Demands of the World Socialist Network
The situation in Yugoslavia is grim, thousands are dying and refugees number in their millions. The victims come from all parts of Yugoslavia and of all races, religions, and nationalities. The current crisis is in Kosova and we will leave the huge numbers of Serb refugees from Croatia and other refugee problems in the area out at the moment.
The Serbian Government and Slobodan Milosevic have engaged in a war of bloody genocide in Kosova, with the driving out or the killing of most of the Kosovar Albanian population. This is after autonomy was abolished and the state of Kosova was brought under the heel of the nationalist Serbian Government.
Something must have been done, something to solve the problems of this war-torn nation. NATO says it has done the only thing possible, bomb the Serbs, regardless of who or what they hit. This is the wrong solution and the only result of the bombing has been the consolidation of Milosevic's power and position, the destruction of all opposition to the Serbian Government, the deaths of hundreds of Serbs whose only crimes were that they were Serbian, the deaths of ethnic Albanians by misguided missiles fired under the orders of misguided men, the continuance and intensifying of the bloodshed in Kosova, and the removal of the chance for Kosova to be free and independent.
NATO has and had no intention of freeing Kosova or ending the bloodshed, or getting rid of Milosevic who was once their allies in controlling "uppity" Yugoslavs, who now could not control the Albanians and suppress dissent at a level that NATO preferred.
The bloodshed and war in Kosova could have been averted quite easily, if NATO wanted it. NATO, not the Serbs, sabotaged the Ramboillet conference and all negotiations since. It was the west that broke the rules and caused the conflict. To see this in more detail see the FAIR site.
What could be done is the rearmament and reinforcing of an independent (not the current) KLA and the organisation of operations in the theatre to be under Kosovar control. A UN negotiated peace deal could have been made (and should have already been made before NATO blundered its way in) to stop hostilities. The cessation of misinformation and omission of facts on the side of NATO while political pressure is applied on behalf of all parties involved on the Serbian Government. A referendum on autonomy, integration, and independence should be put to the Kosovars being supervised by independent and neutral UN organisations and an independent media.
We must try and find real solutions to the problems of Kosova and Yugoslavia and not just bomb the victims while the real criminals on both sides get away. The so-called "civilized" world must learn that our armed forces cannot achieve anything humanitarian in Kosova as long as they blindly attack the people of a country with little justification for the reason and no justification for the methods, and "both" sides (pro-NATO and pro-Milosevic, as war is often divided into two sides, the Kosovar third-party is not mentioned, unless in five-second propaganda shots) should learn that "your" side is not always right, and that governments lie and the media is a propagandist first and an informer last. We must all work together for a solution and try and help the Kosovar meat in the NATO-Serb sandwich survive as a people and as citizens of Kosova.
