Where Are Kosovo's Killing Fields?

[Seth Ackerman]

Thanks, Nathan, for forwarding that commentary. However, the likelihood that
Serb authorities managed to quickly conceal or destroy 10,000 bodies in a
province the size of Connecticut, under the eyes of 50,000 NATO troops,
strikes me as slim.

Nathan's commentary seeks to justify NATO's intervention by referring to
Serb crimes committed after the bombing started (i.e., "every roof is
destroyed", etc.). 

Here it an article by Rollie Keith who was an OSCE human rights monitor in
Kosovo until the March pullout. The article appeared in the May issue of the
Democrat, the journal of the British Columbia NDP.

I pulled out the two most salient paragraphs and pasted them directly below.

--- 

"The situation was clearly that KLA provocations, as personally witnessed in
ambushes of security patrols which inflicted fatal and other casualties,
were clear violations of the previous October's agreement. The security
forces responded and the consequent security harassment and
counter-operations led to an intensified insurrectionary war, but as I have
stated elsewhere, I did not witness, nor did I have knowledge of any
incidents of so-called "ethnic cleansing" and there certainly were no
occurrences of "genocidal policies" while I was with the KVM in Kosovo.

What has transpired since the OSCE monitors were evacuated on March 20, in
order to deliver the penultimate warning to force Yugoslavian compliance
with the Rambouillet and subsequent Paris documents and the commencement of
the NATO air bombardment of March 24, obviously has resulted in human rights
abuses and a very significant humanitarian disaster as some 600,000 Albanian
Kosovars have fled or been expelled from the province. This did not occur,
though, before March 20, so I would attribute the humanitarian disaster
directly or indirectly to the NATO air bombardment and resulting
anti-terrorist campaign."

---
http://www.bc.ndp.ca/News/democrat/1999-3%20May/failure_of_diplomacy.htm

May 1999

Failure of Diplomacy
Returing human righst monitor offers a view from the ground in Kosovo

by Rollie Keith

Canada is currently participating in the NATO coalition air bombardment of
the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, ostensibly to force compliance with the
terms of the Rambouillet and subsequent Paris "Interim Agreement for Peace
and Self-Government in Kosovo". The justification for this aggressive action
was to force Yugoslavian compliance and acceptance to the so-called
"agreement" and to end the alleged humanitarian and human rights abuses
being perpetrated on the ethnic majority Kosovar Albanian residents of the
Serbian province of Kosovo. The bombardment then is rationalized on the
basis of the UN Declaration of Human Rights taking precedence over the UN
Charter that states the inviolability of national sovereignty. While I am
concerned with human rights abuse, I also believe many nations, if not all,
would clearly be vulnerable to this criticism; therefore, we require a
better mechanism to counter national human rights violations than bombing.

What, however, was the situation within Kosovo before March 20, and are we
now being misled with biased media information? Is this aggressive war
really justified to counter alleged humanitarian violations, or are there
problematical premises being applied to justify the hostilities? Either way,
diplomacy has failed and the ongoing air bombardment has greatly exacerbated
an internal humanitarian problem into a disaster. There were no
international refugees over the last five months of the Organization for
Security and Co-operation in Europe's (OSCE) presence within Kosovo and
Internal Displaced Persons only numbered a few thousand in the weeks before
the air bombardment commenced.

As an OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission (KVM) monitor during February and
March of this year, I was assigned as the Director of the Kosovo Polje Field
Office, just west of the provincial capital of Pristina. The role of the
1380 monitors of the KVM, from some 38 of the OSCE's 55 nations, including
64 Canadians, was authorized under UN Security Council Resolution 1199 to
monitor and verify cease-fire compliance, or non-compliance, investigate
cease-fire violations and unwarranted road blocks, assist humanitarian
agencies in facilitating the resettlement of displaced persons and assist in
democratization measures eventually leading to elections. The agreement
which was the basis of the KVM ( I refer to it as the "Holbrooke-Milosevic
agreement") was signed on October 16, 1998, ending the previous eight months
of internal conflict.

Given its international composition, the KVM was organized and deployed
quite slowly and was not fully operational on a partial basis until early in
1999. By the time I arrived, vehicles and other resources along with the
majority of international monitors were arriving, but the cease-fire
situation was deteriorating with an increasing incidence of Kosovo
Liberation Army (KLA) provocative attacks on the Yugoslavian security
forces. In response the security forces of the Ministry of Internal Security
police supported by the army were establishing random roadblocks that
resulted in some harassment of movement of the majority Albanian Kosovars.
The general situation was, though, that the bulk of the population had
settled down after the previous year's hostilities, but the KLA was building
its strength and was attempting to reorganize in preparation for a military
solution, hopeful of NATO or western military support. Consequently the
October Holbrooke-Milosevic agreement restraining the Internal Security
police and army was not strictly adhered to, as unauthorized forces were
deployed to maintain security within the major communities and internal
lines of communication. In my estimation, however, the KLA was left in
control of much of the hinterland unchallenged, comprising at least some
fifty per cent of the province. In addition the parallel Albanian government
of the Kosovo Democratic League (KDL) continued to provide some leadership
to the majority of the Albanian Kosovars.

This low intensity war since the end of 1998 had resulted in a series of
incidents against the security forces, which in turn led to some
heavy-handed security operations, one being the alleged "massacre" at Racak
of some 45 Albanian Kosovars in mid-January. Upon my arrival the war
increasingly evolved into a mid intensity conflict as ambushes, the
encroachment of critical lines of communication and the kidnapping of
security forces resulted in a significant increase in government casualties
which in turn led to major Yugoslavian reprisal security operations that
included armour, mechanized forces and artillery to secure there same lines
of communication. By the beginning of March these terror and counter-terror
operations led to the inhabitants of numerous villages fleeing, or being
dispersed to either other villages, cities or the hills to seek refuge. As
monitors we attempted to follow and report on these cease-fire violations,
but I and my fellow monitors also continued to work with both Kosovo
factions and the internally-displaced population to promote the other
aspects of our mission. In particular within our field office area of
responsibility, we were making progress to facilitate the resettlement of an
unoccupied village from the previous summer, while six other villages were
about to be abandoned due to the increasing hostilities. As an example of
this humanitarian work, we had conducted some dozen negotiating sessions
with both belligerents as well as displaced villagers. Our objective was to
create conditions of confidence and stability and commence the resettlement
of the village of Donje Grabovac. This village of some 700 former
inhabitants sits next to a major coal mine guarded by security forces, which
fuels an adjacent thermal generating plant. On the other side of the
village, less than a kilometre away, the KLA also occupied another village.
Donje Grobovac was the scene of daily shooting incidents and in this case
most were probably initiated by the mine guards. Regardless, tensions were
high and fatal casualties and kidnapping of mine and security forces by the
KLA had occurred prior to our arrival. After our lengthy series of
negotiations, all participants agreed not to provoke their opponents and we
were about to escort former village delegations back to commence
resettlement. If this kind of program could have been expanded and built
upon throughout Kosovo, perhaps supported by an enlarged international
monitoring mission to better reduce the cease-fire violations, I believe
both the international air bombardment and intensified civil war would have
been avoided. But western diplomacy would have to be more flexible for this
to occur.

The situation was clearly that KLA provocations, as personally witnessed in
ambushes of security patrols which inflicted fatal and other casualties,
were clear violations of the previous October's agreement. The security
forces responded and the consequent security harassment and
counter-operations led to an intensified insurrectionary war, but as I have
stated elsewhere, I did not witness, nor did I have knowledge of any
incidents of so-called "ethnic cleansing" and there certainly were no
occurrences of "genocidal policies" while I was with the KVM in Kosovo.

What has transpired since the OSCE monitors were evacuated on March 20, in
order to deliver the penultimate warning to force Yugoslavian compliance
with the Rambouillet and subsequent Paris documents and the commencement of
the NATO air bombardment of March 24, obviously has resulted in human rights
abuses and a very significant humanitarian disaster as some 600,000 Albanian
Kosovars have fled or been expelled from the province. This did not occur,
though, before March 20, so I would attribute the humanitarian disaster
directly or indirectly to the NATO air bombardment and resulting
anti-terrorist campaign.

So what led to this breakdown of the peace process and the air bombardment?
The Rambouillet and subsequent amended Paris ultimatum "Interim Agreement
for Peace and Self-Government in Kosovo" was divided into both political and
military implementation accords. The political accord called for a return of
political, cultural and judicial autonomy for Kosovo Province as previously
provided in the 1974 constitution and was generally acceptable to both
factions. The stumbling block was that the Serbian delegation insisted on
the long-term territorial integrity of Yugoslavia and the supremacy of
federal law. With the KLA desiring total independence, however, and American
compliance, the Albanian Kosovars were given the incentive of a referendum
in three years time to determine the ultimate political future of
Yugoslavia. On the military accord, the Contact Group, less Russia, and the
Ambassador Chris Hill's demand that a NATO force be employed to secure the
Kosovo Implementation Mission of the proposed plan was also completely
unacceptable to Yugoslavia, since it constituted foreign occupation of their
sovereign territory by the western alliance. In turn, the acceptance by the
KLA of their supervised disarmament was only accepted after American
political inducements of obvious independence were offered. The result then
is that proposed agreements were in fact ultimatums, unacceptable to Russia
as well as Yugoslavia, as they left that nation with the clear alternative
of surrender or bombardment.

Was there a diplomatic alternative? I believe there always has to be
political alternatives to war, although I an not a pacifist and I do believe
that defensive hostilities may be justifiable for the right cause. The
western members of the Contact Group, the European Union and the United
States and the Russian Federation could have worked within the United
Nations and kept the Russians on side. As an inducement to an enhanced OSCE
or UN monitoring presence within Kosovo, Yugoslavia could have had its 1991
economic sanctions cancelled and economic restructuring funds offered to
promote its integration within the new Europe, with a guarantee, in return,
to eliminate human rights concerns within Kosovo. This proposed enhanced
OSCE presence, perhaps supported by a limited armed UN presence, may well
have been acceptable to the western power, in order to monitor a fair and
genuine Kosovo agreement. However, the NATO bombardment has been
counterproductive, as it has created a significant European humanitarian
problem of more than 600,000 external refugees that threaten to destablize
the surrounding vulnerable nations, exacerbating regional security. Another
estimated 600,000 plus internally-displaced Kosovars are also being
subjected to the deprivations of the full-scale civil war. Then in the end
the international community will also have to rebuild not only Kosovo, but
the rest of Yugoslavian to ensure their future participation in the new
Europe of the 21st century, This is what the failure of diplomacy with its
consequent ill-prepared and ill-conceived air bombardment has accomplished.

What is crucial to have happen then, is that the unjustified moral certitude
that that has resulted in the demonization and vilification of Yugoslavia
and its nationalist President Milosevic cease, and be replaced by a rational
discourse to enable a fair and just solution to be agreed to.

NATO has gone to war to prevent the humanitarian expulsion of an ethnic
minority and has caused the catastrophic Kosovo population displacement to
occur. The western government, led by inept diplomats and politicians, have
failed to provide a rational and diplomatic alternative, and instead have
incited an irresponsible public opinion, whose conscience has led it to
demand actions to solve problems that it does not comprehend. NATO is now in
a war that it cannot win. Its objective of liberating the Kosovo Albanians
from Serbian misrule has been counterproductive, and has resulted in their
expulsion. The war has broken international law, disregarded the UN Charter,
and violated the NATO mandate. This has arguably irrevocably damaged the
dreams and aspirations for rational diplomacy and the rule of law, meant to
establish an international system with limits on great power ambitions.

There were political alternatives to thiswar, but we also should have known
what would happen. And it did happen. The pointless and degrading bombing
must stop and rational international negotiations must commence. The
alternative is incomprehensible. v

Rollie Keith lives in Chilliwack.