Note: Albanians in Kosovo have had their own education system, hospitals, and media for decades…something that not even Austrians would not give to the minority Slovenian population in southern Austria.

You put it very well…Just because of mass medias propaganda against Serbs doesn’t make them more guilty then Croats, Bosnians, Albanians…people need to look at the facts throughout history to understand the situation. I have studied the Balkans and what Serbs have gone through in the Balkans is a tragedy. They have truly suffered the most in Europe throughout history, mostly during Ottoman occupation, WWI and WWII.

You say: “people lost their lives here no matter if it was 1, 10, 1000, 0r 10,000. What’s the difference?”

The difference is huge. It is being alleged that the Serbian government killed Albanians as a matter of state policy — genocide is being alleged. A high death toll would substantiate that accusation and a low one would refute it.

To Kosovar,

You say “KLA did not attack Serbia. KLA attacked Serbian forces in Kosova which is very different. KLA was not an occupying army instead it fought the occupation.”

You don’t seem to understand the meaning of the word “occupation”. Serbia can’t occupy Kosovo because Kosovo is part of Serbia. Kosovo was part of Serbia in 1389 when the Ottoman Empire occupied it and Kosovo was Serbia again in 1913 when the Ottoman Empire signed the treaty giving it back to Serbia.

You admit that the KLA attacked Serbian security forces in Kosovo, but your problem seems to be that the Serbs shot back. I don’t blame them for shooting back. Any security force in any country would have shot back. Look what your beloved President Clinton did in Waco, Texas and Ruby Ridge, Idaho when a bunch of dumb hillbillies opened fire at American FBI and ATF agents. Look at all of the innocent women and children who died there.

The fact that the KLA started the war is beyond dispute. On August 8, 1997 the Koha Ditore newspaper printed a KLA communique that climed responsibility for a series of armed attacks on Serbian security forces, and the murder of two Albanian civilians named Ali Qullapeku and Ramiz Leku. In the same communique, the KLA threatened to unleash “a greater slaughter than in Bosnia-Hercegovina.”

War sucks. Innocent people ALWAYS get caught in the cross-fire. It has happened in EVERY war that has ever been fought in human history. By starting the war the KLA brought all of the death and destruction that followed.

Look what is happening to the civilian population in Iraq, or what happened to the civilians in Vietnam. Do you accuse the United States of genocide in those wars? Was your beloved President Clinton guilty of genocide in Iraq when his Secretary of State went on national TV and said that ousting Saddam Hussein was worth the death of 500,000 Iraqi children?

Compared to the things that Clinton and Bush have done, Slobodan Milosevic and Radovan Karadzic are a pair of saints.

As them not being to walk around freely that is completely not true…In fact there was an Albanian band at EXIT festival in Novi Sad, Serbia. If everything you say is true that how is it possible that Albanians are all over Serbia, Montenegro? How many Serbs have been invited by Albanians to sing in Kosovo or Albania???? ALso Albanians students were in Belgrade perticipating in various events. If you need proof I will gladlly send it? Serbs have welcomed others at all times unless they commit terrorist acts against them? Unlike Albanians which celebrate the arrival of the biggest war criminal in the world (George Bush)!

Bill,

Of the 100,000 people killed 35,000 were Serbs the rest were Croats and Muslims, however dont forget that Croats and Musilms also fought against eachother. Milosevic was not the only one guilty for the balkan wars, in fact the first soldier was killed in Split, Croatia. Tujman and Izetbegovic were just as guilty as Milosevic, they all had refugee camps set up. Lets not forget the soldiers from Holland which released the Srebrenica civilians to criminals like Mladic. Dont think that those NATO soldiers didnt know what kind of war it was. Ofcourse they did, and this Srebrenica massacre in the biggest peice of evidence against Milosevic to run this one sided story against the serbs. Please stick to the facts and not to propaganda!

To Mike, KLA did not attack Serbia. KLA attacked Serbian forces in Kosova which is very different. KLA was not an occupying army instead it fought the occupation.
There was no NATO bombing in Croatia or Bosnia (until late) but Serbs did massacres there too. No Mike it has nothing to do with NATO, this is just the Serbian way of doing things. Let me tell you that less than 10% of the murdered people were members of the KLA, the rest were civilians. What does this tell you? The Serbs were “fighting” civilian population.
And yes, THANK YOU PRESIDENT CLINTON, THANK YOU USA AND NATO.
Mike, no matter what I still can not wish you were an Albanian living in Kosova during this time.
Hey Gib,
Have you seen how Albanians in the north of Kosova live? I don’t think they are as free to move around and speak loudly as Serbs are in Pristina. I won’t say that everything is great for them but don’t forget that the wounds are still open. In time everything will settle down.

Be Good,
Kosovar

I think that everyone should visit Kosovo and see how the Serbs live. You will get a good idea how it will be for the Serbs if Kosovo gets independence. But, without NATO it will be far worse.

There is an eight century gap between the last mention of Illirians in the 5th century AD and the first mention of Albanians on the Balkans in the 11th century AD. It is quite a leap to say that Albanians are Illirians, but to be honest I don’t know how any of that is relevant to the discussion here.

The fact that the KLA started the war is indisputable. The public statements that the KLA issued before the war started are perfectly clear. In 1997 they openly threatened to unleash a war in Kosovo “worse than Bosnia” unless Serbia met their demands.

The KLA attacked Serbia and started the war. One can debate whether the Serb response was too harsh, but it certanly wasn’t any worse than we’ve seen in a lot of other countries when there have been insurrections.

What Clinton did was take a relatively small conflict between Serb security forces and KLA terrorists and turn it into a full-blown international catastrophe. Prior to the 1998 Milosevic-Holbrooke agreement there were only a handful of deaths in Kosovo and Serbia had practically destroyed the KLA.

The Milosevic-Holbrooke agreement forced Serbia to withdraw police from Kosovo under threat of NATO bombing and allowed the KLA to reconstitute itself. The KLA regrouped, renewed its attacks, Serbia retaliated, so NATO started bombing Serbia.

Every war crime that Serbia is accused of by the Hague Tribunal is alleged to have taken place *AFTER* the Milosevic-Holbrooke agreement, and 99% of the war crimes are alleged to have taken place *AFTER* NATO started bombing. The only exception is Racak, and there is a lot of doubt surrounding that incident.

If Clinton had just minded his own damn business and stayed out of Kosovo everything would have been settled in 1998. There would have been far less loss of life because the KLA would have been defeated and there would have been no need for a full-blown war.

Every group that does NOT have equal rights as the other group living in the same place will fight in any way to gain them. That should explain why was there an atack or a KLA.

Don’t forget an important part of history since you lke to go back 50 years. I sugest you go back centuries and look into BC times in Balkans. If you find something called “Illirians” (Ylirians) those are today’s albaians.

P.S. If you look at history,look at history good and go way back, dont stop where you want to stop. If you talk about present than stick to present, but ether way, you cant make your case.

If we want to talk about what happened in 1999 we should also mention what has been happening in that area throughout history. Over the last 50 yrs Serbs have been systematically cleansed from Kosovo. If you look at Yugoslav statistics and if you talk to anyone form former Yugoslavia, excpet Albanians from Kosovo they will tell you that Albanians had a system of genetically dmoniating Serbs in Kosovo by having 10 children per family something which was supported by Tito because it diluted the Serbian population in Yugoslavia(go to wikipedia and look at persons per/sq. kilometer in Kosovo and compare to Albania and Serbia proper, you will see that the numbers are unnaturally high for Kosovo for the region). Also, Albanins constantly terrorizing Serbs and their homeland by killing, raping and more using terrorist tacts by KLA, just as they planned in Ft. Dix. Ft. Dix is nothing new to the Serbs, thats the way they have been living with Albaninas for over 50 yrs.

I dont understand how Albaninas in Kosovo trully believe that Kosovo a region which is the most corrupt in Europe because of Albanian mafia could invite someone to come visit it. Serbs in Kosovo have to be protected by enclaves, like slaves, with no rights. Let me mention that the Serbs in Kosovo are mostly elderly, yet Albaninas have to attack these poor people. I would understand that if the KLA was responsable then we can blame them for what happend in 2004 but you cant. If you watch videos of these attacks on the Serbs in March 2004 you will see that all Albanians were involved in burning churches, killing and cleansing Serbs. How do Kosovo Albanians belive that they deserve their own country when all they have done for 50 yrs was terrorise and try to dominate the Serbs? It is Albanians that have time and time again commited crimes against the Serbs, we can even go back to Ottoman occupaiton to WWI, and WWII. However today the whole world judges the situation on what happend ing 1999 by Milosevic, something which was horrible but Albanians are to blame also. We should take a look at hisotry as a whole and you will see that Serbs have been defending themselves and nothing more.

I was in Kosova all the time before and during the war and it really hurts me when I hear such lies.
Well let me tell you that hundreeds and thousands of people were being displaced, kidnapped, killed and massacred even before the NATO intervention and that was the reason why US and NATO intervened in the first place and for which the Abanians (not only Kosovar Albanians) are grateful forever. It is ridiculous how you speak about the number of people killed, obviously according to your twisted mind, not enought to cause an intervention…..espetially as the victims were mostly of “muslim religion”?
Let me remind you that near Gjakova there is a small village called Meje, were over 300 people were killed in one day almost of them of christian religion.

I noticed on your text that almost all the time you refer to both parties as christians or muslims. You would have to be blind and in such a denial not to see that people were killed because they were Albanians and not because of their religion.

What happened in 2004 is terrible and has no excuse or justification, but no matter how much you would like to put it that way it had nothing to do with the religion. Churches were burned or destroyed because they were Serb and not because they were Christian, othewise how do you explain the fact that not a single Albanian Catholic Churche was damaged during that time as in all towns thare are Caltholic Churches too.
Once again I’m not trying to justify what happened, in the contrary I think that was wrong.

Therefore my dear Sir, you’re way off the base and please, please do not humiliate yourself with such lies.

An advice for you, visit Kosova (although I’m almos sure it wont make any difference as it seems you’re beyound help).

Kind regards
Kosovar