🔥 Orthodox Christian Serbia & NATO-Muslim Kosovo on The Verge of War
❖ ኦርቶዶክስ ክርስቲያን ሰርቢያ እና ኔቶ–ሙስሊም ኮሶቮ በጦርነት አፋፍ ላይ
🔥 25 NATO Soldiers & 50 Serbian Civilians Injured
President Aleksandar Vucic put the Serbian army on the highest level of combat alert after around 25 NATO peacekeeping soldiers defending three town halls in northern Kosovo were injured in clashes with Serbs as they protested against ethnic Albanian mayors
At least 25 NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR) peacekeepers and 50 Serbian protesters were injured on Tuesday in northern Kosovo during clashes over the recent election of ethnic Albanian mayors, reported United Press International.
The violence comes after local Serbs gathered in front of municipal buildings on Saturday to protest the town Zvecan’s newly elected mayors and to prevent them from entering. The ethnic Albanian mayors were sworn in on Friday to replace Serb mayors who had resigned in November in protest over a cross-border dispute involving vehicle registrations.
On Tuesday, KFOR units issued a warning to the protesters to disperse.
“You are causing unrest. You are putting yourself and your community at risk,” an audio warning from the KFOR troops blared out. “Leave the area and go home. Otherwise, the KFOR will be forced to intervene.”
KFOR troops used tear gas and stun grenades to disperse the crowd while protesters responded with stones, bottles and sticks, according to Kosovo police who confirmed that five protesters were arrested.
In addition to the injuries, military, police and media vehicles were damaged during the attacks, the police said, calling the protesters continually non-peaceful.
So far, several KFOR officers were injured while five individuals have been arrested for attacks and violence, the police said.
Protest is ongoing and the situation continues to be tense, especially in Zvecan. In other municipalities, there are people and criminal groups wearing black clothes and masks, the police added.
NATO issued a statement on Tuesday, calling for an end to the violence.
“NATO strongly condemns the unprovoked attacks against KFOR troops in northern Kosovo, which have led to a number of them being injured. Such attacks are totally unacceptable. Violence must stop immediately,” NATO said.
“We call on all sides to refrain from actions that further inflame tensions, and to engage in dialogue. KFOR will take all necessary actions to maintain a safe and secure environment, and will continue to act impartially, in accordance with its mandate under the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244 of 1999.”
Several Italian and Hungarian soldiers were among those injured after sustaining trauma wounds with fractures and burns due to the explosion of incendiary devices and were under observation at a health facility, according to the KFOR.
“I want to express my solidarity with the soldiers of the KFOR mission who were injured in Kosovo during the clashes between Serbian demonstrators and the Kosovar Police. Among them 11 Italians, three of whom are in serious condition, but not life-threatening. The Italian military continues to commit themselves to peace,” Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, wrote in a tweet on Tuesday.
US ambassador to Kosovo, Jeff Hovenier, also condemned the attacks.
“The US strongly condemns the violent actions of protesters in Zvecan today, including the use of explosives against NATO’s KFOR troops seeking to keep the peace. We reiterate our call for an immediate halt to violence or actions that inflame tensions or promote conflict,” Hovenier said in a tweet.
Meanwhile, Serbian President Aleksander Vucic, whose country does not recognise Kosovo, blasted Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti for fuelling tensions.
“In the last three days, anyone could understand what was being prepared for today in Kosovo. Everything was organised by Albin Kurti, everything with his desire to bring about a big conflict between Serbs and NATO,” Vucic told reporters Tuesday.
Serbs in the north gathered at 7 am Tuesday to express their dissatisfaction with the illegal takeover of local governments and that the KFOR did not protect the Serbs and did not prevent the violence.
💭 This is how hatred turns into words and deeds/ actions. The Turks and the Gala-Oromos have been in a strict spiritual alliance for the past five hundred years, and are carrying out massacres, especially against the Orthodox Christians of Armenia and Ethiopia, to this day. In Ethiopia alone, up to sixty million Orthodox Tewahedo Christians lost their lives in the diabolical conspiracy created by the Turkish and Gala-Oromo union. Yes! 60 million!
If such individual Turks can openly and boldly show so much hatred and insults against their Muslim brothers from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Arabia, it is not difficult to imagine how much hatred they have for Christians who deeply believe they should disappear from the world. History has shown us.
In fact, the hate speech of this wicked Turkish individual is softer than the hate speech of today’s Gala-Oromo leader of Ethiopia, the evil Abiy Ahmed Ali and his allies against the Aksumite Christian Ethiopians. In the last two years, Abiy Ahmed has been making this kind of hateful speech repeatedly. The Gala-Oromos and their allies have massacred up to two million Orthodox Christians and brutalized two hundred thousand women, virgins and children in under two years
🔥 World War III | For the past 500 years, Anti-Christ Turkey is Bombing The World’s Most Ancient Christian Nations: Armenia & Ethiopia
💭 Ethiopia: The Next Phase of Genocide of Christians | Protestant + Islamic Jihad by The Heathen Galla-Oromos
👉 One tragic example: On 7 January 2022 (Orthodox Christmas)
The Fascist Galla-Oromo regime of Ethiopia used a Turkish drone operated by the Turkish army in a strike on a camp for internally displaced people that killed nearly 60 civilians
🔥 Serbia President Puts Military on Combat Alert, Orders Army to Move Closer to Kosovo Border
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic placed the country’s army on full combat alert and ordered its units to move closer to the border with Kosovo, the Tanjug news agency reported on Friday.
Vucic’s orders came as Serbs in the northern Kosovo’s municipality of Zvecan clashed with Kosovo police who were trying to help the newly elected ethnic Albanian mayor enter his office.
The local vote had been boycotted by Serbs who represent a majority in the area.
Local media reported that Kosovo police fired tear gas at a crowd gathered in front of the municipality building.
💭 Tell Me Who Your Friends Are And I Will Tell You Who You Are!
☆ Roman Catholics and Muslims were Allies since the First Crusade. (No wonder ‘The Second Vatican Council’)
The conquest of the Byzantine metropolis Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks in May 1453. When Ottoman Sultan Mehmet conquered Constantinople in 1453, his first destination was Haghia Sophia, the towering seat of Orthodox Christianity. In front of what was then the largest church in the world, he knelt, sprinkled soil on his turban as a sign of humility and recited the Muslim prayer of faith, turning the church into a mosque: “There is no Allah-god but Allah-god, and Mohammed is his prophet.”. The new Antichrist Sultan Erdogan did the same to Hagia Sophia two years ago.
When the Orthodox Church broke away from Rome over the issue of papal authority in 1054, Constantinople became the undisputed political and religious center of the Greek-speaking world.
The city was sacked in 1204 by Western Catholic crusaders, cementing the split between Catholic west and Orthodox east.
In 2004, the late Pope John Paul expressed “disgust and pain” for the sacking of the city by the Fourth Crusade.
☆ Protestantism and ☪ Islam were allies during the early-16th century when the Ottoman Empire, expanding in the Balkans, Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia. The Turks and Protestants imported the Galla-Oromo tribe from Madagascar to the Horn of Africa to use them in their Jihad on Orthodox Christians of Ethiopia. Aḥmad Grāñ and The 16th Century Jihad In Ethiopia is repeated today in the exact same manner.
Ethiopia: The ‘revenge Jihad’ was sought and pre-planned a 126 years ago – after the defeat of Italian Romans at the battle of Adwa, Tigray, Ethiopia on March 1, 1896 .
Almost two years ago, with the meticulous knowledge of the C.I.A and State department, Anti-christian Jihadist nations and organizations strategically displaced millions of Orthodox Christians from Western Tigray – so that they could be gathered together in such a concentration camp like here in Shire. Now they are attempting to massacre them. All pre-planned by The UN + USA + Europe + UAE + Israel + Egypt + Oromos + Amharas + TPLF — and God forbid, could be finished within short time like Hitler’s Auschwitz and Dachau concentration and extermination camps.
UN + America & Europe allow their proxies; the Islamo-Protestant Perpetrators (Fascist Oromo Regimes of Ethiopia and Eritrea) to commit crimes against Ancient Orthodox Christians of Ethiopia.
💭 In 1999 the US + Europe (NATO) did the same thing directly against Orthodox Christian Serbia to help Albanian and Turkish Muslims – ‘to avenge’ the death of 45 Albanian Muslim terrorists.
💭 Senator Joe Biden, in 1999, bragged “I suggested bombing of Belgrade. I suggested that American pilots go there and destroy all bridges on the Drina”.
The 78 days of air strikes lasted from 24 March 1999 to 10 June 1999. The bombs kept falling even on Serbia’s Easter – called Pascha – which is the holiest day of the Orthodox Christian year. NATO bombed innocent Serbians with Depleted Uranium because they killed 45 Albanian terrorists?! Mind boggling!
In this archived clip, for example, Joe Biden said in a fiery speech, “I will continue with every fiber in my being to keep America involved with troops that can shoot and kill….”
“I believe it is absolutely essential for American troops to be on the ground with loaded rifles and drawn bayonets.”
“To be an enemy of America can be dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal.”
— Henry Kissinger
The Belgrade terror rocked Serbia, almost exactly on Orthodox Easter, when Antichrist NATO bombed Belgrade 24 years ago.
In 2017 Serbia appointed or forced by US + EU to appoint its first female and openly gay prime minister. The appointment of Ana Brnabic came as a surprise and disappointment to many Orthodox Christian Serbs. ‘Serbia must choose between EU and Russia‘, says Germany.
🔥 If Antichrist NATO and Co. can send drones to Moscow, why not terrorize Belgrade? They can and will! The Luciferians have already acceded to the throne the citizens of Sodom, who brought the spirit of death and slavery to Orthodox Serbia, Ukraine and Ethiopia. The only fruit we see is terror, war and destruction, slavery and death.
For Muslim Albanian terrorists, they would rather help them do their diabolical work in the Balkans than allow them to migrate to Northern Europe and form a mafia group.
It is no coincidence that Russia + Ukraine + Armenia + Greece + Serbia + Ethiopia are all countries where Orthodox Christian peoples live and where wars and terror have been unleashed by the Edomites of the West and the Ishmailites of the East.
Let’s remember, Serbia was denied Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia and nearly all the eastern lands, known as Old Serbia by NATO & Co.
💭 Anti-Orthodox Conspiracy: NATO ‘Ready to Act’ in KOSOVO if Tensions with SERBIA Escalate. US/NATO Kosovo created State to protect Muslims good. After Ukraine they’re preperaing to attack Orthodox Serbia, again!
💭 Top 10 Countries With the Largest Orthodox Christianity in the World
በዓለም ላይ ብዙ የኦርቶዶክስ ክርስቲያን ምዕመናን ያሏቸው ፲ ምርጥ አገሮች
Russia/ ሩሲያ
Ethiopia/ ኢትዮጵያ
Romania/ ሩማኒያ
Ukraine/ ዩክሬይን
Greece/ ግሪክ
Egypt/ ግብጽ
Serbia/ ሰርቢያ
Bulgaria/ ቡልጋሪያ
USA/ አሜሪካ
Belarus/ ቤላሩስ
💭 A suspect has been arrested after eight people were killed and at least 14 injured in Serbia’s second mass shooting this week.
The gunman fired an automatic weapon from a moving vehicle near a village 60km (37 miles) south of Belgrade.
The interior ministry said the suspect was arrested after “an extensive search”.
It comes after a boy killed nine people at a Belgrade school on Wednesday, Serbia’s worst shooting in years.
Police announced the latest arrest around 08:40 local time (07:40 BST) on Friday. The suspect – who has only been identified by his initials UB – was detained near the city of Kragujevac, the interior ministry said.
The arrest followed an extensive manhunt, which local media reported involved over 600 police officers. Early on Friday morning, Serbian media said that special police forces had arrived at the villages of Mladenovac and Dubona, where the latest shooting occurred.
Photos from the scene showed police officers stopping cars at checkpoints as they tried to find the gunman. A helicopter, drones and multiple police patrols were also used.
Reports on local media say the suspect – who the interior ministry said was born in 2002 – started firing at people with an automatic weapon after having an argument with a police officer in a park in Dubona on Thursday evening.
Milan Prokić, a Dubona resident, told Radio Belgrade 1 he heard shots near his house: “It’s sad, regrettable, we locked ourselves in our home so [the shots] wouldn’t come to us.”
The man is then said to have proceeded to shoot people from a car, killing at least eight people and wounding many more.
All injured people admitted to hospital were born after the year 2000, Serbian broadcaster RTS has reported.
Two people aged 21 and 23 were operated on, but remain in critical condition.
The minister of health, Danica Grujičić, and the head of the Security Intelligence Agency, Aleksandar Vulin, reportedly travelled to the area in the early hours of Friday.
On Wednesday, a thirteen-year-old boy shot dead eight fellow pupils at his school in Belgrade, as well as a security guard. It prompted the Serbian government to propose tighter restrictions of gun ownership.
Mass shootings are extremely rare in Serbia, which has very strict gun laws, but gun ownership in the country is among the highest in Europe.
The western Balkans are awash with illegal weapons following wars and unrest in the 1990s. In 2019, it was estimated that there are 39.1 firearms per 100 people in Serbia – the third highest in the world, behind the US and Montenegro.
-Serbian media “This is the highest level of military preparedness since 1999”
-Serbian security forces are ready for combat
-Sirens reported in #Raska Serbian town near Kosovo border
-The Kosovo Security Council is holding an urgent meeting, seeks action from -KFOR/ NATO to remove Serbia’s barricades on the border.
👉 Russia back Serbia, USA/NATO back Kosovo
👉 Reminder: There is a 24 hrs ultimatum on Serbia.
According to a Serbian outlet, The president of Serbia has been given a 24-hour deadline to remove the roadblocks in northern Kosovo by 5 countries. Some say 10 hours or so are left…
💭 Kosovo has been under UN and NATO administration since a 78-day NATO-led air war that halted a Serb crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists in 1999.
Kosovo’s Serbs, who have boycotted Kosovo’s public institutions, have warned of secession of the Serb-dominated north if Kosovo gains independence.
Christian church set in flames by Albanian Muslim Fanatics 2004. Killing of non-muslims is legitimate. The crosses are still fallen – not in Iraq, in Europe. It was just one of nearly 200 destroyed or desacrated churches and monasteries. There is growing concern that Kosovo, a disputed region in the southern province of Serbia, is emerging as a bastion of radical Islam. 90 percent of Kosovo’s population is ethnic Albanian Muslims. Serb Christians, for who Kosovo is an ancestral homeland and the site of many important Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries, make up roughly 10 percent of the population. Kosovo is part of Serbia but majority of Albanian Muslims want independence.
Kosovo-Metohija is the cradle of the Serbian Orthodox church and of Serbian culture. The towns, cities, and villages all have Serbian names from the medieval period when it was part of Serbia. The oldest Serbian Orthodox churches are located in Kosovo. Albanian settlement and colonization during the Ottoman Turkish period could not erase its Serbian heritage. Moreover, Kosovo-Metohija was never a part of Albania. In fact, there had never been an Albanian state until 1912.
In Kosovo, the small Jewish population was ethnically cleansed out of Kosovo in 1999 along with Kosovo Serbs and other non-Albanians after NATO troops occupied the Serbian province. The Kosovo Jews fled to Belgrade. There are no more Jews living in Kosovo today, which is under NATO military occupation. So the islam is getting closer to Europe step by step – but in this case the eyes of the UN are watching it.
💭 Anti-Orthodox Conspiracy: NATO ‘Ready to Act’ in KOSOVO if Tensions with SERBIA Escalate. US/NATO Kosovo created State to protect Muslims good. After Ukraine they’re preperaing to attack Orthodox Serbia, again!
💭 Top 10 Countries With the Largest Orthodox Christianity in the World | በዓለም ላይ ብዙ የኦርቶዶክስ ክርስቲያን ምዕመናን ያሏቸው ፲ ምርጥ አገሮች
Posted by addisethiopia / አዲስ ኢትዮጵያ on December 27, 2022
✞ የሰርቢያ ፓትርያርክ የሰርቢያን እየሩሳሌም ኮሶቮን እንዳይጎበኙ ተከለከሉ✞
✞ The authorities in Pristina have decided to ban His Holiness Patriarch Porfirije of the Serbian Orthodox Church from making his planned visit to Kosovo today through Wednesday.
The Serbian primate had planned to visit the ancient Patriarchate of Peć, Visoki Dečani Monastery, and other holy sites. The ban was announced yesterday evening.
Both the Patriarchal office and the Diocese of Raška and Prizren in Kosovo have issued responses.
His Holiness the Serbian Patriarch Porfirije received with astonishment the news that the authorities in Pristina today forbade him to travel to the Peć Patriarchate, which is the first and centuries-old seat of the Serbian Orthodox Church and the monastery in which the Patriarch is the abbot, in the days before the great feast of the Nativity of Christ, which is being celebrated by the entire Christian world.
Patriarch Pofririje does not give up his intention to serve the Divine Liturgy in the Patriarchate of Peć and expects that this extremely discriminatory decision will be repealed and that the trampling of the human rights and religious freedoms of Orthodox Serbs living in the Province, on the land of their ancestors, where the Serbian people have lived continuously for at least fifteen hundred years, will be stopped.
His Holiness Patriarch Porfirije prays to God for peace and goodwill among all people, and especially prays for peace to prevail between Serbs and Albanians in Kosovo and Metohija, where they have lived together for centuries.
The Serbian Orthodox Raška-Prizren Diocese with its clergy, monks and faithful people received with astonishment and deep disappointment the news that the authorities in Priština today did not approve the planned visit of His Holiness the Serbian Orthodox Patriarch to Kosovo and Metohija in the period between 26-28. December. It was planned that in addition to his patriarchal monastery (in Peć), the Patriarch planned also visit Visoki Dečani Monastery, our faithful people in Orahovac and Gračanica.
As stated in the Communique of the Cabinet of His Holiness, this is a discriminatory decision that once again confirms the threat to the human and religious rights of our people in this region, because the Serbian Patriarch is also the Archbishop of Peć and he wanted to make a pastoral visit in order to visit his people and holy places in the days before the joyous Feast of the Nativity of Christ. Our Patriarch has repeatedly appealed on peoples of all faiths to live in peace and mutual respect and during his recent enthronement in Peć, he once again called for peaceful coexistence of Serbs and Albanians in Kosovo and Metohija.
Unfortunately, the authorities in Priština have been continuing for weeks with rhetoric aimed at criminalizing the entire Serbian people, and even harassing the Church, although the Church only went public with calls for peace and demands for the respect of its rights. Recent interviews of Mr. Kurti in which he openly attacked and unfairly accused the Serbian Orthodox Church, various proscription lists published by members of the Kosovo Assembly in which the Serbian Orthodox Church is mentioned as a kind of extremist organization, as well as constant attempts to drag our Church into the political narrative, cause serious concern. During the time of the current Kosovo Government, inter-ethnic relations have worsened considerably, the relations between Kosovo institutions and our Church, on which we have worked for years in the spirit of cooperation and dialogue, have never been at a lower level. Rhetoric displaying open ethnic hatred towards everything Serbian and Orthodox deeply threatens to take us all twenty years back. This situation does not lead to a better future not only for the Serbs, but also for the Kosovo Albanians and other communities in Kosovo and Metohija.
In recent weeks, while the latest crisis in the north of Kosovo has emerged, the SOC has not made any political statements because we are not a political organization, and our Diocese has publicly called for peace, restraint and solving of all problems through dialogue. This is what we are doing this time too by appealing to everyone to show responsibility in this situation and preserve peace and restraint, not using any form of violence or aggressive rhetoric. We especially expect the international representatives to do everything in their power to prevent the current crisis from escalating and to stop what the Serbs in Kosovo rightly perceive as open persecution.
The rights of all citizens, regardless of their origin, must be adequately protected, which unfortunately has not happened in Kosovo and Metohija, where for the last 23 years we have been continuously facing with discrimination on an ethnic basis, belligerent political rhetoric which threatens the safety of our believers as well as the SOC religious and cultural heritage. This happens amid the open disrespect for court decisions, laws and selective application of justice by the Kosovo institutions. It is unfortunate that this behavior continues and even intensifies during the Christmas holidays. The latest illegal and utterly uncivilized action against the Serbian Patriarch represents the culmination of arrogance, which threatens further deterioration of inter-ethnic relations.
Therefore, we pray to Christ, the only true Peacemaker, that in these days when we prayerfully observe and celebrate His Birth, reason and peace prevail over madness and cries for violence, so that all citizens in Kosovo and Metohija may live peacefully and safely and that all existing problems may be solved in spirit respecting the basic human and religious rights of all people living here.
In medieval times, Kosovo was part of the original Serbian kingdom. Together with some neighboring areas, Kosovo entered the annals of history as Stara Srbija, or Old Serbia. The Serbian rulers from the 12th century onward built churches, monasteries, and fortresses in the area, such as those at Gracanica, Decani, Pec, and Prizren. These kings also competed for territory with the neighboring Byzantine and Bulgarian Empires.
Kosovo is called the cradle of Serbian civilization because an important battle took place there in 1389. The Nemanja dynasty had died out shortly after its peak during the impressive reign of Emperor Dusan (r. 1331-1355). When the Ottoman Turks continued their push north and west from their foothold in Europe, they still faced determined resistance, however, from Serb forces and their allies, led by a prince named Lazar Hrebeljanovic.
The battle on June 28, 1389, at a site known as the Field of Blackbirds just outside today’s Pristina, brought disaster to the Serbs. Although a semi-independent Serbian state would survive for another seventy years, this battle was the beginning of a long period of occupation and foreign domination for the Serbs.
The date of the battle has, paradoxically, become the single most important red-letter day in Serbian history. The Serbs grew increasingly proud of their tradition of resistance to the Turkish invaders, who were Muslim. As memorialized and mythologized–to this day–in Serbian epic poetry, folk songs, and nationalist histories, the Serbs saw themselves as the bulwark of Christendom that had blunted the force of the Ottoman invasion. The Ottomans went on to capture Bosnia, Hungary, and much of Croatia, and they besieged the great central European city of Vienna twice. But the significance of the Serbian pride in resistance to the Ottomans is more than just military and nationalist; it also reflects the “crusading” mentality so common in Europe in the Middle Ages. Christian Europeans often cooperated in land and sea campaigns against the Turks, whom they regarded as infidels. The Europeans had also mounted bloody invasions of the Holy Land a few centuries earlier during the Crusades, ostensibly fighting a holy war to liberate the area from the rule of Muslims.
It is important to note that in 1389 the Serbs were assisted by the Albanians in the Battle of Kosovo. The Albanians were also Christians. After suffering defeat by the Ottoman army, many Albanians gradually converted to Islam, as did other Europeans in Bosnia and Bulgaria.
This famous battle symbolizes the survival of the Serbian culture and language during the centuries of Ottoman rule. This survival was due in part to the Ottoman style of rule, which was usually rather indirect and did not aim at the assimilation of its conquered peoples. But it was also due to the structure and intellectual feats of the Serbian Orthodox Church. The church played an important administrative role under the Ottomans and kept alive a sense of Serbian identity, unity, and territorial claims. Thus, the Battle of Kosovo stands in Serbian history and culture as a symbol of suffering, of the struggle against invaders, and of cultural survival against the odds.
❖ Serbs Withdraw From All Political Institutions in Kosovo, Including Assembly, Government, Judiciary, Police and Administrative Staff
❖ Russia ally Serbia, which was betrayed by Russia in 1999, Sends Troops to Kosovo Border as NATO Could Face Another Conflict
A deputy commander of NATO’s peacekeeping mission in Kosovo says the alliance is “ready to act” and even prepared to increase troop numbers if trouble erupts amid a vehicle-licensing standoff between Kosovo and Serbia.
Brigadier General Luca Piperni told journalists at the Kosovo Force (KFOR) headquarters in the Kosovar capital, Pristina: “We are vigilant and ready to act…if we have an increase of tensions, but we can also draw on reserve forces…that we can call in at short notice.”
Serbia doesn’t recognize its former province Kosovo as an independent state, and 10 years of EU-mediated talks aimed at normalizing diplomatic and other mutual relations have so far failed.
Piperni called the current situation calm but tense and said he could not exclude the risk of fresh unrest or violence in heavily Serb northern Kosovo as the deadline looms.
The vehicle-registration issue and refusal to respect mutual ID documents have long posed practical problems in northern Kosovo in particular, where ethnic Serbs are in the majority.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell announced a compromise deal on August 27 over the distribution of exit and entrance documents in which Serbia agreed to abolish entry and exit documents for Kosovo ID holders and Kosovo agreed not to introduce them for Serbian ID holders.
He welcomed it as a “European solution” to a stubborn problem in the Balkans, where ethnically fueled wars killed more than 130,000 during and after the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s.
Last weekend, a text circulated online that some suggested was a “new framework” for the EU-mediated talks on normalization between Serbia and Kosovo.
On September 19, Vucic said he’d rejected an EU envoy’s effort to give him a document and suggested that his country faced problems whether or not it “accepted” Kosovo’s membership in the United Nations.
“If the situation deteriorates, we are ready to intervene, we are ready to be in the middle between the protesters and the security organizations,” Piperni said. “We have sufficient forces to deal with the situation…. With that amount of troops we can end any kind of increase of tensions.”
Kosovo’s government has set a date of October 31 for imposing “reciprocal” local-registration requirements on vehicles crossing the Kosovar-Serbian border similar to those already required by Serbian authorities.
Ethinic Serbs in Kosovo begin to raise Serbian flags in Northern Kosovo, also Serbs serving in the Kosovo Government have resigned including civil servants.
Middle Eastern Muslims seem to be baffled by the situation in Kosovo. Should they, as proud Muslims, sympathize with the predominantly Muslim Albanians? Or should they, as stalwart opponents of the United States and NATO, and in some cases long-time friends of Belgrade, sympathize with the Serbs? Indecision and contradiction lead to a curious mish-mash of reactions and an overall inability to respond in way that might materially affect the outcome of the crisis.
The one Middle Eastern country with a predominantly Muslim population offering heartfelt support for the NATO operation is Turkey, where concern has less to do with Islamic brotherhood than with five centuries of Ottoman imperial rule in Kosovo and the fact that some 60,000 Kosovars speak Turkish as their mother-tongue and the many family ties between the Kosovars and the citizens of Turkey. “I saw my relatives on television, walking through mud and in pain. I tracked them down and brought them home,” says Fahri Turkkan, head of the Kosovo Albanian Solidarity Group in Turkey. This sort of reaction has led to an outpouring of popular support for the NATO operations and to a nearly fever-pitch concern for the well-being of the refugees -15,000 of whom have found their way to Turkey, a larger number than to any other member state of NATO. Indeed, so many Turkish families have opened their homes to refugees that government-sponsored refugee camps have had hardly any takers.
In the rest of the region, Muslim opinion is much more negative. Emotions are muted among NATO’s rather few supporters. Yes, the Saudi authorities endorsed the bombing operations (“We must encourage the Americans and their allies in NATO to stay the course”) and even called for ground troops “to finish the job,” but they did so quietly, for this position goes against the feelings of most Saudis. More weakly yet, the government of Jordan condemned the Serb actions without endorsing NATO’s air campaign.
To the extent that Muslim Arabs back NATO’s actions, they do so to argue for parallels between the plight of Kosovars and Palestinians. Serb and Israeli actions are allegedly “no different”: an article with the provocative title “Netansevic”points to ethnic cleansing, deportation of citizens, and destruction of civilian records and property deeds. Advocates of this line sometimes take the next step: “the justifications given by NATO leaders for attacking the Serbs also apply to Israel” and the United States should “handle the Palestinian problem … with the same approach, determination, and willpower” as in the Balkans. One Egyptian newspaper columnist actually writes about his dream “of a day when NATO forces carry out punishing operations against Israel.”
Arab critics of NATO are far more numerous and much more voluble. Many of them simply and emphatically reject the notion that the Americans and their friends are using force on behalf of Muslims. Hizbullah issued a statement declaring that the fighting in the Balkans “does not aim at protecting Albanian Muslims [but is] designed to preserve American interests, and the strongest proof of this is the ongoing killing of Albanians in Kosovo by the Serbs.” In other words, Hizbullah completely ignored NATO’s proclaimed intention of helping the Kosovars and instead dwelt exclusively on the unfortunate consequences of its actions.
Many others adopted this line and drew conclusions furthering their usual viewpoint. A Syrian newspaper rejected “the story line that the aim of this Third World War, mounted unilaterally by the Atlantic Alliance, is to afford protection for the Muslims of Kosovo,” arguing instead that it has the more far-reaching goal of putting “a definitive end to the nuclear and military capabilities of Russia after it has been subjugated economically.” This alarmist statement points to the renewed Syrian need to pander to Russia.
In addition to “strongly condemning this tyrannical aggression,” the Iraqi analysis dismissed purported U.S. and European concern with the Albanians of Kosovo, calling this nothing more than “disguises concealing other objectives,” which it claims are to weaken Yugoslavia and “encircle Russia.” It went on to predict that if “the United States targeted Belgrade this time, so the Cruise missiles will echo in Moscow itself and in other capitals” and ended with a rousing call to arms: “O states of the East, be united!”
The Iranians were likewise little impressed by NATO’s attempts to safeguard the Kosovars and return them to their homes; they reversed this goal and interpreted the aerial bombing campaign as a way to tamp down the Islamic threat to Europe. “The NATO airstrikes,” explained Iran’s supreme leader, “contrary to Western propaganda, have not only failed to bring tranquility to Muslims but have worsened their situation… The process will continue until Muslims are driven out [of Europe], Islam is wiped out and the Islamic community is destroyed.”
This motley collection of official responses points to two main conclusions. First, the Middle East often lives politically in a world of its own making, one that often leads to strange and even false conclusions. Second, on the question of Kosovo, anti-Americanism trumps Muslim solidarity.
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Addis Ethiopia Weblog 