Saverio_Ciraci: Not Really a Peace Yet!

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From: Saverio_Ciraci@PolimeriEuropa.IT
To: nettime-l@Desk.nl
Date: Thu, 10 Jun 1999 15:13:02 +0200
Subject: Not Really a Peace Yet!

Warning: it's not really a peace yet ! Keep you awake, peace people.
Best regards

_______ forwarded from Committee for Peace in the Balkans -------------

Anti-war movement to keep campaigning and fight for a just peace
 News release Thursday 10 June 1999
 Alice Mahon MP, Chair of the Committee for Peace in the Balkans, said:

 'It is to be hoped that NATO's illegal bombing of Yugoslavia will finally
end today. But vital questions remain to be answered: 

 1. No indications have been given as to how and when the demilitarisation
of the KLA will be accomplished in line with the G8 Agreement.

 2. No guarantees of safety have been provided to the Serbian population of
 Kosovo - and statements from the Pentagon have indicated what amounts to
acquiescence in their possible ethnic cleansing. 

 3. Nothing seems to have been agreed yet as to the location, numbers and
command structure of the Russian component of the UN force - it would
clearly be preferable to Serbs and Albanians alike for the Russians to be
deployed in the Serb areas of Kosovo. 

 4. Given that NATO told the world that it had no quarrel with the
civilian population of Yugoslavia, NATO states must pay for the
reconstruction of the deliberate damage done to the civilian
infrastructure of the country.  Attempts to put political conditions on
economic aid indicate that the goal of the United States in the Balkans is
not human rights but its own economic and political hegemony. 

 5. In these circumstances, the question must be asked as to whether the
presence of NATO troops in Kosovo will be followed by further attempts to
dismantle the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia by outside intervention, and
whether NATO is already planning its next war in the Balkans if the
Serbian people continue to elect governments which NATO dislikes. 

 6. Other states throughout the world will also be asking whether at some
point NATO will abrogate to itself the right to intervene into their
country, particularly in the light of NATO's new strategic concept
providing for offensive operations throughout the Euro-Atlantic region. 

 'For all of these reasons, and to assist all of the peoples of Yugoslavia
whose country has been devastated by more than ten weeks of
round-the-clock bombing, the anti-war movement which has campaigned
against the bombing will be continuing its activities for the foreseeable
future and seeking to build links with the similar anti-war coalitions
which have emerged around the world.'

     FUTURE ACTIVITIES INCLUDE: Saturday 26 June 1999: International
Conference: Consequences of NATO's war on Yugoslavia 10am to 5pm, Conway
Hall, Red Lion Square, London WC1. 


 NATO countries must pay for the reconstruction of Yugoslavia News release
Wednesday 9 June 1999 The Committee for Peace in the Balkans said today: 

 'With apparent progress towards a UN Security Council resolution on
Kosovo, it is quite clear that NATO's continued bombing is the main
obstacle to peace in Yugoslavia. It is absurd to demand that there be
evidence of a Yugoslav withdrawal before bombing stops because this
exposes troops and civilians seeking to leave to NATO air attack and to
KLA attacks backed by NATO. 

 'As for the deployment of an international force in Kosovo, it would
clearly be preferable to deploy Russian troops in areas whose population
has been predominantly Serb. NATO's rejection of this, and statements by
Pentagon spokespeople that they expect many Serb civilians to leave,
indicates NATO acquiescence in the ethnic cleansing of the Serbs from
Kosovo, in the same way as the United States effectively backed the ethnic
cleansing of Serbs from Croatia. These legitimate fears are reinforced by
the fact that the KLA's military command is now headed by a leader of the
ethnic cleansing operation carried out by the Croatian army. 

 'Finally, NATO has retreated from its demands at Rambouillet in
February,effectively admitting that its ultimatum at that time was of a
character which no sovereign state could accept. Yet much of Yugoslavia
has been reduced to rubble, and thousands of people have been killed and
injured by NATO, in a war whose aim was declared to be the
`non-negotiable' Rambouillet document. In those circumstances, it is
obviously incumbent upon the NATO states to pay for the reconstruction of
what they have destroyed and for the UN war crimes tribunal to demonstrate
for the first time some independence from the US by indicting those
responsible for NATO's massacres of civilians and destruction of their
means of life in terms of electricity and water supplies, factories,
schools, hospitals, roads, railways and bridges. 

 'The Committee for Peace in the Balkans believes that NATO intervention
into the Balkans region has deepened divisions between its peoples,
fostered conflicts and thrown the economic development of the region back
by decades. Internationally, it has made the world a far more dangerous
place, horrified the populations of Russia and China, and will undoubtedly
lead many states to believe that faced with the threat of unilateral
attack by NATO they need to acquire weapons of mass destruction.'

     FUTURE ACTIVITIES INCLUDE: Saturday 26 June 1999 International
Conference: Consequences of NATO's war on Yugoslavia 10am to 5pm, Conway
Hall, Red Lion Square, London WC1.