The NATO air campaign in Yugoslavia is clearly a violation
of international law.
Since Kosovo is a province of the nation
Yugoslavia, and the United Nations charter
prohibits aggression
against a sovereign nation,
NATO has no right to interfere in
their internal affairs.
Article 2 Section 4 states, "All
Members shall refrain in their international relations
from the
threat or use of force against the territorial integrity
or political
independence of any state."
NATO's intervention is also a
crime against peace according to the Nuremberg Principles.
The
rationale of stopping Serbian genocide against the Albanian people
of Kosovo
has been proven false, since those atrocities have actually
increased as a result of the air war.
The war crimes of the Serbians
in Kosovo do not justify NATO
in committing crimes against the
Serbians;
rather this policy only multiplies the war crimes.
Now
thanks to the European Greens it has come out that
the press failed
to report Appendix B of the Rambouillet agreement in which Yugoslavia
had to accept occupation of all Yugoslavia by NATO troops with
NATO press censorship
to avoid being bombed.
Yet the Serbian parliament
was willing to accept the political settlement
with autonomy for
Kosovo if implementation would be by United Nations authority.
Not being willing to yield its national sovereignty to occupation
by a hostile military alliance
while willing to accept a UN-implemented
agreement
is hardly the resolution of a nation "asking to
be bombed."
The short-term results seem to be that the Serbians have escalated
their purge
(a term preferable to the outrageous euphemism "ethnic
cleansing")
of the Albanians, resulting in hundreds of thousands
being driven from their homes,
many of which are burned, and the
killing of thousands.
This negative purge is especially harmful
as it aims to exterminate the most intelligent,
capable, active,
and freedom-loving of the Kosovars,
while leaving in place only
those who submit and cooperate with such atrocities.
Attempts
by NATO to reduce Yugoslavia's military capabilities by bombing
appear to be too late, crude, and inadequate to solving the problems
on the ground.
The hundreds of thousands of Kosovar refugees pose
humanitarian problems in Kosovo
and for their neighbors Albania,
Montenegro, Macedonia, and others.
Serbians may also be using
Kosovar men as
shields, hostages, and decoys against NATO attacks.
The long-term consequences are also likely to be very harmful.
The example of NATO disregarding the United Nations charter and
processes
by taking matters into their own hands (arms) portends
the arrogance of a new empire
with no organized entity capable
of stopping them.
This could mean a new imperial world order under
the control
of the wealthy western nations imposed by military
force.
Kosovo and Yugoslavia are likely to be devastated
and filled
with hatred and resentment for decades to come.
To compare the current situation of Yugoslavia to Nazi Germany
is an insult to most people's intelligence.
The military capabilities
of Yugoslavia are a tiny fraction of those of the United States
alone
even without its 18 NATO allies.
If we are afraid of a great
military power trying to take over the world,
everyone knows in
what direction to look.
Certainly there is a similarity between
the racist crimes of Nazis and Serbian attempts
to eliminate Muslim
Albanians, and the same poor policies used against Germany
could
result in another, though smaller, holocaust in the Balkans.
Germany, Italy, and Japan never should have been allowed to
re-arm
in violation of international law.
If the League of Nations
had been effectively supported by the United States
and other
countries, the second world war could have been prevented.
If
world laws protecting human rights had been enforced by a democratic
world authority,
Jews, Slavs, and other minorities would have
been defended
by nonviolent officers of the world government.
Yet the United States because of Republican political ambitions
refused to join the League of Nations.
Isolationist policies allowed
fascist nations to build up their militaries,
violate treaties,
and invade other countries.
Even after the war developed, President
Franklin Roosevelt pleaded with Hitler
not to bomb cities; but
by the end of the war allies known as the United Nations
had been
reduced by the fascists to their own tactics of bombing major
cities to rubble,
culminating in the two atomic bombs in Japan.
Yet in Denmark and Norway creative nonviolent methods
were used
to resist and disobey Nazi occupation.
The major lesson of the first world war is that a strongly
supported League of Nations
could have prevented the second world
war.
The first world war also should have taught humanity the
futility and brutality of trying
to solve human conflicts by force
of arms.
The victorious nations of the second world war hoped
to prevent future wars
by establishing the United Nations Organization;
but once again it is proving inadequate.
The UN is more oligarchic
than democratic, as its enforcement agency, the Security Council,
can be blocked by any one of the original nations that won the
second world war
(USA, Britain, France, Russia, and China), which
also happened to be the first nations to gain nuclear weapons.
The United States should have learned from the Vietnam War
the folly of interfering in a civil war.
The USA spent 140 billion
dollars destroying that country, an amount greater than
the total
domestic national product of Vietnam during the entire war.
Suppose
instead the US had contributed funds for education
and other humanitarian
projects instead.
Would not there had been a better chance of
making those people our friends?
The Fellowship of Reconciliation
(FOR) has suggested providing scholarships
to universities for
Kosovars.
With what is currently being blown up (using cruise
missiles at a million dollars a pop)
probably half the country
could be given a university education.
President Clinton has recently developed a dangerous case of
"ultimatumitis."
How many ultimatums have been given
to Saddam Hussein in Iraq?
Many parents have learned the hard
way that to give a child an ultimatum
can result in alienation
and loss of respect, perhaps even permanently.
Is the United States
only learning from these wars
how to improve its ability to destroy
targets?
Perhaps the greatest political lesson of the 20th century will
be how to bring about
social change by nonviolent methods as demonstrated
by Mahatma Gandhi in India
and by others elsewhere.
By applying
Jesus' teaching in the sermon on the mount Gandhi showed that
oppressed people can gain their freedom with self-respect by peaceful
and democratic
methods if they are willing actively to make sacrifices
for their just causes.
Have we learned nothing from the development of genocidal nuclear
weapons?
When will we realize that organized mass murder is a
very serious crime
the people of the world should not tolerate.
Since almost every nation claims now to believe in democracy,
why are we not practicing it on a world level?
Has not the collapse
of the Soviet Union taught us that an arms race
can bankrupt a
country?
Don't people in the United States realize how much more
prosperous they could be
if they did not throw away over $300
billion a year on organized destruction?
Certainly the atrocious crimes of the Serbs against Kosovars
should not be tolerated,
but any child knows two wrongs do not
make a right.
The rule of law also needs to be made universal
by democratic processes.
Individuals must be held accountable
for actions that violate the rights of others.
But to use the
blunt instruments of war to punish whole nations and peoples
for
the crimes of their leaders and supporters tends to escalate the
violence and the crimes.
We must begin from where we are.
In relation to international
law, that means with the United Nations.
It is outrageous that
the United States currently owes about 1.6 billion dollars in
dues
to this organization while it is increasing its military
budget to an amount greater
than all military expenditures of
the rest of the world combined!
The US must pay its dues.
Individuals
most responsible for the worst war crimes and violations should
be indicted
by the International Law Tribunal and brought to trial.
We could begin with Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic
and
work our way down to lesser offenders from there.
If Clinton,
Blair, and others are not careful, they may get themselves on
the list too.
They should be arrested by nonviolent means.
If
they refuse to submit or resist with violence, then whatever means
is necessary
should be used to bring them to justice.
However,
the authorities used for this process should be those who represent
the world
as a whole by democratic processes, not those appointed
by the most powerful nations.
Major league baseball in America
shows an analogous situation to the world.
The teams with wealthy
owners buy the best players.
So instead of a competitive sport,
professional baseball has become a competitive
business in which
the rich have an overwhelming and unfair advantage.
Ultimately we need either to revise the United Nations or call
a world constitutional
convention to draw up a truly democratic
world government
that will protect the human rights of all, oversee
the process of universal disarmament,
and resolve all conflicts
between nations and peoples by the most peaceful means possible.
A carefully designed federal constitution can distribute powers
fairly in ways
that will be responsive to the needs of all people,
while allowing local states to be autonomous in most areas of
their lives.
This has been published in the book PEACE OR BUST.
For ordering information, please click here.
***********************************************************
A friend of a friend sent me the following STATEMENT ON KOSOVO:
Date: Thursday, April 8, 1999 8:00 PM PST
From: peaceworkers@igc.org (David Hartsough)
From: "International Peace Bureau (IPB)" <mailbox@ipb.org>
KOSOVO: PEACE MOVEMENTS OPPOSE
BOTH ETHNIC CLEANSING AND BOMBING
Geneva, April 8, 1999.
The International Peace Bureau - representing
186 citizens' peace organisations worldwide—
is appalled and
sickened by the recent events in Kosovo/a.
We utterly condemn
the Serbian policies of discrimination, ethnic "cleansing",
massacre and terror against the Kosovars.
At the same time we
believe NATO's air-strikes have so far done nothing
but accelerate
the repression, unite the Serbian nation around Milosevic,
and
alienate the Russians and others in the region.
Belgrade's cease-fire
offer, no matter how cynical, did present an opportunity
to de-escalate
the crisis.
NATO's abrupt refusal slams shut the door to a early
resolution.
PREVENTION - LOST OPPORTUNITIES
We are saddened that the West refused the challenge of creating
a partnership with Russia
at Rambouillet and turned its back on
patient, non-violent strategies.
This is in stark contrast to
the negotiations on N. Ireland, for example,
where Tony Blair
repeatedly argues that "You can't bomb your way to the conference
table."
If for the past 8 years the West had supported effectively
the nonviolent response
of the Kosovo Albanians led by Ibrahim
Rogova;
if Milosevic had been indicted at the Hague Tribunal as
a war criminal;
if Kosovo had been included in the Dayton peace
agreement;
if serious attempts had been made to counter the Serb
media propaganda machine;
if more skilled mediators with different
negotiation styles had been used;
if full support and financing
had been offered to the
Organisation for Security and Cooperation
in Europe (OSCE);
then there might not have been an armed struggle,
and we might not be facing today's horrendous mess.
LAWLESS ACTION
Few outside NATO HQ dispute that there is no UN endorsement
for
its unlicensed attacks against a sovereign state.
NATO has usurped
the authority both of the UN and of the OSCE,
violated Article
2.4 of the UN Charter, as well as NATO's own Charter,
and contravened
both the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties
and the Helsinki
Final Act.
The intervention of a supposedly defensive regional
organisation sets a new
and dangerous precedent for other military
groupings
to take lawless action anywhere in the world.
This is
a major challenge for the UN, its Secretariat and agencies, and
its supporters.
Civil society must defend the one global organisation
capable of addressing global problems.
It may be true that there
is a new, evolving legal/moral norm implying a duty
of humanitarian
intervention to protect vulnerable civilians.
It is clear that
many around the world feel that there was 'no choice'
but to resort
to military force in order to avoid another Srebrenica-style massacre.
However, given its highly controversial nature, we believe this
option should have been tested
in UN forums rather than unilaterally.
The use of German forces in the attacks is particularly insensitive,
given the suffering the Serbs endured at the hands of both Nazis
and Ustashe.
US POLICY
US commentators point out that the bombing and its aftermath could
have grave
consequences in terms of reinforcement of the US military
buildup and 'proof'
of the two simultaneous regional wars doctrine.
Furthermore, it will re-militarize the American people, many of
whom see unilateral force
as the only way to deal with internal
and international disputes or humanitarian crises.
US policy towards
the Balkans has been contradictory at best—
supporting democracy
and negotiation and then abandoning such methods.
In particular,
the military action has effectively 'pulled the rug' from under
the democratic representatives of the Kosovo Albanians and instead
given support to the unconstitutional Kosovo Liberation Army,
with the effect that NATO is now acting as its air force.
NATO's 50th ANNIVERSARY AND THE OSCE
IPB has campaigned against the expansion of NATO on the grounds
that
it is both unnecessary and destabilising, given the fierce
opposition in Russia.
We have long urged that support and financing
be transferred to the pan-European OSCE.
It was a tragic mistake
not to have invested in—and mobilised—
a far larger OSCE monitoring
team in Kosovo; and we doubt the wisdom
of withdrawing those that
were present just at the crucial moment.
As in Rwanda, the withdrawal
of the international community's representatives
may come to be
seen as the fatal signal for all-out assault on civilians.
Can
it be a coincidence that this latest NATO action almost coincides
with the 50th anniversary review of NATO's Strategic Concept?
For months NATO spokespersons have been advocating a new approach,
including taking action across state borders for "humanitarian"
reasons.
The way this action has been taken raises serious questions
of accountability and legality.
It must not be seen as a precedent
for future NATO policies.
The long term structure for resolving
such problems in the future is surely the
'Charter for a cooperative
security structure in Europe' to be adopted
by the OSCE Summit
in November 1999 in Istanbul.
SELECTIVITY
We utterly condemn the hypocrisy of the most powerful NATO states,
which have opted for military strikes over Kosovo and yet have
failed to muster
an equivalent UN-led response to situations of
even greater suffering and oppression,
e.g. Kurdistan, Sri Lanka,
or Ethiopia-Eritrea, where so far
over 45,000 have died and no
end to the killing is in sight.
A BOOST FOR THE ARMS INDUSTRY
The military mobilization has brought the US arms industry a sudden
boost in orders,
and is likely to strengthen their hand in arguing
for additional Pentagon subsidies.
The Clinton administration
has already increased military spending this year
and the conflict
of course provides an ideal environment
for testing the latest
hi-tech equipment.
Such developments are extremely negative
from
the perspective of reducing arms production,
sales and exports,
since they reinforce the militarisation of Western economies
which
should have been reversed at the end of the Cold War.
DEPLETED URANIUM
IPB is especially concerned at reports that NATO has been using
depleted uranium
in its attacks on Serbian targets,
both with
its A10 attack aircraft and Tomahawk Cruise missiles.
DU is pyrophoric,
bursting into an intensified flame-up that releases micron-sized
aerosol particles that can be ingested by military personnel or
civilians.
NATO is risking prolonged contamination of the environment,
putting at risk innocent civilians, especially children,
now in
the Balkans as well as Iraq.
DU has been condemned by the UN Commission
on Human Rights,
at its Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination
and Protection of Minorities.
The Commission requested that the
Secretary-General prepare a written report
on DU and certain other
weapons of mass destruction (Resolution 1997/36).
We believe this
weaponry is being tested with complete lack of concern for its
effects.
REFUGEES/HUMANITARIAN CRISIS
The massive flows of refugees fleeing Kosovo threaten the stability
of the whole region.
It is extraordinary that NATO planners—who condemned Milosevic as capable of
almost any evil—failed
to predict or prepare for the exodus of hundreds of thousands
into Macedonia, Albania and Montenegro.
None of these countries
can in the short term cope with such numbers,
and before long
could suffer severe social and political consequences.
Macedonia
especially is likely to experience an upsurge in nationalist sentiment
which could bring war to another region.
We urge Western governments
to accelerate their relief programs and to provide
similar levels of funding to those which are being lavished on the war effort.
It is shameful that the US, UK and France, most willing to bomb,
seem least willing to accept large numbers of refugees on their
soil.
We believe a worldwide UN appeal should also be launched
for financial contributions, materials and volunteers, both short
and long-term.
RETURN THE RESPONSIBILITY TO THE U.N.
IPB demands that the focus of attempts to resolve the crisis must
shift back to the UN.
Given the impasse in the Security Council,
the Secretary-General should ask
the Security Council to request
an immediate emergency session
of the General Assembly (UN Charter
Articles 12 and 14).
We urge that such a session should pass a
resolution calling for:
1) an immediate cease-fire by ALL parties
to the conflict,
and the de-militarisation of Kosovo;
2) the mediation
of a new Kosovo peace settlement package,
with full backing given
to the U.N.
Secretary-General, and with the full participation
of other governments in the region;
3) the dispatch, as soon as
conditions allow, of a multinational (non-NATO)
protection force
of U.N. peacekeepers and civilian volunteers to Kosovo
to enable
the return of the ethnic Albanians to their villages,
the rebuilding
of their homes, and their future safety;
4) allocation of major
financial and human resources to both Kosovo and Serbia
to assist
with the reconstruction;
5) a special report from the Security
Council on its actions to resolve this conflict (Article 15).
This would: a) offer a face-saving way for all sides in the conflict
to de-escalate the war;
b) restore the U.N. to its proper role
in resolving conflict;
c) provide an opportunity for Milosevic
to return to the negotiating table;
d) give Russia and other disgruntled
nations a role in peacekeeping and in the peace settlement.
URGENT MEASURES, CREATIVE THINKING AND THE LONG TERM
IPB believes this crisis is a profound and complex challenge for
all those who wish
both to see human rights respected and peaceful
ways found to resolve bitter conflicts.
The immediate challenge
is how to ensure that
the Kosovar refugees can return in safety
to their homes.
The use of NATO ground troops at this stage would
likely lead to terrible bloodshed.
Possibly the intervention of
Kofi Annan or Nobel laureates
such as Nelson Mandela or Shimon
Peres could provide a new opportunity.
But more pressure will
be needed to persuade all the governments involved
to change tack
before further killing and mass evictions take place.
The first
casualty of this war, as in so many others, has been objective
reporting,
and the circulation of information not controlled by
either the propaganda machine
of Milosevic or the news-packaging
of NATO is essential for clear assessment of the situation.
Meanwhile,
peace, human rights and other humanitarian movements need to engage
in an intensive process of creative thinking to explore all the
dimensions and options
for a peaceful and lasting transformation
of the crisis.
These will include global measures such as the
rapid establishment of the
International Criminal Court and the
prosecution of those guilty of war crimes;
a Global Code of Conduct
on arms transfers and other measures
to restrict the availability
of weapons, both large and small;
strengthening the resources
and prestige of the OSCE and other regional structures;
substantial
investment in peace education and conflict resolution training;
and much more besides.
It is a long road ahead.
From: (Mr.) Colin Archer, Secretary-General International Peace
Bureau,
41 rue de Zurich, 1201 Geneva, Switzerland.
Tel: +41-22-731-6429,
Fax: 738-9419,
Email: mailbox@ipb.org
Web: http://www.ipb.org/ also:
http://www.haguepeace.org/
*******************************************************