Kosovo: Where the West got it fundamentally wrong

Over recent years, the West has been propelled by an ever-more imperialist Washington, whose expansionist policies are fuelled by the selfish interests of the clique of corporate elitists who have their country’s policy in their grip – Capitalism’s worst nightmare – and a gaggle of sycophants who squirm for praise in the hope of being thrown some morsels under the table.

Photo: Kosovo: Where the West got it fundamentally wrong

The latest chapter in this hideous story, after the acts of piracy and mass murder against the civilians of Iraq during the 1990s, after the illegal attack against Serbia, after the slaughter of wedding parties in Afghanistan, after the breach of international law, the UN Charter and the Geneva Conventions in the act of butchery in the Second Gulf War, we now have a meddlesome and interfering stance on the future status of Kosovo.

The fundamental question

Were Kosovo simply a UN-administered province undergoing some serious and open process of dialogue as to its future status, with respect being given to the Serbian side – after all, Kosovo is part of Serbia – nobody would be that worried.

However, here lies the crux of the matter: Kosovo is, and always has been, the heart of the Serbian nation, since the battle of Kosovo Polye (Blackbird Field) in 1389, the reason for the heart of the Serbian civilization to continue beating, even in the face of adversity. For Serbs, Kosovo Polye is a rallying call. Kosovo Polye is the Motherland. Kosovo Polye is home.

An Independent Kosovo

But the West, insensitive, arrogant, true to form, could not care less. The Albanian connection in the US House of Congress speaks louder and transcends all notions of logic. The corporate elitists have decided. After all, the heroin trade is worth billions. Therefore we have talk and rumours in diplomatic circles in the international community that the powers that be have decided that Kosovo is to be an independent state.

The only reason that most Albanians ever went to live in Kosovo was because it was part of Serbia, with a standard of living far higher than that of Albania. The number of pregnant Albanian women who went to Kosovo to bear their child over the years is numbered in the tens of thousands. The children were pawns in the take-over bid which was the dream of a Greater Albania, some Quixotic chimera which was never more than a dream for Albanians and a nightmare for their neighbours.

This bid took on a more sinister twist in the nineties, with Al Qaeda and the CIA once again walking hand-in-hand, arming the Albanians for different reasons but playing the same song in tandem. The result was the much-feared (outside Washington’s Capitol Hill) UCK (Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosoves, Kosovo Liberation Army). The mother of international terrorism.

Slobodan Milosevic made the mistake of trying to free his country of this scourge (wholly unconnected with the Bosnian question which was partly solved with the creation of Republika Srpska) and paid a heavy price. Many were the Albanian women fleeing eastwards away from the KLA and into the Serb lines because they did not want to be forced into prostitution in Albanian mafia gangs operating overseas. After all, women’s rights in Serbia are respected. One cannot say the same in the case of all Albanians.

The Greater Issue

As usual, the West is incapable of looking beyond its nose and as usual, as with the case of Iraq, the West has got it fundamentally wrong. If Kosovo gains independent status, what happens elsewhere and what will the effects of this be in South Ossetia, Chechnya, Daguestan, Ingushetia, Nagorno-Karabakh, and Abkhazia in the Caucasus? Or Republika Srpska and the Albanian enclaves throughout the Balkans in Greece, in Serbia, in Montenegro, in Macedonia?

In short, the Balearics, Bavaria, Brittany, Burgundy, Catalonia, Cornwall, Corsica, Euskadi, Flanders, Scotland, Sicily or Wales, to name a few, have more reason to press for a legitimate claim of independence than Kosovo.

The point is that it is not the role of the European Union nor indeed anyone else outside Belgrade to decide whether Kosovo is independent or not. Kosovo is a question for Serbia and Serbs to decide, period.

As we saw throughout centuries of imperialism, colonization and slavery, the west has an abominable record on meddling and interfering and drawing lines on maps. And they just cannot leatrn, can they?

Timothy BANCROFT-HINCHEY