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> Very important documents. German govt. reports state that no extensive
> persecution of Albanians in Kosovo was taking place prior to the Nato
> bombing. ( The German govt. nonetheless supported the bombing decision. )
> This revelation completely undercuts the pro-war argument that Nato bombing
> was intended to prevent "genocide." It is not that the "genocide" or "ethnic
> cleansing" accelerated after the bombing; it simply did not exist prior to
> the bombing--it began with the bombing. The documents point out that the
> Serbian forces were fighting the KLA, not Albanians in general.
>
> http://www.zmag.org/ZNETTOPnoanimation.html
>
> IMPORTANT INTERNAL DOCUMENTS
> =46ROM GERMANY'S FOREIGN OFFICE
> REGARDING PRE-BOMBARDMENT
> GENOCIDE IN KOSOVO
>
> As in the case of the Clinton Administration, the present regime in
> Germany, specifically Joschka Fischer's Foreign Office, has justified its
> intervention in Kosovo by pointing to a "humanitarian catastrophe,"
> "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing" occurring there, especially in the
> months immediately preceding the NATO attack. The following internal
> documents from Fischer's ministry and from various regional
> Administrative Courts in Germany spanning the year before the start of
> NATO's air attacks, attest that criteria of ethnic cleansing and genocide
> were not met. The Foreign Office documents were responses to the
> courts' needs in deciding the status of Kosovo-Albanian refugees in
> Germany. Although one might in these cases suppose a bias in favor of
> downplaying a humanitarian catastrophe in order to limit refugees, it
> nevertheless remains highly significant that the Foreign Office, in contrast
> to its public assertion of ethnic cleansing and genocide in justifying
> NATO intervention, privately continued to deny their existence as
> Yugoslav policy in this crucial period. And this continued to be their
> assessment even in March of this year. Thus these documents tend to
> show that stopping genocide was not the reason the German government,
> and by implication NATO, intervened in Kosovo, and that genocide (as
> understood in German and international law) in Kosovo did not precede
> NATO bombardment, at least not from early 1998 through March, 1999,
> but is a product of it.
>
> Excerpts from the these official documents were obtained by IALANA
> (International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms) which sent
> them to various media. The texts used here were published in the German
> daily junge welt on April 24, 1999. (See
> http://www.jungewelt.de/1999/04-24/011.shtml as well as the commentary
> at http://www.jungewelt.de/1999/04-24/001.shtml). According to my
> sources, this is as complete a reproduction of the documents as exists in
> the German media at the time of this writing. What follows is my
> translation of these published excerpts.
>
> Eric Canepa Brecht Forum, New York April 28, 1999
>
> I: Intelligence report from the Foreign Office January 6, 1999 to the
> Bavarian Administrative Court, Ansbach:
>
> "At this time, an increasing tendency is observable inside the
> =46ederal Republic of Yugoslavia of refugees returning to their
> dwellings. ... Regardless of the desolate economic situation in
> the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (according to official
> information of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia 700,000
> refugees from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzogovina have found
> lodging since 1991), no cases of chronic malnutrition or
> insufficient medical treatment among the refugees are known
> and significant homelessness has not been observed. ...
> According to the Foreign Office's assessment, individual
> Kosovo-Albanians (and their immediate families) still have
> limited possibilities of settling in those parts of Yugoslavia in
> which their countrymen or friends already live and who are
> ready to take them in and support them."
>
> II. Intelligence report from the Foreign Office, January 12, 1999 to the
> Administrative Court of Trier (Az: 514-516.80/32 426):
>
> "Even in Kosovo an explicit political persecution linked to
> Albanian ethnicity is not verifiable. The East of Kosovo is still
> not involved in armed conflict. Public life in cities like Pristina,
> Urosevac, Gnjilan, etc. has, in the entire conflict period,
> continued on a relatively normal basis." The "actions of the
> security forces (were) not directed against the
> Kosovo-Albanians as an ethnically defined group, but against
> the military opponent and its actual or alleged supporters."
>
> III. Report of the Foreign Office March 15, 1999 (Az: 514-516,80/33841)
> to the Administrative Court, Mainz:
>
> "As laid out in the status report of November 18, 1998, the
> KLA has resumed its positions after the partial withdrawal of
> the (Serbian) security forces in October 1998, so it once
> again controls broad areas in the zone of conflict. Before the
> beginning of spring 1999 there were still clashes between the
> KLA and security forces, although these have not until now
> reached the intensity of the battles of spring and summer
> 1998."
>
> IV: Opinion of the Bavarian Administrative Court, October 29, 1998 (Az:
> 22 BA 94.34252):
>
> "The Foreign Office's status reports of May 6, June 8 and July
> 13, 1998, given to the plaintiffs in the summons to a verbal
> deliberation, do not allow the conclusion that there is group
> persecution of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo. Not even
> regional group persecution, applied to all ethnic Albanians
> from a specific part of Kosovo, can be observed with sufficient
> certainty. The violent actions of the Yugoslav military and
> police since February 1998 were aimed at separatist
> activities and are no proof of a persecution of the whole
> Albanian ethnic group in Kosovo or in a part of it. What was
> involved in the Yugoslav violent actions and excesses since
> =46ebruary 1998 was a selective forcible action against the
> military underground movement (especially the KLA) and
> people in immediate contact with it in its areas of operation.
> =2E..A state program or persecution aimed at the whole ethnic
> group of Albanians exists neither now nor earlier."
>
> V. Opinion of the Administrative Court of Baden-W=8Drttemberg, February
> 4, 1999 (Az: A 14 S 22276/98):
>
> "The various reports presented to the senate all agree that the
> often feared humanitarian catastrophe threatening the
> Albanian civil population has been averted. ... This appears to
> be the case since the winding down of combat in connection
> with an agreement made with the Serbian leadership at the
> end of 1998 (Status Report of the Foreign Office, November
> 18, 1998). Since that time both the security situation and the
> conditions of life of the Albanian-derived population have
> noticeably improved. ... Specifically in the larger cities public
> life has since returned to relative normality (cf. on this Foreign
> Office, January 12, 1999 to the Administrative Court of Trier;
> December 28, 1998 to the Upper Administrative Court of
> L=8Dneberg and December 23, 1998 to the Administrative Court
> at Kassel), even though tensions between the population
> groups have meanwhile increased due to individual acts of
> violence... Single instances of excessive acts of violence
> against the civil population, e.g. in Racak, have, in world
> opinion, been laid at the feet of the Serbian side and have
> aroused great indignation. But the number and frequency of
> such excesses do not warrant the conclusion that every
> Albanian living in Kosovo is exposed to extreme danger to life
> and limb nor is everyone who returns there threatened with
> death and severe injury."
>
> VI: Opinion of the Upper Administrative Court at M=8Dnster, February 24,
> 1999 (Az: 14 A 3840/94,A):
>
> "There is no sufficient actual proof of a secret program, or an
> unspoken consensus on the Serbian side, to liquidate the
> Albanian people, to drive it out or otherwise to persecute it in
> the extreme manner presently described. ... If Serbian state
> power carries out its laws and in so doing necessarily puts
> pressure on an Albanian ethnic group which turns its back on
> the state and is for supporting a boycott, then the objective
> direction of these measures is not that of a programmatic
> persecution of this population group ...Even if the Serbian
> state were benevolently to accept or even to intend that a part
> of the citizenry which sees itself in a hopeless situation or
> opposes compulsory measures, should emigrate, this still
> does not represent a program of persecution aimed at the
> whole of the Albanian majority (in Kosovo)."
>
> "If moreover the (Yugoslav) state reacts to separatist strivings
> with consistent and harsh execution of its laws and with
> anti-separatist measures, and if some of those involved
> decide to go abroad as a result, this is still not a deliberate
> policy of the (Yugoslav) state aiming at ostracizing and
> expelling the minority; on the contrary it is directed toward
> keeping this people within the state federation."
>
> "Events since February and March 1998 do not evidence a
> persecution program based on Albanian ethnicity. The
> measures taken by the armed Serbian forces are in the first
> instance directed toward combatting the KLA and its
> supposed adherents and supporters."
>
> VII: Opinion of the Upper Administrative Court at M=8Dnster, March 11, 1999
> (Az: 13A 3894/94.A):
>
> "Ethnic Albanians in Kosovo have neither been nor are now
> exposed to regional or countrywide group persecution in the
> =46ederal Republic of Yugoslavia." (Thesis 1)