|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
||| |||
||| A N T I F A |||
||| |||
||| I N F O - B U L L E T I N |||
||| _____ |||
||| |||
||| * News * Analysis * Research * Action * |||
||| |||
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
*****
||/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\|/\||/\||
|| * -- SPECIAL -- * April 12, 1999 * -- EDITION -- * ||
||\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/||\/||
* SPECIAL EDITION *
* * *
_________________________________________________________________
NATO'S `HUMANITARIANISM' IN THE BALKANS
_________________________________________________________________
CONTENTS
------
1. (MC) MICHEL CHOSSUDOVSKY: Impacts of NATO's
`Humanitarian' Bombings. The Balance Sheet in
Yugoslavia
2. (NAT) THE NATION: The Clinton Doctrine
3. (IND) THE INDEPENDENT [London]: In Serbia, Too, The
Ordinary People Feel the Suffering and Agony of
War
* * *
AD-HOC COMMITTEE TO STOP CANADA'S PARTICIPATION IN THE WAR
IN YUGOSLAVIA
For immediate release, April 11, 1999. For distribution at
Press Conference Monday, April 12, 10 a.m.
National Press Theatre
150 Wellington Street, Ottawa
_________________________________________________________________
IMPACTS OF NATO'S `HUMANITARIAN' BOMBINGS.
THE BALANCE SHEET OF DESTRUCTION IN YUGOSLAVIA.
_________________________________________________________________
By Michel Chossudovsky
Department of Economics, University of Ottawa
Ottawa, K1N6N5
Voice box: 1-613-562-5800, ext. 1415
Fax: 1-514-425-6224
E-Mail: chossudovsky@sprint.ca
- Sunday, 11 April 1999 -
* * *
Amply documented, the bombings of Yugoslavia are not
strictly aimed at military and strategic targets as claimed by
NATO. They are largely intent on destroying the country's
civilian infrastructure as well as its institutions.
According to Yugoslav sources, NATO has engaged around 600
aeroplanes of which more than 400 are combat planes. They have
flown almost 3,000 attack sorties, "with 200 in one night alone
against 150 designated targets". They have dropped thousands of
tons of explosives and have launched some 450 cruise missiles.
The intensity of the bombing using the most advanced
military technology is unprecedented in modern history. It far
surpasses the bombing raids of World War II or the Vietnam War.
The bombings have not only been directed against industrial
plants, airports, electricity and telecommunications facilities,
railways, bridges and fuel depots, they have also targeted
schools, health clinics, day care centres, government buildings,
churches, museums, monasteries and historical landmarks.
INFRASTRUCTURE AND INDUSTRY
According to Yugoslav sources: "road and railway networks,
especially road and rail bridges, most of which were destroyed or
damaged beyond repair, suffered extensive destruction". Several
thousand industrial facilities have been destroyed or damaged
with the consequence of paralysing the production of consumer
goods. According to Yugoslav sources, "[B]y totally destroying
business facilities across the country, 500,000 workers were left
jobless, and 2 million citizens without any source of income and
possibility to ensure minimum living conditions". Western
estimates as to the destruction of property in Yugoslavia stand
at more than US$ 100 billion.
BOMBING OF URBAN AND RURAL RESIDENTIAL AREAS
Villages with no visible military or strategic structures
have been bombed. Described as "collateral damage", residential
areas in all major cities. The downtown area of Pristina (which
includes apartment buildings and private dwellings) has been
destroyed. Central-downtown Belgrade -- including government
buildings -- have been hit with cluster bombs and there are
massive flames emanating from the destruction. According to the
International Center for Peace and Justice (ICPJ):
"No city or town in Yugoslavia is being spared. There are
untold civilian casualties. The beautiful capital city of
Belgrade is in flames and fumes from a destroyed chemical plant
are making it necessary to use gas masks".
CIVILIAN CASUALTIES
Both the Yugoslavia authorities and NATO have downplayed the
number of civilian casualties. The evidence amply confirms that
NATO has created a humanitarian catastrophe. The bombings are
largely responsible for driving people from their homes. The
bombings have killed people regardless of their nationality or
religion. In Kosovo, civilian casualties affect all ethnic
groups. According to a report of the Decany Monastery in Kosovo
received in the first week of the bombing:
"Last night a cruise missile hit the old town in Djakovica,
mostly inhabited by Albanians, and made a great fire in which
several Albanian houses were destroyed ... In short, NATO attacks
are nothing but barbarous aggression which affects mostly the
innocent civilian population, both Serb and Albanian.
THE DANGERS OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINATION
Refineries and warehouses storing liquid raw materials and
chemicals have been hit causing environmental contamination. The
latter have massively exposed the civilian population to the
emission of poisonous gases. NATO air strikes on the chemical
industry is intent on creating an environmental disaster, "which
is something not even Adolf Hitler did during World War II."
According to the Serbian Minister for Environmental Protection
Branislav Blazic, "the aggressors were lying when they said they
would hit only military targets and would observe international
conventions, because they are using illegal weapons such as
cluster bombs, attacking civilian targets and trying to provoke
an environmental disaster". A report by NBC TV confirms that NATO
has bombed a the pharmaceutical complex of Galenika, the largest
medicine factory in Yugoslavia located in the suburbs of
Belgrade. The fumes from this explosion have serious
environmental implications. "The population is asked to wear gas
masks that in fact nobody [has]."
Supply with drinking water for the inhabitants of Belgrade
is also getting difficult after the drinking water facility at
Zarkovo was bombed.
HOSPITALS AND SCHOOLS
NATO has targeted many hospitals and health-care
institutions, which have been partially damaged or totally
destroyed. These include 13 of the country's major hospitals.
More than 150 schools (including pre-primary day care centres)
have been damaged or destroyed. According to Yugoslav sources,
more than 800,000 pupils and students do not attend schools in
the wake of the war destruction. There is almost no pre-school
institutions (nurseries and day-care centres) which are
operational.
CHURCHES, MONASTERIES AND HISTORICAL LANDMARKS
NATO has also systematically targeted churches, monasteries,
museums, public monuments and historical landmarks.
"The targets of the attacks on historical and cultural
landmarks have included the Gracanica monastery, dating back to
the 14th century, the Pec Patriarchate (13th century), the
Rakovica monastery and the Petrovarardin Fortress, which are
testimony to the foundations of the European civilization, are in
all world encyclopedias and on the UNESCO World Heritage list".
THE USE OF WEAPONS BANNED BY INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION
The NATO bombings have also used of weapons banned by
international conventions. Amply documented by scientific
reports, the cruise missiles utilize depleted uranium "highly
toxic to humans, both chemically as a heavy metal and
radiologically as an alpha particle emitter". Since the Gulf War,
depleted uranium (DU) has been a substitute for lead in bullets
and missiles. According to scientists "it is most likely a major
contributor to the Gulf War Syndrome experienced both by the
veterans and the people of Iraq". According radiobiologist Dr.
Rosalie Bertell, president of the International Institute of
Concern for Public Health:
"When used in war, the depleted uranium (DU) bursts into
flame [and] releasing a deadly radioactive aerosol of uranium,
unlike anything seen before. It can kill everyone in a tank. This
ceramic aerosol is much lighter than uranium dust. It can travel
in air tens of kilometres from the point of release, or be
stirred up in dust and resuspended in air with wind or human
movement. It is very small and can be breathed in by anyone: a
baby, pregnant woman, the elderly, the sick. This radioactive
ceramic can stay deep in the lungs for years, irradiating the
tissue with powerful alpha particles within about a 30 micron
sphere, causing emphysema and/or fibrosis. The ceramic can also
be swallowed and do damage to the gastro-intestinal tract. In
time, it penetrates the lung tissue and enters into the blood
stream. ...It can also initiate cancer or promote cancers which
have been initiated by other cancinogens".
According to Paul Sullivan, executive director of the
National Gulf War Resource Center:
"In Yugoslavia, it's expected that depleted uranium will be
fired in agricultural areas, places where livestock graze and
where crops are grown, thereby introducing the spectre of
possible contamination of the food chain."
The New York based International Action Center called the
Pentagon's decision to use the A-10 "Warthog" jets against
targets in Serbia "a danger to the people and environment of the
entire Balkans". (Truth in Media, 10 April 1999). In this regard,
a report in from Greece:
"...registered an increase in levels of toxic substances in
the atmosphere of Greece, and said that Albania, Macedonia,
Italy, Austria and Hungary all face a potential threat to human
health as a result of NATO's bombing of Serbia, which includes
the use of radioactive depleted uranium shells". (see Truth in
Media, 10 April 1999).
THE PLIGHT OF THE REFUGEES
What is not conveyed by the international media, is that
people of all ethnic origins including ethnic Albanians, Serbs
and other ethnic groups are leaving Kosovo largely as a result of
the bombing.
There are reports that ethnic Albanians have left Kosovo for
Belgrade where they have relatives. There are 100,000 ethnic
Albanians in Belgrade. The press has confirmed movements of
ethnic Albanians to Montenegro. Montenegro has been portrayed as
a separate country, as a safe-haven against the Serbs. The fact
of the matter is that Montenegro is part of Yugoslavia.
* * *
A frequent contributor to Antifa Info-Bulletin, Michel
Chossudovsky is Professor of Economics at the University of
Ottawa and author of The Globalisation of Poverty, Impacts
of IMF and World Bank Reforms, Third World Network, Penang
and Zed Books, London, 1997.
Recent articles by Chossudovsky on the global economic crisis at:
http://wwwdb.ix.de/tp/english/special/eco/6373/1.html
http://www.transnational.org/features/chossu_worldbank.html
http://www.transnational.org/features/g7solution.html
http://www.twnside.org.sg/souths/twn/title/scam-cn.htm
http://www.interlog.com/~cjazz/chossd.htm
http://www.heise.de/tp/english/special/eco/
http://heise.xlink.de/tp/english/special/eco/6099/1.html#anchor1
* * *
_________________________________________________________________
THE CLINTON DOCTRINE
_________________________________________________________________
THE NATION
April 19, 1999
http://www.thenation.com/issue/990419/0419klare.shtml
By Michael Klare
President Clinton's decision to use military force against
the Serbs was not simply a calculated response to Slobodan
Milosevic's intransigence. A careful reading of recent
Administration statements and Pentagon documents shows that the
NATO bombing is part of a larger strategic vision.
That vision has three basic components. The first is an
increasingly pessimistic appraisal of the global security
environment. "In this last annual threat assessment of the
twentieth century," Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet
testified on February 2, "I must tell you that US citizens and
interests are threatened in many arenas and across a wide
spectrum of issues." Those perils range from regional conflict
and insurgency to terrorism, criminal violence and ethnic unrest.
The second component is the assumption that as a global
power with far-flung economic interests, the United States has a
vested interest in maintaining international stability. Because
no other power or group of powers can guarantee this stability,
the United States must be able to act on its own or in
conjunction with its most trusted allies (meaning NATO).
The third component is a conviction that to achieve global
stability, the United States must maintain sufficient forces to
conduct simultaneous military operations in widely separated
areas of the world against multiple adversaries, and it must
revise its existing security alliances -- most of which, like
NATO, are defensive in nature -- so that they can better support
US global expeditionary operations.
Combined, these three propositions constitute a new
strategic template for the US military establishment. This
template is evident, for example, in the $112 billion the
President wants to add to the Defense Department budget over the
next six years, which will be used to procure additional
warships, cargo planes, assault vehicles and other equipment
intended for "power projection" into distant combat zones.
Less public, but no less significant, is the US effort to
convert NATO from a defensive alliance in Western Europe into a
regional police force governed by Washington. Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright first unveiled this scheme this past December
at a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels. Claiming that
missile-armed "rogue states" pose as great a threat to Europe as
the Warsaw Pact once did, Albright called on NATO to extend its
operational zone into distant areas and to combat a wide range of
emerging threats. "Common sense tells us," she said, "that it is
sometimes better to deal with instability when it is still at
arm's length than to wait until it is at our doorstep."
Herein lies the essence of what might be termed the Clinton
Doctrine -- the proposition that the best way to maintain
stability in the areas that truly matter to the United States
(like Western Europe) is to combat instability in other areas,
however insignificant it may seem, before it can intensify and
spread. Perhaps the most explicit expression of this doctrine was
Clinton's February 26 speech in San Francisco -- an important
statement that clearly foreshadowed the decision to bomb Serbia:
It's easy...to say that we really have no interests in who
lives in this or that valley in Bosnia, or who owns a strip
of brushland in the Horn of Africa, or some piece of parched
earth by the Jordan River. But the true measure of our
interests lies not in how small or distant these places are,
or in whether we have trouble pronouncing their names. The
question we must ask is, what are the consequences to our
security of letting conflicts fester and spread. We cannot,
indeed, we should not, do everything or be everywhere. But
where our values and our interests are at stake, and where
we can make a difference, we must be prepared to do so.
This is an extraordinary statement; not since the Vietnam
era has a US President articulated such an ambitious and
far-reaching policy. Moreover, as we have seen in the Balkans,
Clinton has every intention of acting on its precepts. His
decision to bomb Serbia is consistent with a clearly delineated
strategic plan.
There is a growing debate over the wisdom of bombing Serbia.
Certainly many people are concerned about the humanitarian
dimensions of the Serbian actions in Kosovo. But in the course of
this debate it is essential not to lose sight of the larger
strategic doctrine behind the bombing. If the newly hatched
Clinton Doctrine is not repudiated, the bombing of Yugoslavia may
be only the first in a series of recurring overseas interventions
-- a prospect that should galvanize peace and disarmament groups
across America.
Michael T. Klare, professor of peace and world security
studies at Hampshire College, is The Nation's defense
correspondent.
Send your letter to the editor to letters@thenation.com.
Copyright 1999 The Nation Company, L.P. All rights reserved.
Unauthorized redistribution is prohibited.
If you liked what you just read, you can subscribe to The
Nation by calling 1-800-333-8536 or by following this link.
The Nation encourages activists and friends of the magazine
to share our articles with others. However, it is mandatory
that academic institutions, publications and for-profit
institutions seeking to reprint material for redistribution
contact us for complete guidelines.
Please attach this notice in its entirety when copying or
redistributing material from The Nation. For further
information regarding reprinting and syndication, please
call The Nation at (212) 209-5426 or e-mail
dveith@thenation.com.
*****
_________________________________________________________________
IN SERBIA, TOO, THE ORDINARY PEOPLE FEEL
THE SUFFERING AND AGONY OF WAR
_________________________________________________________________
THE INDEPENDENT
International News
Saturday, 10 April 1999
http://www.independent.co.uk/stories/B1004902.html
By Robert Fisk in Cuprija
NATO's war is growing more brutal by the hour. I spent most
of yesterday - the Orthodox Easter Good Friday - clambering
through the rubble of pulverised Serb homes and broken water
pipes and roof timbers and massive craters. At Cuprija, Nato jets
have blasted away seven homes, two of them direct hits, during an
attack on the local army barracks. In Kragujevac, the workers at
the massive Zastava car plant who so stubbornly told me just over
a week ago that they would sleep on the factory floor to protect
their workplace - they even sent e-mails to Clinton, Albright and
Solana to this effect - were rewarded with an attack by cruise
missiles that smashed into the car works and wounded 120 of the
men.
And at Aleksinac, it now turns out that up to 24 civilians
may have been killed five days ago in the attack by a Nato jet -
believed by the Yugoslav military to be an RAF Harrier. Workers
still digging through the wreckage yesterday told me that they
had recovered 18 bodies and that six more civilians were still
missing.
The 13th funeral was held yesterday morning - of Dragica
Milodinovic, who died of her wounds three days after her husband,
Dragan, and their daughter were blasted to pieces in the bombing.
At the site yesterday, I found Svetlana Jovanovic standing beside
a mechanical digger, unnoticed by the policemen, rescue workers
and journalists walking over the wreckage. "Both my parents died
just over there - where the bulldozer is moving the rubble," she
said quietly. "I was staying in Nis for the night and this saved
my life." Beside her was part of the torn casing of the Nato bomb
that buried the couple in their cottage.
There is a lot of palpable anger in Aleksinac - a Russian
resident shouted abuse when he heard me speak in English. But
there was not a word of malice from Svetlana, no rhetorical
condemnation of the Nato attacks. When I said how sorry I was for
her family, she replied in English: "Thank you for coming to see
our suffering."
Spyros Kyprianou, the speaker of the Cypriot parliament,
turned up at the bomb sites during the day on a hopeless mission
to secure the release of the three American soldiers captured by
Serb forces last week - in anticipation, no doubt, of obtaining
US support for a Greek Cypriot solution to the island's
partition. He was given a loud and angry account of Nato's sins
from Serbian government officials - nothing about the appalling
suffering of Kosovo's Albanian civilians, of course - and never
had a chance to hear the names of those who died in Aleksinac.
Nato says the bomb that killed the people there may have
suffered a "malfunction" which caused - that obscene phrase yet
again - "collateral damage". The "damage" in this case includes
Svetlana Jovanovic's parents, the Milodinovics and their
daughter, Jovan Radojicic and his wife, Sofia, Grosdan
Milivojevic and his wife, Dragica. Nor was it "collateral": one
of the bombs landed square on the Jovanovic house. It was the
same story - with mercifully no deaths - at Cuprija.
A farming town of 20,000 a hundred miles south of Belgrade,
its local barracks was attacked early on Thursday in a raid that
left a square mile of devastation through dozens of homes. The
Yugoslav army garrison had abandoned the place 10 days ago -
"we're not fools," a policeman said - but the civilians stayed on
and waited for the inevitable. When the first of seven bombs
fell, they ran to their basements as their houses collapsed on
top of them.
I found one home that was simply blasted from its
foundations and hurled across the road into a neighbour's field,
the owner left crouching - miraculously untouched - in his
basement. Another bomb had exploded in a lane opposite a school,
breaking the local water mains and blasting down the walls of a
bungalow.
True, there is a military barracks at Cuprija - at least two
bombs had torn off the roof of the empty Tito-era monstrosity
half a mile away. And there is a military building 800m from the
site of the Aleksinac slaughter. And yes, Nato believes - and
Yugoslav sources confirm - that part of the Zastava car factory
is used for weapons production. It is the fate of Yugoslav
industry that, thanks to Tito, hundreds of its factories have
dual production facilities. And the Kragujevac car plant
management had pleaded with its workers to end their sit-in.
But Nato's refusal to show restraint when it knew the
workers had stayed in the factory shows just how far it is now
taking its war against Serbia.
On Thursday, military officers at the Pentagon announced the
"human shield" of Belgrade's young people on the capital's
largest road bridge would not prevent them attacking the
structure. I couldn't help thinking amid the devastations
yesterday that if Nato goes on widening its bombing campaign to
include civilians - as it very clearly did in Pristina this week,
despite its preposterous claim that the Serbs bombed themselves -
then the final death toll at Aleksinac could soon be academic.
Perhaps there are those in Nato who will argue that after
their ferocity towards the Kosovo Albanians, the Serbs deserve "a
dose of their own medicine". It can always be said - in all
truthfulness - Serb casualties are minimal compared with their
victims in Kosovo. But if it stays its present course, Nato's
offensive risks a massacre.
Copyright 1999. Independent Newspapers [UK] Ltd.
* * *
** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107,
material appearing in Antifa Info-Bulletin is distributed
without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest
in receiving this information for research and educational
purposes. Submissions are welcome. **
* * *
ANTIFA INFO-BULLETIN (AFIB)
750 La Playa # 730
San Francisco, California 94121
E-Mail: tburghardt@igc.org
*
On PeaceNet visit ANTIFA INFO-BULLETIN on pol.right.antifa
Via the Web --> http://burn.ucsd.edu/~aff/afib.html
Archive --> http://burn.ucsd.edu/~aff/afib-bulletins.html
*
ANTI-FASCIST FORUM (AFF)
Antifa Info-Bulletin is a member of the Anti-Fascist Forum
network. AFF is an info-group which collects and
disseminates information, research and analysis on fascist
activity and anti-fascist resistance. More info:
E-mail: aff@burn.ucsd.edu
Web: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~aff
Order our journal, ANTIFA FORUM, cutting-edge anti-fascist
research and analysis! 4 issues, $20. Write AFF, P.O. Box
6326, Station A, Toronto, Ontario, M5W 1P7 Canada
+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+
+: * A N T I F A I N F O - B U L L E T I N * +:
:+ :+
+: * RESISTING FASCISM * BY ALL MEANS NECESSARY! * +:
+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+
++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
++++ if you agree copy these 3 sentences in your own sig ++++
++++ see: http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++
(
geocities.com/CapitolHill)