| IV. Kosovo – a look from outside
Albania encourages everything what happens in Kosovo.
Each achievement of the Kosovars has been saluted and approved. That
they are cleansing the territory from Serbs and Romanies, that they keep
in fear and tension the Gorantsi(s) and the Turks – all this has been explained
with the consequences of the endured suffering. No one is inclined
to comment the fact that the aggression turns against their own people,
against the intellectuals, former ideologists of the resistance against
the Serbs, who fear now the Kosovar xenophobia and the vague prospects
for the development of Kosovo.
The prevailing answer of the respondents from Albania
is: “Kosovo must be independent, and after plenty of time, if there is
such a need, we could unite.” Albanians know one truth only from their
history textbooks that Kosovo is a long-standing Albanian territory, which
was treacherously raided by the Serbs in 1912 and was cut from the motherland
along with its population.
A great disappointment reigns among the Albanian community
in Macedonia six months after the end of the war. Contacts are kept only
by businessmen and the Mafia structures, which redistribute the illegal
economic sphere. Ordinary people, who gave shelter to refugees, have no
contacts with their new friends from Kosovo, they do not know their fate,
nor can they exchange any information with them.
We put a question to a famous Albanian intellectual and
political leader, who was familiar with the first part of the research:
“Well, what happens now in Kosovo; is our ascertainment that Kosovo will
turn into an attractive center, in Mecca or in Piemonte for all the Albanians
in the world still valid?” He answered with bitterness, “Kosovo will never
be anything else but one big Aviano, or in simpler words, a big American
base”. Question: “Are the Kosovars aware of what has happened with them
for six months now?” Answer: “The only Albanians in the world who do not
understand what is happening with them are the Kosovar Albanians”. Another
respondent from the Macedonian Albanian community added accordingly: “Actually,
they cannot get out of the euphoria of victory and revenge or rather, this
euphoria gradually and imperceptibly turns into a lasting fanaticism, admixed
with criminality and impunity”. Another respondent: “They are isolated
from the outer world, for this reason no one of us can warn them that they
are closed in a ghetto where hatred only is bred. It is only the Mafiosi
and the traffickers who travel everywhere and meet whom they want”.
In Bulgaria, from where a lot of drivers convey building
materials from the Ukraine and other parts of the region, there is already
an ironic catchword about the new Kosovo racism: “It is best to be a black
person in Kosovo”. A Bulgarian official from the UN mission was killed
because of his Slav origin, two of the Bulgarian drivers were also killed.
According to the Bulgarian drivers KFOR and the international police troops
are not in a position to gain command of criminality: “They attack and
maraud. When a KFOR soldier appears, they have already disappeared, when
the soldier goes away, they come again to finish off what they started.
Our work is like a Russian roulette.”
The Bulgarian policemen from the international contingent,
who have gained a long experience in Cambodia and Bosnia determined their
mission as the most difficult one. They explained that both in Cambodia
and in Bosnia, or wherever they had worked, they had always relied on the
empathy and the assistance of the local people, but this was not the case
in Kosovo: “The police work is entirely based on the contact with the local
people, and everywhere this worked – in Bosnia we even left good friends.
We are facing a wall here, no one is willing to ask for our help or to
assist us. In fact, nobody is willing that we stay there”. Another Bulgarian
policeman: “I have long experience and I know that nothing is black/white
in life and namely the nuances are the place where we lay the principles
of our work. Here in Kosovo, we met for the first time an absolute elementary
black/white which made us feel helpless and our efforts - useless.”
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