosovo/altnews.html
*Web bears witness to civilian casualties*
The Free Serbia Web site, hosted by a group of folks against the
bombings in Kosovo, has put up photographs of non-military targets
in Serbia hit by NATO. Rife with warnings of extremely disturbing
images, the photographs portray civilians killed or injured by the
bombs. If you want to bypass the government's officialspeak on
collateral damage and see the destruction for yourself, visit
this page. Just be sure you're ready to stomach it.
http://freehosting.at.webjump.com/am/aman-bre-webjump/civil/e-index.html
You can subscribe to Kosovo Update and find their coverage at
http://www.motherjones.com/total_coverage/kosovo/
Headlines
---------
As Air Raids Drag On, NATO Fears Stalemate
by Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times (5-14-99)
http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/REPORTS/YUGO/lat_airwar990514.htm
White House Hires PR Expert to Handle Kosovo
by Ann Compton, ABC News (5-13-99)
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/OnBackground/onbackground990513.html
US May Pull Belgrade Bandwidth
by Leander Kahney, Wired News (5-13-99)
http://www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/19671.html
Albright Asks Lawmakers to End Balkan Effort
by Juliet Eilperin, Washington Post (5-13-99)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-05/13/052l-051399-idx.html
'One boy with spiky hair lost his legs and lay white-faced
on a stretcher. Another, still spotty with acne, was razed
by shrapnel' - Under attack with the KLA
by Janine di Giovanni, Times of London (5-13-99)
http://www.the-times.co.uk/news/pages/tim/99/05/13/timkoskos01003.html?3394235
Allied Air Chief Stresses Hitting Belgrade Sites
by Michael Gordon, New York Times (5-13-99)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/051399kosovo-nato.html
_____________________________________________________________________
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