Ariel Rusila's Conflicts [Ex-BalkanPerspective]

September 25th I saw three headlines in international press regarding the independence question of Kosovo province. The most important forum now going on is the UN General Assembly where Serbia’s initiative to ask the International Court of Justice its opinion on the legality of Kosovo’s unilaterally proclaimed independence is now under discussion. An ICJ advisory opinion would provide politically neutral, yet judicially authoritative guidance, to many countries still deliberating on how to approach Kosovo’s UDI in line with international law. Like predicted before Kosovo UDI has already motivated separatist movements in South America, Caucasus an Asia and forecast is more to come. Second news came from Swiss government which has informed Kosovo that its newly appointed representative Mr Naim Mala is not preferred” as Kosovo’s charge d’affaires in Bern. Mala was among the first ten diplomatic envoys appointed by President Fatmir Sejdiu to mainly Western capitals that recognized K...

As follow-up to my previous article “Operation Storm – forgotten pogrom” published on 5th August 2008 I have now added to my document library of my main blog - Ari Rusila's BalkanBlog - a document “Croatia: Krajina 1991 genocide” which includes a comprehensive study “Tudjman & the Croatian Ustashe Nazi genocide of Krajina Serbs in 1991 – Part 1 and Part 2 - by Nathan Pearlstein, Joshua Rosenberg, Max Rosenthal and Shlomo Baum”. Due the reason that part 2 includes extremely brutal photographs I have removed them from this document. If one wants look the full article it can be found through following links: * http://4international.wordpress.com/2008/03/19/tudjman-the-croatian-ustashe-nazi-genocide-of-krajina-serbs-in-1991/ * http://4international.wordpress.com/2008/03/21/tudjman-the-croatian-ustashe-nazi-genocide-of-krajina-serbs-part-2/ AriRusila's B logarchive balkan ari rusila Bookmark this on Delicious

One news headline on Serbianna pages popped up to my eyes yesterday. I quate Ten oxygen bottles required by the Hospital Center in Gracanica after they were seized by Kosovo separatists who demanded recognition of Kosovo in exchange for life of Serbian babies. So this is real live in multi-ethnic "independent"/UN protectorate Kosovo with "European perspective". This news - not first of that kind - are showing me at least few aspects about Kosovo problematic The Great (Western) Powers do not see or care about impact of their shortsighted policy (e.g. hesitated recognition of Kosovo independence) The high level governments and organizations with their nicely formulated statements and ideas about human rights etc. are far away from the facts on the ground The people who are suffering about high level policy have no role with designing this policy nor can they have some influence to that AriRusila's B logarchive balkan ari rusila Bookmark this on Delicious

The Netherlands held fast to its opposition Monday 15th to closer ties between the European Union and Serbia blocking of the implementation of the Temporary Agreement. Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen said his country would continue to block a pre-membership accord with Serbia until it had met the Netherlands' definition of "full cooperation" with the war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands. However Serbia – and maybe Macedonia too - can have an attractive alternative to alliance with stagnated EU or to strategic short-sightedness of Washington. Good future could be with BRIC. BRIC BRIC is an acronym for the economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China combined. The general consensus is that the term was first prominently used in a Goldman Sachs (investment bank) report from 2003, which speculated that by 2050 these four economies would be wealthier than most of the current major economic powers. The BRIC thesis posits that China and India will become the wo...

This year trend in international politics seems to be different separatist movements around the globe. Kosovo’s unilateral proclamation of independence from Serbia last February played a key role in these developments, which we already have seen in Bolivia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia and probably many more waiting to spark. This trend has big potential, because it is estimated that there is about five thousand ethnic groups on globe. I think now it is time and worth to speculate some variations between independent state and occupied territory. Last week the ethnic Albanian movement ANDI led by Nevzat Haliti made demand that the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia rename itself into "Macedonia-Ilirida" in order to reflect ethnic Albanian demands for a formation of their own entity inside the country. The outcome of this has been described also dual-state , which is one more definition of some sort of self-governance. Definition problem Most common aim of secessionist mov...

Tim Guldimann, head of the OSCE mission in Kosovo, said on Monday 8 th that Kosovo today is "not what we could call a multi-ethnic society". "Different communities live in Kosovo, but a multi-ethnic society means integration, mutual understanding, tolerance and cohabitation. We do not see this," he stated. His words have good base in a new OSCE report on human rights, ethnic relations and democracy in Kosovo for the period from the summer of 2007 to the summer of 2008. Also the headline of other report by Amnesty International tells enough “Kosovo ( Serbia ): The challenge to fix a failed UN justice mission The Kosovo judiciary continues to suffer from serious shortcomings due to the failure to properly apply the law and international human rights standards. OSCE report e.g. highlights that Almost nine years after the conflict, a large number of properties remain illegally occupied, despite the resolution of almost 30,000 residentia...

When speaking about interests of West I would like to make a difference between US – or Anglo-American -interests and EU interests. After “Cold War” US has all the while expanded its influence post-Soviet territory with aim to guide those region’s natural resources under US companies. GUUAM (Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova) Group was founded 1999 with help of US to foster favorable conditions conducive to economic growth through development of an Europe-Caucasus-Asia transport corridor. As pointed out by Michel Chossudovsky in his book America’s ‘War on Terrorism,’ (presentation of Anglo-American war policy from the 1990s Balkans to the present), GUUAM has been “dominated by Anglo-American oil interests, ultimately purports to exclude Russia from oil and gas deposits in the Caspian area, as well as isolating Moscow politically.” More specifically, the US-led military invasion - in close liaison with Britain-responds to the interests of the Anglo - American oil g...

During last conflicts in Caucasus and before in Balkans there has been discussion about EU's position between conflicting parties -between east and west. I can agree with those who advise that EU should not take sides but rather balance its criticism with conflicting parties. From my point of view this could mean an approach with keywords such as understanding, dialogue and multi-polar world. The Balkans have been the focus of extensive public attention for a long time yet not many people can honestly claim to have a firm understanding of the region, its history or the complexity of the problems. The same one can say about Caucasus. I would like to claim that one factor has is share 1st creating problems and 2nd making difficult to manage them. This factor is lack of dialogue, which in both regions has created one-sided picture in western mainstream media and peoples mind. In dialogue, one listens to the other side in order to understand, find meaning, and find agreement. In debat...

Europe's leading human rights and security body, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, accused the Georgian government of committing likely war crimes in the Georgian rebel region of South Ossetia, Der Spiegel said in a report published on Monday 1 st September 2008. The Vienna-based OSCE massively criticized Georgia's western- backed leadership for its assault on South Ossetia, saying Tbilisi planned the invasion well in advance. According OSCE report by Spiegel there is at least four interesting facts which mainstream Western media now must swallow: First, the article presents evidence showing how Georgia prepared military actions against South Ossetia before the event transpired, Second, it demonstrates how Georgia attacked South Ossetia before Russian tanks even entered the Roki tunnel, Third, the article includes testimonies from observers who say Tbilisi ordered an attack on South Ossetia at night while innocent civilians were sleeping,...