By: Mary Mostert, Analyst, Original Sources (www.originalsources.com)
July 16, 1999
In 1996 I was a very active supporter of Bob Dole for President, although I thought he was really wrong in some of his statements about the Bosnian war at the time.
As I delved into the problems, reading material from both Albanian and Serb sources, I kept running into articles which claimed that my hero, Bob Dole, was a "lobbyist" for the Albanians. I dismissed the charge as unsubstantiated and unlikely. Bob Dole, I believed sincerely, would not be involved with a terrorist group like the KLA which, it appeared quite early on, to be financed in large measure by the sale of heroin. Illyria, an Albanian publication, wrote admiringly of Bob Dole in an Editorial on March 4, 1999:
At the start of this decade, one man, then a powerful senator, stood on the steps of the Capitol and vowed to fight for the rights of the Albanians in Kosova.Through the loud cheers of thousands of demonstrators, Bob Dole promised he would visit Kosova and see at first hand the brutality of the Serb regime, which aimed at the ethnic cleansing of the Albanian population. Serb dictator Slobodan Milosevic, who later would win himself the deserved nickname of the Butcher of the Balkans, had just launched a vicious attack on the Albanian people and their institutions. The move marked the beginning of the breakup of Yugoslavia.
The Western world, including America, was caught by surprise -- it rejected the idea of the disintegration of the Yugoslav Federation and thereby unintentionally gave a boost to the ambitions of Milosevic who quickly used force to oppose the secession of Slovenia, and later Croatia and Bosnia. He had already placed Kosova under martial law and arrested thousands who dared to oppose him. Following his speech on the steps of the Capitol building, Dole later that year visited Kosova as he had promised.
...Dole was then among the very few voices in support of Albanians' rights. The man who later would run for president visited Kosova again and again. His belief in the need to stop Milosevic grew stronger. Last year when hundreds of thousands of Albanians were hiding in the woods across the Kosova mountains as their villages lay in ruins amid the shelling of Serb forces, Dole, despite fragile health, visited the refugees, promising to help bring peace to their country.
Of course, what Illyria failed to note is that ALL nations, including the United States of America, generally move against those who are trying to dismantle the country. What Milosevic did was no different that what Abraham Lincoln did when South Carolina announced it was going to leave the United States and create an independent nation. Perhaps Milosevic was too harsh, although a lot of Serbs seemed to feel he dragged his feet too long and let the Albanian separatist movement get away with too much terrorism before taking action.
President Clinton ASKED Bob Dole to try to persuade the Albanians "that U.S. intentions are good and that the White House is serious about the issue. Not that the Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is not a respected U.S. official among the Albanians (her dedication on the issue is to be admired), but Bob Dole brings to Kosova a familiar face -- the face of a man who has fought for their rights in the past and continues to do so." ("Albanian Telegraphic Agency" http://www.telpress.it/ata/ata.htm)
What I did not know until the last few days was just how much campaign money had gone into Bob Dole's, and other congressional leaders', campaigns from the Albanian lobby. But, what has been the final straw for me was the passage of S 1234 Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2000 which was passed 97-2 on June 30, 1999. Bob Smith, who just this week left the Republican party over matters of principle, and Robert Byrd were the only Senators to vote against the bill.
Tucked away in the depths of the bill, totally undiscussed on the Senate Floor is a provision which is clearly intended to kill as many Serb children this winter as possible - and 97 American Senators, Democrats and Republicans, voted in favor of it. I called the office of a Republican senator who shall be temporarily nameless, and inquired if the Senator knew of a provision recently voted on which, according to an e-mail I received, "names Yugoslvia a 'terrorist state'. The aide, who had a Croatian name, said without hesitation that I was referring to S 1234, Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2000, section 525 of the bill which did indeed list Yugoslavia as a terrorist state, along with Cuba, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Iran, Sudan, or Syria.
I also found, reading the bill, that Section 578 of S 1234 called for Sanctions against Yugoslavia which would
1. Require the Secretary of the Treasury to to work in opposition to, and vote against, any extension by international institutions of any financial or technical assistance or grants of any kind to the government of Serbia-Montenegro.
2. Require the Secretary of State to block any consensus to allow the participation of Serbia-Montenegro in the OSCE or any organization affiliated with the OSCE.
3. Require the Secretary of State to vote against any resolution in the United Nations Security Council to admit Serbia-Montenegro to the United Nations or any organization affiliated with the United Nations, to veto any resolution to allow Serbia-Montenegro to assume the United Nations' membership of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and to take action to prevent Serbia-Montenegro from assuming the seat formerly occupied by the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
4. Require the Secretary of State to oppose the extension of the Partnership for Peace program or any other organization affiliated with NATO to Serbia-Montenegro.
5. Require the Secretary of State to oppose and to work to prevent the extension of SECI membership to Serbia-Montenegro.
These draconian sanctions, which are guaranteed to kill hundreds of thousands of people in a nation which is now about 90% unemployed because American bombers destroyed most of its means of production, will remain in place, according to the bill, until the President "certifies" that:
1. The representatives of the successor states to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia have successfully negotiated the division of assets and liabilities and all other succession issues following the dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia;
2. the government of Serbia-Montenegro is fully complying with its obligations as a signatory to the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina;
3. the government of Serbia-Montenegro is fully cooperating with and providing unrestricted access to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, including surrendering persons indicted for war crimes who are within the jurisdiction of the territory of Serbia-Montenegro, and with the investigations concerning the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Kosova;
4. the government of Serbia-Montenegro is implementing internal democratic reforms; and
5. Serbian, Serbian-Montenegrin federal governmental officials, and representatives of the ethnic Albanian community in Kosova have agreed on, signed, and begun implementation of a negotiated settlement on the future status of Kosova.
In effect these provisions destroy totally the G-8 agreement that Milosevic and the NATO nations signed in early June. It provides for the Yugoslavia's assets to be totally under the control of NATO - since they are the ones occupying Kosovo, and apparently intend to occupy the rest of Yugoslavia, which is exactly what the Rambouillet agreement required of Milosevic - uncontrolled access not only to Kosovo, but ALL of Yugoslavia by NATO troops.
Recently in an interview on 60 minutes, Leslie Stahl asked Madelein Albright: "I understand that 500,000 Iraqi children have died due to our sanctions...was it worth it?" Albright replied, "It was worth it." I asked the Senator's aide almost exactly the same question: "This will cause hundreds of thousands of Serb and other children in Yugoslavia to die, just like in Iraq!" I said. "Surely the Senator is not approving that?"
The aide said, "That's what they deserve for choosing a man like Milosevic." I was dumbfounded. The children have chosen NO ONE! Apparently this whole war IS about money - just as many Serbs have been trying to tell me for weeks - but I didn't believe it. Now I find that the Senate of the United States has passed an appropriations bill that spells it out in detail - and the threat is in effect: Give up your assets to us or we kill your children.
Wm. Doric wrote recently, "This was never about Serbs versus Croatians, Slovenians, Bosniacs or Kosovars, repugnant new words in the Balkan lexicon - this was about the cycle of "isms" that have plagued the Balkans for 600 years - Imperialism, Islamism, Fascism, Communism, Socialism, and back again to imperialism. ...Thirty men died in Ron Brown's place crash -they were all corporate vultures whetting their appetite on the spoils of Yugoslavia. We eagerly dismembered a socialist system to transform Yugoslavia into a cluster of weak extremist principalities incapable of charting an independent course of self-development. The International Monetary Fund will help to complete the process by making all of the natural and mineral wealth of Yugoslavia accessible to multinational corporate exploitation. Impoverished, Yugoslavia still has a proud record of a 90% literacy rate and a very skilled Serbian population - who will now be forced to work at subsistence wages.
"The dismantled petroleum, mining and automobile industries no longer offer any competition with existing Western producers. With a shattered economy and 90% unemployment, Serbia is now wide open to transnational companies that could invest and rebuild on their own terms. The title of Michael Lees 1990 book The Rape of Serbia now rings with an astonishing truth."
I must point out that even if ALL the wild stories we've been told by the spin-doctors since this war began were true, and of course, they are not, killing the children of Yugoslavia is totally indefensible. For the United States of America to pass a bill like this with NO discussion, NO reports in the media of its impact is reminiscent of the behavior of a Fascist state. How can we expect "peace" in the Balkans when we treat our once valiant ally of World War II this way - while saying and doing NOTHING about President Tudjman of Croatia and President Izetbegovic of Bosnia, the commanders in chiefs of armies who had concentration camps in which Serbs were raped, tortured and murdered? Why has the Clinton Administration BLOCKED efforts to bring three Croatian generals to the War Crimes Tribunal, while orchestrating a total destruction and the death of many thousands of innocent children because their country's leader is someone they don't like? Why did America use cluster bombs, which are anti-personnel bombs that kill more children than anyone else on Yugoslavia?
What will this mean on the ground in Yugoslavia? Doric noted, "As a 'terrorist state', there will be no travel in or out of Yugoslavia. Mail will be stopped and all of us will be subject to government restrictions on communications with Serbia. Speaking out will carry a price that might be considered subversion. There will be no reconstruction by any nation and no medical assistance and tens of thousands of Serbs will die right before our eyes - just like 1.8 million Iraqi people have died in the last 5 years. The stupidity of this bill is that without rebuilding Serbia, where 60% of Europe's trade flows down the Danube River, the trade will permanently stop. Serbia's neighbors will be punished right along with the Serbs. Mitch McConnell has just shown how much hate can drive a person to immoral conduct and hate speech."
Can anything be done about it? It is not yet law. Call, write, telephone and fax your representative in Congress. (go to: http://originalsources.com/PLobby/ContactCongress.shtml) Write letters, or send this article, to your local newspaper. For national news sources, go to: http://originalsources.com/PLobby/ContactMedia.shtml.
Back in 1962 I was one of 52 American women who flew to Geneva, Switzerland in an effort to stop the testing of nuclear bombs in the atmosphere because, as a young mother of four little children, I was concerned about the sharp increase in child cancer and leukemia from cancer-causing Strontium 90 that children all over the world were drinking along with their milk. Although the Senate was almost solidly behind the nuclear testing, after six months of work by a small group of women, organized in a loose confederation called "Women's Strike for Peace" the testing of bombs in the atmosphere was stopped -by a vote of 94-6 in the Senate- saving the lives of hundreds of thousands of children worldwide.
It's time for those who care about the children - whether they be women or men -to speak up and demand a halt to US policies which are killing children. We can stop this madness.
To comment, or be put on the e-mail action list: mmostert@originalsources.com
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