| [ EnglishOnly ] in KIDS 글 쓴 이(By): thinker (God's Boy!) 날 짜 (Date): 1999년 6월 22일 화요일 오후 07시 10분 39초 제 목(Title): Korea Herald ! Dear friends, Read the following article which will appear in Korea Herald on 23rd June'99. Sincerely, Sanjeev. No Winner in Kosovo ! The war has ended and Kosovo peace agreement has been signed but one thing is certain: The winner will be none, in fact all the parties were desperate to end the conflict. The Clinton administration was desperate for an exit. NATO talked incessantly about how constructive Russia had been in Bosnia -- and could be again in Kosovo. Yugoslav president Mr. Milosevic was also in the similar situation. That exit took the form of a diplomatic agreement signed by NATO and Yugoslav generals after the 11 weeks of bombing. It has also constituted capitulation with some ad hoc face saving. And it was brokered by all groups involved in the war including NATO countries and the Russians played an important role to bring the military offensive against Belgrade to end. The peace agreement signed by NATO and Yugoslav has left an unanswered question : Who뭩 the winner in this conflict ? None of the member countries who backed the NATO air-strikes are winners individually or collectively. In fact, NATO all together failed in what it had aimed for. Of course, any party is free to declare the winner. There are different and controversial claims about winning this conflict. Even after the conflict, both parties are trying to put that they are winners. NATO claims that they are winners as the Yugoslav president Milosevic has agreed on pulling back the Yugoslav forces, paramilitary troops and the state police from the Kosovo province. On the other side, president Milosevic in a state televised speech confirmed that Yugoslavia is the winner as they didn뭪 surrender to NATO and have not given up the sovereignty over the Kosovo and Kosovo is still with Yugoslavia. He also claimed that his army didn뭪 surrender to the well equipped armies of the world뭩 19 most developed nations together. This Balkan conflicts brought the cold-war adversaries back to the pre cold-war era. Russia was boiling with anger over the unilateral air-strikes by NATO backed by USA without the UN permission. Another reason for the Russian anger was the close relations and strong cultural ties in between Balkans and Russians. Russia and Yugoslavia are historical ally and Balkans are strategically important for Russia. Many unwanted incidents also took place during the seven weeks air-strikes against Belgrade. The worst of them was the bombing of Chinese embassy by NATO planes, which chilled the relations between China and western world. Russia kicked NATO's representatives out of Moscow. It sent a spy ship into the Adriatic to shadow the U.S. fleet. It threatened to send military supplies to Belgrade. It boycotted NATO's 50th-year summit in Washington. When the strikes began against Belgrade, thousands of Albanians left their homes and fled to nearby countries of Macedonia and Albania. Officially, it has been estimated that more than 600,000 ethnic Albanians took refuge in the neighboring countries and faced the bombings on their convoy뭩 by NATO mistakenly. All people suffered including the NATO troops, Yugoslav people but the real sufferers are the refugees who fled their homes in fear of the Serb forces and state police which was on the mission of eliminating the ethnic Albanians. The economy of Yugoslavia has been put in shambles. It will take at least ten years to rebuild the infrastructure which has been damaged severely. The railways, bridges, national highways and even hospitals became the target of NATO뭩 bombings. They didn뭪 spare even the oil-refineries and food factories. NATO targeted all the strategic infrastructure to crumble the backbone of Mr. Milosevic and his army, who it alleged was involved in the ethnic cleansing of ethic Albanians, and wanted Milosevic to sign the peace plan on the dictated lines proposed by NATO. Whatever the details of the deal, the losers and winners are foreordained: NATO have retreated. The Kosovar Albanians, having suffered death and dispossession, will never even get back to where they were before Clinton embarked on his little Balkan adventure or misadventure. Serbia will retain control of all of Kosovo under the NATO peace keeping forces and Russians are going to be the party to look after the peace-keeping process along with the NATO troops. The Russians, hailed as the diplomatic brokers, will be honored for their service to peace. Russia's voice at the U.N., so muted since 1991, will grow louder. About the winner in this conflict: All sides are losers. This was a war which witnessed no one as winner. The losers are Serbs, Albanians as well as NATO. But Serbs and Albanians will realize it when they will rebuild what have they lost. Yugoslavia looks like a deserted place after the bombing. The hardship that the Serbs and Albanians face will take away their cheerfulness and happiness. Many Albanians have lost their homes and nothing is left to be called home. Thousands are suffering in the refugee camps from many kinds of diseases. The weather hostilities also made them to suffer. This conflict brought the Russia and China more closer and have vowed to work together along with India to undermine the dictatorship of America. Whatever were the reasons of this conflict, one thing is very clear : This was the war of prestige for western alliance, NATO, but the Serbs including the Albanians will remember it as a nightmare for them. |