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SIRIUS: The
Strategic Issues Research Institute
Tuesday, June 22, 1999 Kosovo In the 1980s ARCHIVE: Kosovo In the 1980s NOTE: This archive, intended for research purposes, contains copyrighted material included "for fair use only." Contents:
The following excerpted article appeared in my inbox in early February and got me thinking and collecting articles about Kosovo in the 1980s from major newspapers and wire services. A number of good people contributed to finding these articles and I thank them. The New York Times, Monday, July 12, 1982 Exodus of Serbians Stirs Province in Yugoslavia "Serbs .... have... been harassed by Albanians and have packed up and left the region. "The [Albanian] nationalists have a two-point platform, ...first to establish what they call an ethnically clean Albanian republic and then the merger with Albania to form a greater Albania." "Some 57,000 Serbs have left Kosovo in the last decade... The exodus of Serbs is admittedly one of the main problems... in Kosovo..." [Full text included below in Article #9.] * * * * I got more and posted an archive on the web Readers retrieved more articles from Lexis-Nexis and other archives and I present a broad sampling herein. Contrast Bob Dole's assertions of Serbian oppression of the Albanians in his Senate Resolution (article #16 below) with articles from the newspapers and wire services at the time. US foreign policy was led astray. The Kosovo Question is vastly more two-sided than we have been led to believe in the last two years of buildup to the NATO Air War against Yugoslavia. Benjamin Works * * * * Census Data; 1981 2. Extract From SIT-7-6-98, Strategic Issues Today; Kosovo Minorities in Census Data: The following data were provided in March by a Professor Batakovic to Bob Djurdjevic, a computer industry consultant and independent journalist from Phoenix, AZ. Mr. Djurdjevic forwarded the following note, which I have edited and added percentage breakdowns for Prof. Batakovic's census figures: "According to Prof. D. Batakovic, member of the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences (SANU), who has done extensive demographic studies of Kosovo, the following are the Kosovo population stats in 1981, when the manipulation of the numbers was not as blatant as it is now:" ------------------------------------------------------------------- Kosovo Population (per Prof. Dusan Batakovic, SANU, 11-Mar-98): POPULATION 1981 ..Percent Albanians .1,226,736 .77.5% Other Muslims ..71,075 . .4.5%..(Turkish and Slavic Muslims) Serbs 209,497. ...13.2% Montenegrin Serbs ....27,028 ..1.7% Others (Gypsies, etc.) ...50,104 ....3.0% Total .1,584,440 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Note: The Census data do not reflect that some 50,000 Serbs had left the province by the time of this census, as confirmed by The New York Times article preceding this item. The data do not do a particularly good job of reporting the other 18 minorities which are neither Serb nor Albanian. Now the population has grown over the last 17 years and some non-Albanians have moved out, being tired of this political nonsense, but the Muslim and Christian communities of non-Albanians remain strongly entrenched in Kosovo as do the Albanian Catholics. So what we have is Albanian Geg neo-fascists and drug lords against virtually everybody --and anybody-- else. At the same time, it is reasonably estimated that some 300,000 Albanians have left Kosovo for Switzerland, Germany and the US since the Milosevic crackdown, which qualifies these emigrants as refugees. The International Roma organization militating for Gypsy rights estimates the Kosovo Gypsy population as high as 400,000 and others estimate the Kosovo Roma at 100-150,000. -BCW, Feb. 27, 1999. * * * * The Articles: The Washington Post; April 3, 1981, Friday, Final Edition SECTION: First Section; World News; A17 1. Yugoslavs Take Emergency Steps In Face of Ethnic Disturbance By Michael Dobbs, Washington Post Foreign Service DATELINE: BELGRADE, April 2, 1981 Yugoslavia's communist authorities today imposed emergency measures in an attempt to quell mounting disturbances among the country's politically sensitives ethnic Albanian minority. Serious clashes between demonstrators and security forces in the province of Kosovo, which borders on Albania, have triggered the first crisis in Yugoslavia since president Tito's death 11 months ago. The gathering unrest reached a climax yesterday when, according to official sources, several hundred people were injured as police firing tear gas broke up a march of at least 10,000 protesters through the provincial capital of Pristina. Under the emergency measures, all public gatherings and movement by "group of people" are banned in the province -- Yugoslavia's poorest region. Army units have been called into protect public buildings, including Pristina's town prison that was the target of yeaterday's march. The protesaters, who included university students and miners, were demanding the release of people detained following riots over the last month. Officials said that demonstrators, some of them armed with guns and firing at the police, pushed children in front of them to make it more difficult for the security services to disrupt the march. Kosovo has long been regarded as one of the weak points in post-Tito Yugoslavia because of its economic backwardness and rivalry between the province's ethnic Albanian majority and Serb minority. Years of what Kosovo's million Albanians considered repression by the Serb elite last boiled over in 1968 when violent demonstrations had to be quelled by the Army. In a nationwide television broadcast, Kosovo's president, Dzavid Nimani, accused the demonstrators of being manipulated by "enemy forces" wanting to destroy Yugoslavia -- a federal state made up of many different national groups. Some of the marchers are said to have chanted slogans calling for unity with Albania, a militantly communist neighbor state, but the main demand was for Kosovo to be upgraded from a province into a republic. A complicating factor is the reported serious illness of Albania's isolationist leader, Enver Hoxha, 72, who succeeded in breaking away from Soviet domination in 1961. One of the "nightmare scenarios" for post-Tito Yugoslavia is of the Kremlin somehow regaining control over Albania after Hoxha's death and fomenting unrest among the Albanian minority here. The latest round of disturbances began March 11, when about 2,000 students at Pristina University rioted over poor living conditions and inequality. The riots were suppressed by police and the discontent has now spread both to other sections of the population and other parts of the province. Serious incidents have been reported in half a dozen towns in Kosovo over the past three weeks, including Pec, where the refectory of a Serbian monastery was burned in mysterious circumstances. This created the danger of a backlash among Serbs, Yugoslavia's largest national group, for whom the patriarchate of Pec has great historical and emotional significance. Taken together, the latest events reflect the two gravest problems confronting Tito's successors: ethnic differences in the complex multinational state and an increasingly serious economic crisis. Inflation is running at more than 40 percent, there are 800,000 unemployed in a total population of 22 million, and Yugoslavia is heavily in debt. The economic problems are most pronounced in poor provinces such as Kosovo, despite a program of large scale investments over the last 10 years. One fear of Yugoslav leaders is that economic strains in less developed parts of the country could trigger new political tension. The comparison with Poland springs to mind, but Yugoslavia is very different. Its multinational make up virtually precludes a protest from a largely united population, as in Poland. Tito, during his 35-year rule, excelled in playing one nationality against another. In addition, there are more outlets for tension than in Poland. Yugoslavs are free to travel abroad and, to a limited extent, participate in political and economic decision-making through the system of workers' self-management. Nevertheless, the latest disturbances do represent the most serious ethnic unrest to have erupted in Yugoslavia for a decade. In his televised speech, President Nimani said the authorities were determined to use all necessary measures to safeguard public order. A statement from the provincial Interior Ministry said the emergency restrictions would remain in force "as long as the extraordinary situation in the province continues." Territorial reserve units, normally intended to serve against an external enemy, have been mobilized to assist the police and security services. Officials said meetings were being held in factories throughout Kosovo to drum up support for the firm stand taken by the authorities. Local Communist Party branches have sent telegrams to Yugoslavia's collective leadership condemning the disturbances and pledging their loyalty. Last week officials said 21 students were detained following a 24-hour occupation of Pristina University. The flare-up coincided with the arrival in the province of a ceremonial baton that youths carried around the country to mark Tito's birthday. The annual event is intended to demonstrate unity and brotherhood among the south Slav nations. Copyright 1981 The Washington Post * * * * The Economist; April 11, 1981 SECTION: World politics and current affairs; EUROPE; Pg. 67 (U.S. Edition Pg. 49) 2. Jugoslavia; Home-grown bother Kosovo, Jugoslavia's poorest region, is behaving in an un-communist fashion. Trouble began with student demonstrations on March 11th in Pristina, the capital of the mainly Albanian-inhabited province. They were put down by the police with relative ease but two subsequent bouts of rioting, on March 26th and April 1st and 2nd, were more serious, and spread to a number of Kosovo towns besides Pristina. Mr Stane Dolanc, a member of the Jugoslav Communist party's top body, on Monday said that 11 people had been killed in the riots so far, two of them policemen, and 57 wounded. Unofficial estimates put the numbers higher. Whatever the figures, nobody denies that the Kosovo riots were a serious affair. Overnight curfews were imposed in a number of Kosovo towns, and foreign journalists were not allowed into the province. Those who managed to get there before the ban were told to leave because the authorities said they ''could not guarantee their safety''. A ban on all public gatherings remains in force. Mr Fadil Hoxha, a member of Jugoslavia's collective state presidency and a Kosovo Albanian (not to be confused with Albania's leader across the border, Enver Hoxha), spoke the day after the last and most serious of the riots of a ''counter-revolution'' in Kosovo aimed at creating a rift between the province's Albanians on the one hand and its Serbs and Montenegrins on the other. Montenegrins and Serbs are Orthodox Christians and Slavs; most of the Kosovo Albanians are Moslems and non-Slavs. Mr Hoxha called the organisers of the riots ''the darkest servants and agents of various intelligence centres and agencies''. Mr Dolanc was more circumspect on Monday, saying that the authorities would have to be deaf and blind to blame the trouble entirely on ''outside factors''. Indeed Albania, one potential ''outside factor'', has remained reserved throughout. Frontier posts between Albania and Jugoslavia have remained closed. Official announcements from Tirana have merely noted the outbreak of disturbances in Kosovo. Clearly the Jugoslav policy of keeping on good-neighbourly terms with Albania has paid off. Could the Russians have been stirring it? Mr Hoxha did speak of Marxist-Leninist slogans used in the Kosovo demonstrations that were strongly reminiscent of ''Cominformism'', which is a Jugoslav term for pro-Sovietism. But it seems unlikely that the Soviet Union would choose this moment to kindle a crisis in Jugoslavia to add to the other crises on its hands. The west, for its part, is doing nothing more inflammatory than praying for post-Tito Jugoslavia to stay stable and united. Clearly the trouble in Kosovo is home-grown. What the Kosovo Albanians appear to want is not necessarily secession from Jugoslavia but concessions within Jugoslavia: more economic aid and, more awkwardly for the authorities, the upgrading of Kosovo's status. At the moment Kosovo is an autonomous province of the Serbian republic. Kosovo nationalists want it to become a fully-fledged republic on a par with Serbia, Croatia and the other four. Albanian nationalists in Kosovo have argued for years that it is a nonsense for Montenegro, with only a third of Kosovo's population, to be a republic while Kosovo is not. But this demand has been resisted by Serbs unhappy that in Kosovo, once the heartland of the medieval Serbian kingdom, the Serbs are now a minority (18% at the time of the 1971 census and almost certainly less now). So rather than yield on the demand for republic status, the Jugoslav government will try to offer more economic aid, especially more investment for the development of its lignite and other mineral riches. The university of Pristina, which now has 35,000 students, has been promised more facilities. But all this will cost money, and Jugoslavia will not find it easily in the present tight financial squeeze. Besides, Kosovo already gets nearly half of all internal Jugoslav development aid. If it were to get more still, there would be grumbles from elsewhere, not least from Serbia, which has poor areas bordering on Kosovo which would not be eligible for aid. * * * * The New York Times, April 19, 1981, Sunday, Late City Final Edition SECTION: Section 4; Page 4, Column 1; Week in Review Desk 3. ONE STORM HAS PASSED BUT OTHERS ARE GATHERING IN YUGOSLAVIA By DAVID BINDER DATELINE: WASHINGTON Josip Broz Tito has not been dead a year, but the Yugoslav ''brotherhood and unity'' he nurtured for 35 years has already developed fissures on a sensitive flank, the mostly Albanian province of Kosovo. What started March 11 as an isolated, seemingly insignificant protest - a student at the University of Pristina dumped his tray of cafeteria food on the floor - escalated by April 2 into riots involving 20,000 people in six cities. Nine people died and more than 50 were injured. Only last week did authorities relax a state of emergency in the province, lifting a curfew and reopening schools. There are other multi-ethnic countries with sizable minorities. But none equals Yugoslavia for ethnic, linguistic and religious diversity and is so vulnerable to centrifugal forces. Hence the concern of Marshal Tito's successors over the explosion of resentment among Yugoslavia's predominantly Moslem Albanian minority of 1.4 million, most of whom live in Kosovo. After the riots, Stane Dolanc, a member of the Communist Party Presidium, warned of ''the danger of the growth of other kinds of nationalisms'' in Yugoslavia - a thinly veiled allusion to the traditional and still virulent rivalry between the dominant Serbs and Croats. The Kosovo rebellion was bad enough news for the Belgrade leadership; it coincided with setbacks that have put Yugoslavia's economy in its worst straits in decades. Industrial production dropped 0.6 percent from February 1980 to February 1981 (Kosovo's dropped 2 percent), while the cost of living rose 40.5 percent, according to official figures. Exports now constitute only 10 percent of the gross national product - the lowest proportion in Europe - and are sinking. The Yugoslavs also spent $1.2 billion more in 1980 for oil imports, despite such conservation measures as gasoline rationing. The foreign debt stands at $17 billion. ''Evidently our economy does not function well,'' acknowledged Milos Minic, a member of the collective party leadership, in a speech to party activists in Zagreb last month. ''Stop the uncontrolled rise of prices!'' demanded Cvijetin Mijatovic, the current President in the revolving succession to Tito, in another grim assessment of the economy before a gathering in Nis. The Government, having just authorized sharp price increases for alcohol and tobacco products, declared that price rises would have to be held this year to 30 percent at the producer level and 32 percent at the retail level. Belgrade is also looking to revitalize Tito's vaunted system of factory self-management, which has ''deteriorated'' under the pressure of inflation, according to Mr. Mijatovic. He and other leaders have described cases of economic anarchy arising when worker councils have raised prices for their products without considering the common good. The collective leadership, created by Tito partly because he did not want to be succeeded by one prominent figure, has functioned adequately despite its Rube Goldberg construction. Yet its very dispersal of authority has deprived it of the charisma required to persuade a nation of independent spirits that it is really leading Yugoslavia. Of course, Tito is a hard act to follow. According to Belgrade officials, the leadership took pains after his death last May to maintain a low profile, but this soon may change. One official said he expected the next Prime Minister, to be elected next year, to play a more prominent role. He also noted that all but one of the eight members of the collective presidency will be replaced in 1983 and he suggested that this might encourage the current leaders to ''become more inspirational because they have nothing to lose.'' Serbs, Turks and Albanians Outsiders sometimes forget that socialist Yugoslavia was born not only of the war against Hitler, but also of a raging civil war that pitted nationality against nationality and church against church, at a cost of 1.7 million lives. The nationality problems of the Kosovo region, desperately poor despite considerable mineral wealth, are centuries old and were exacerbated in both world wars. Originally the home of Serbia's founding dynasty in the 12th century, Kosovo lost most of its remaining Serbian population in the 17th century when the Serbs, Orthodox Christians, fled northward to distance themselves from the Ottoman Turks. Albanian tribesmen filled the vacuum; they now constitute more than four-fifths of the province's population. When the great powers agreed in 1913 to make Albania independent more or less within its present borders, they ceded Kosovo to the Serbian monarchy. It was a blow the Albanians have never forgotten, the more so because their own independence movement had begun in the Kosovo town of Prizren in 1878. World War II brought more upheavals when Kosovo was handed to Mussolini's Italy by Germany and some Albanians enlisted out of gratitude on the Italian side. Retribution came when Tito's partisans entered the area, massacring suspected collaborators before the horrified eyes of their own Albanian Communist comrades in arms. Tito Partisans Once Ruled Albania For a time, Tito's dominant forces ruled Albania and a permanent Yugoslav-Albanian federation was even contemplated. One holdout was Enver Hoxha, who had earlier called for a plebiscite in Kosovo. In 1948, the reversals caused by Tito's ouster from the Cominform lofted Mr. Hoxha into the Albanian leadership he still holds today. For two succeeding decades, Tito's Yugoslavia held down the Albanians of Kosovo, denying them proper schooling and arresting or killing outspoken Albanian teachers. The repression ended in 1966 with the fall of the Serb leader who was Tito's number two, Aleksandr Rankovic. Since then, federal money has poured into Kosovo at a higher rate than into any other part of the country. Pristina University has grown to become one of the country's largest with 48,000 students. Most of the region's administrators, and its police, are ethnic Albanians. The Kosovars are even allowed to fly the Albanian flag, a black eagle on a red field. Yet this ''tremendous dynamic of development,'' as Mr. Dolanc described it, ironically has fed unrest. There were riots in 1968 and again in 1975. This time the youths of Kosovo shouted ''We want a republic'' (their semi-autonomous province has almost all rights of a Yugoslav republic except the right to secede) and some even demanded annexation by Mr. Hoxha's Albanian fatherland. Copyright 1981 The New York Times Company * * * * THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR; May 7, 1981, Thursday, Midwestern Edition SECTION: Pg. 5 4. Kosovo sparking a Yugoslav purge? By Eric Bourne, Special correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor One year after they assumed office, members of Yugoslavia's collective presidency are facing the first post-Tito jolt to the unity of this multinational state. The nationalist riots that erupted in Kosovo province, which has an ethnic Albanian majority, in mid-March have shaken the confidence of the new leaders, who seemed to be enjoying smooth sailing as they held to such Tito-established policies as nonalignment. The unrest also prompted an outcry from a public concerned that officials had supporessed evidence of impending trouble and done nothing to prevent its developing into a full-fledged threat to the federation as a whole. Now the Communist Party chief in the province has resigned amid calls for a purge. Mahmut Bakali accepted much of the responsibility for not heading off the extremist nationalist riots. Ever since 1945, this backward, onetime Serb "colony" has been the problem child in the effort to forge and maintain a stable Yugoslav union of so many differing peoples, languages, and religions. Anti-Serb demonstrations have flared periodically. Steady federal aid since the 1950s, and the "Albanianization" of the police in 1966, have made little real difference. It is not surprising, therefore, that Tito's successors are preoccupied with this first menacing threat to his dream of security through "brotherhood and unity." It has even overshadowed massive economic problems --ports still not competitive in the West despite closer ties to the European Community, and a consequent 44 percent dependency on Comecon trade. Since 1974, Kosovo has had autonomy in all domestic affairs. Why not then republican status? It seems a simple enough solution. The latest unrest repeated the demand that Kosovo be made a republic and incorporate Albanian populations in the neighboring republics of Macedonia and Montenegro. A Belgrade newspaper calls it absurd to speak of exploitation (as Kosovo) extremists do) of a region that has had so much aid from the rest of the country. But economic gain s have not moderated acute nationalist sentiment or the underlying sense of social-political inferiority. COPYRIGHT 1981 THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE PUBLISHING SOCIETY * * * * AP; October 23, 1981, Friday, PM cycle ADVANCED-DATE: October 17, 1981, Saturday, PM cycle SECTION: International News 5. Minorities Leaving Yugoslav Province Dominated by Albanians By KENNETH JAUTZ, Associated Press Writer DATELINE: PRISTINA, Yugoslavia Hundreds of Serbs and Montenegrins are leaving Kosovo Province in the aftermath of rioting that erupted last spring over demands of the ethnic Albanian majority for greater autonomy. Nine people were killed and 260 others injured in the disorders, during which extremists proposed making Kosovo part of neighboring Albania, Eastern Europe's most-orthodox Communist nation. Local officials say security has been restored to the province, but the minorities leaving are said to fear for their future in the area. "We have the situation under full control, but this does not mean hostile activity has totally ceased," Azem Vlasi, president of the Kosovo Socialist Alliance, told visiting journalists recently. Reports on the number of those leaving Kosovo vary widely. But the newspaper Politika of Belgrade, the national capital, estimated that as many as 4,000 people have left or are planning to leave the province, which has a population of about 1.5 million, 77 percent of whom are ethnic Albanians. Officials here downplay the reports of departures, saying citizens have a right to move about the country as they please. Nevertheless, a municipal commission, set up in this provincial capital after the rioting to help those moving obtain job transfers and new housing elsewhere, recently has been turning down requests for such assistance. Enver Redzepi, deputy president of the provincial legislative assembly, said 882 Serbs and Montenegrins have formally applied to move from the area since the riots. "There may have been some other cases of people leaving our area, perhaps nearly a thousand," he said. Most of those asking to leave say new jobs, better living conditions and family considerations prompted their move, but Redzepi said 147 requests had been turned down. "We will not assist in departures that are not justified," he said without elaboration. Politika indicated that many do not give "true reasons," fearing they will not receive official help with their move. The departures from the province could prove significant for Yugoslavia, since the nation is made up of areas inhabited by various ethnic groups with long histories of rivalry. In Kosovo, relations have long been poor between the province's Albanian majority and the Montenegrins and Serbs, who used to hold the most important political and economic jobs. The province is in the southern part of the Republic of Serbia, one of Yugoslavia's six constituent republics. In view of Kosovo's large non-Serbian population, however, the province enjoys a greater degree of autonomy than provinces in other constituent republics. "It's a real worry for them," one Western diplomat said of the departing Serbs. "It's a part of Serbia, but over the years there's fewer and fewer Serbs." Serbs have been gradually leaving the province for years. This trend, coupled with an ethnic Albanian birthrate three times the national average, could raise the likelihood of increased Albanian nationalism in the area. Diplomatic analysts say the Pristina commission, although advertised as a government body to assist in moving, is a way of hindering people from leaving. "The net effect is that it shows they want to keep Serbs there," one diplomat said in Belgrade, the Yugoslav capital. Authorities here emphasize the trouble-free reopening of Pristina University, where student unrest first sparked the demonstrations, but say there have been isolated cases of "nationalist-oriented grafitti." "Nationalism is a state of mind, an ideology," said Vlasi. "One does not fight it quickly, with hostile measures, but over time and with education." © 1981, The Associated Press * * * * THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR; December 15, 1981, Tuesday, Midwestern Edition SECTION: Yugoslavia; Pg. B2 6. Why turbulent Kosovo has marble sidewalks but troubled industries By Elizabeth Pond DATELINE: Zagreb, Yugoslavia Yugoslavia's poorest region, Kosovo, never seems to catch up with the rest of the country no matter how much money is poured into it. This is because the area's energy and transport facilities are so much poorer than those in the north - and because the birthrate (the highest in Europe) is so much greater in the south. In fact, one unit of investment in northern Croatia is 71/2 times as productive as one in southern Kosovo, the Zagreb Economic Institute calculates. It is Yugoslavia's own north-south problem in microcosm. And it can lead to ominous political consequences, as shown by last spring's nationalist demonstrations by the Kosovars (ethnic Albanians) that left eight protesters and one policeman dead. For the Kosovars, it's a cause of constant resentment that they still trail far behind the rest of the country in economic development 35 years after the launching of postwar Yugoslavia with its dreams of economic equalization. For the Serbs, it's a cause of constant exasperation that the Kosovars turn the donations from the rich parts of the country into marble sidewalks and the handsomest university library in all of Yugoslavia (as one disgruntled northern taxpayer expressed it), while never seeming to get their own industry past the handout stage. The task of getting a laggard economic region to a takeoff point is not impossible. Bosnia, another Yugoslav hinterland, has made the transition, even though no one admits this yet officially. For the rest of the 1981-85 five-year plan, Bosnia will still receive federal development funds. But by 1985 it will be considered mature enough to continue on its own economic strength, leaving Kosovo and Montenegro as the main underdeveloped regions. Kosovo's problems seem more intractable, however, for historical and geographic as well as demographic reasons. Kosovo, unlike the once Austrian-ruled Slovenia and Croatia in the north, was for centuries under the rule of an Ottoman empire that cared very little for industrial development. The deeper one went into the Ottoman Balkan provinces, the more primitive the economy. Kosovar was among the most primitive of all. Even the unification of Yugoslavia after World War I did little to modernize the region. In the post-World War II period there has been a conscious attempt to bring Kosovo into the 20th century. But setbacks have included (besides the birthrate) politically guided investment in prestige projects rather than in a sound economic base, a draining of population away from farms to the glamorous city, and overeducation of an unemployable Kosovar intelligentsia in the 10-year-old university in Pristina. The urgent question must therefore be how Kosovo can get out of the vicious circle of underdevelopment. And just about the only answers that have come up that go beyond more-of-the-same are energy and raw-materials investment and direct investment. The former is promising because of Kosovo's concentration of lignite, nickel, lead, zinc, and other resources - and Yugoslavia's push in the current five-year plan to reduce imports, especially energy. One of the investment priorities between now and 1985 is coal, and it is hoped that accelerated lignite production could stimulate the overall Kosovo economy. The idea of having prosperous northern enterprises invest directly in kosovo.netpanies (rather than funneling money through the more politicized development fund) has long been a pet proposal of the Slovenes. Now the Slovenes have won Belgrade's approval for half of their mandatory contribution to Kosovo's development to come in this form. There are precedents for such direct cooperation. Fifteen years ago Slovenia's big wine enterprise took an active interest in developing Kosovo vineyards and marketing Kosovo wine in West Germany and Britain. There has been similar cooperation in pharmaceuticals, and Slovene companies are now investing heavily in the expansion of lignite production and in construction of a thermonuclear power station in Kosovo. Proposals are also circulating for Slovenia's labor-short textile industry to farm out work to Kosovo's underemployed population. COPYRIGHT 1981 THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE PUBLISHING SOCIETY * * * * Financial Times (London); February 5, 1982, Friday SECTION: SECTION I; European News; Pg. 2 7. Police fail to crush resistance in Kosovo By Paul Lendvai in Vienna POLICE in Yugoslavia claimed to have destroyed 33 secret Albanian nationalist groups in the southern Yugoslavian province of Kosovo, and to have seized arms caches and large amounts of propaganda material. They admit, however, that the situation there remains "serious." Students are continuing to cause trouble at the University in Pristina, the capital, and elsewhere, despite the severe jail sentences of up to 15 years handed out to demonstrators. Mr Mehmet Malici, the provincial police chief, revealed that 280 people have been sentenced, more than 800 fined and some 100 are still under investigation. Nevertheless, "minor incidents" still occur. So far this year, for instance, almost 300 hostile slogans have been daubed on buildings. The authorities blame the unrest on the "internal enemy in collusion with foreign forces, above all with the Albanian intelligence service." The autonomous province of Kosovo is part of the republic of Serbia but almost 80 per cent of the 1.6m population are ethnic Albanians. It has been under virtual military rule since last April, when successive waves of violent demonstrations shattered public order. Latest reports confirm the situation to be still highly volatile, with the great majority of the ethnic Albanians refusing to co-operate with the police. "Nin," the Belgrade weekly publication, has recently revealed that Serbs and Montenegrans are being attacked, their wives and daughters occasionally raped and their property destroyed. Such "Fascist type" intimidation methods, it said, is forcing them to migrate to other parts of Yugoslavia. There are sporadic reports about the unrest spreading to Montenegro and Macedonia, where hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians live in compact groups. The demonstrators, primarily young people, last year demanded republic status for the province. The Belgrade leadership has rejected this, seeing it as a prelude to a merger with neighbouring Albania. The entire political leadership of Kosovo, from the party secretary to the police chief and television director, have been removed and the Serbian republican authorities have tightened their control over the province. But in view of the severe unemployment -- only 176,000 are employed, against 72,000 officially registered workless -- young ethnic Albanians are likely to remain a serious cause for concern. The Belgrade newspapers also admit that ethnic Albanian officials and politicians in the province are often physically threatened and their cars and houses damaged by the nationalists, who regard them as collaborators. The eruption of national hatred and the accelerated migration of Slavs has provoked an equally dangerous nationalist backlash in Serbia and other parts of eastern Yugoslavia. The crisis in Kosovo has also whipped up nationalistic sentiments among the estimated 35,000-40,000 Albanians working in the West. In recent months, several Yugoslav diplomatic and trade offices have been attacked by Albanian extremist groups and three politically active Albanian residents in West Germany were murdered in mysterious circumstances last month. Copyright 1982 The Financial Times Limited * * * * Financial Times (London); June 1, 1982, Tuesday SECTION: SECTION II; Financial Times Survey; Yugoslavia III; Pg. 29 8. Kosovo riots jolt the regions David Buchan / D.B. Problems are compounded by a lack of unity in the Yugoslav market AS FAR back as 1960, Marshal Tito claimed to have solved Yugoslavia's nationalities question. In a way he had. It has been a remarkable feat that the 19 different nationalities recorded in the Yugoslav census (including the small proportion which actually declared themselves "Yugoslavs") have lived together in more or less continuous peace for 37 years now in a federation of six republics and two autonomous provinces. But the nationalities issue will never be really settled until the regional problem is. With the poorest region (Kosovo) having one-sixth of the average income of the richest (Slovenia), vast differences remain. The problem is compounded by lack of unity in the Yugoslav market. To let the nationalities "do more of their own thing," wide economic powers -- from investment planning to foreign currency allocation -- have been devolved on republics and provinces. The result is something like eight economies. This has left the federal authorities in Belgrade a thin line to tread: between appearing to hold back a relatively rich region, which sparked the 1971 outbreak of Croatian nationalism and which frets Slovenes now, and letting a poor region fall too far behind, which underlay the outburst in Kosovo last year. Kosovo has given many Yugoslavs a nasty jolt that the nationalities-cum-regional problem may be getting worse, not better. The bloody riots that erupted in March-April 1981 in the streets of Pristina, Kosovo's capital town, have not been repeated since. But the calls by some of the province's million ethnic Albanian majority for Kosovo to be a full republic have not totally subsided either. With a couple of smaller protests this spring, police and militia are still in force there, and a total of 280 people have been locked up in the past year or so. The elevation of Kosovo from a province loosely attached to Serbia to full republican status might seem a harmlessly small step to most non-Yugoslavs. Kosovo already largely runs itself. As a province it has slightly fewer representatives at the federal level than a republic, but has a blocking veto over most major decisions. But fears by other Yugoslavs of such a change are also easy to see. Albania, with its powerful radio Tirana transmissions and whirring presses, has weighed in to accuse "Great Serb chauvinism" of once again trying to deny Kosovan Albanians their just rights. This has confirmed many Yugoslavs in their suspicion that "republican" demands are the thin end of a wedge that would split Kosovo off into the waiting grasp of President Enver Hoxhas of Albania. Short of that, it is probably the case that a change in Kosovo's status would set off other centrifugal forces in Yugoslav society. Wide gap The root, however, of Kosovo's discontent is economic, and its plight is but the severest of these less-developed regions, which are very roughly to the south of the Sara and Danube rivers, the limit of the old Turkish occupation. Thus, Kosovo has a per capita gross national product of 31 per cent of the Yugoslav average, Bosnia-Hercegovina 66 per cent, Macedonia 65 per cent, Montenegro 80 per cent, Serbia 96 per cent. Roughly to the north of those rivers formerly under Austrian rule, is Voyvodina with 121 per cent of the national average, Croatia with 126 per cent and Slovenia with 198 per cent. The gap was not always this wide. Between 1947 and 1980, the underdeveloped regions rose from 30 to 37 per cent of the population, but their share in national net social product (a measure of physical output that excludes services) fell from 23.4 per cent to 21.6 per cent and in per capita terms this meant a drop from 77 per cent to 58 per cent of the national average. This is despite a transfer of resources from richer areas to poorer by means of the Yugoslav regional fund set up in 1966. All Yugoslav companies pay 1.8 per cent of their income into this fund which then backs investment projects in the under-developed regions. The federal government also creams off 0.8 per cent of republics and provinces incomes to boost social services for the poorer areas. In fact, Kosovo's particular problems have not gone unnoticed by the regional fund's administrators who have steadily increased the share going to the province, from 30 per cent of the total in 1966-70 to 42 per cent in 1981-5. But the effort clearly failed -- for reasons, some of which are special to Kosovo and others typical of the whole underdeveloped region. In the opinion of Mr Dragan Vasiljevic, the fund's assistant director, they include diversion of capital investment funds into operating social services for an expanding population, investment into energy and extractive industries, products from which were kept artificially low in price by the federal government, and production of other goods poor in quality and design. Perhaps another reason for Kosovo's current problems might be added. For cultural reasons relatively fewer Albanian Kosovans have felt inclined to up sticks and move to richer pastures. Migration has been Yugoslavia's traditional safety valve -- both to western Europe, and to other parts of Yugoslavia. The biggest internal migration has, for instance, been from Bosnia to Slovenia. But there is now a net "reflow" of some 25,000 Yugoslavs a year from countries like West Germany, and with housing shortages and slowing economies, the richer Yugoslav republic no longer want fresh labour in the quantities they once did. So, if the labour cannot go to the jobs, the jobs must come to them. But that is precisely the problem. A unified market, in terms of a free flow of capital and goods, barely exists in Yugoslavia, as countless officials and businessmen will attest. The republics and provinces have used, or misused, their economic autonomy won in the 1970s to try to create the infrastructures of mini-states. Mr Edo Rasberger, a Slovene, for instance, says it makes sense for each region to have its own separate oil products distribution to ensure its fair share; he runs Petrol, a company that does just that for Slovenia. But he points out that it makes no sense for each Republic to try to build its own refinery, as they are doing, when the country's existing refineries are working way below capacity. Mr Ivan Racan, a leading Croatian communist, complains of the economic nationalists in his republic who wanted to build an unneeded Zagreb-Split highway (in preference to a vital new Zagreb-Belgrade route) simply because it was within Croatian boundaries. He sees in the current climate of austerity a welcome chance to axe similar prestige follies. Dr Ljubisav Markovic, a leading federal parliamentarian, notes that republic contracts often do not get out to competitive tender but go to local companies, creating local monopolies. Mr Pavle Gazi, secretary of the federal communist central committee, says that in present circumstances, key raw materials like iron ore or coal have stopped circulating freely because some companies would rather export them than ship to another republic. Major effort On top of this, the country's foreign exchange market had virtually collapsed as companies hoarded foreign exchange even when they did not need it, for fear of not being able to get it back again to buy imports. This Balkanisation of the economy has serious national consequences in terms of competitivity and inflation, and the flow of resources from "have" to "have-not" regions inside Yugoslavia. Luckily, something is being done about it. First, there is a major effort under way to reform the foreign exchange market by requiring a compulsory pooling of foreign exchange so that the poorer regions of the country which do less exporting get some share. Second, half of the regional fund is now available on very easy terms (14 years repayment at 4.2 per cent for most underdeveloped regions and 17 years at 3 per cent for Kosovo) to back joint ventures between companies in the rich north and poor south of the country. The aim is to get the more efficient companies from Yugoslavia's richer areas to lend a direct hand to those in Kosovo and elsewhere and in the process to get both to think more "nationally." Copyright 1982 The Financial Times Limited * * * * The New York Times, Monday, July 12, 1982 9. Exodus of Serbians Stirs Province in Yugoslavia By MARVINE HOWE, Special to the New York Times DATELINE: PRISTINA, Yugoslavia Danilo Krstic and his family are hardworking wheat and tobacco farmers, Serbs who get along with their Albanian neighbors. "You have to love the place where you live to stay on the land here," Marko Krstic, the oldest son, told visitors to the farm at Bec, a few miles from the Albanian border. There have been no serious troubles between Serbians and Albanians in Bec, but Serbs in some of the neighboring villages have reportedly been harassed by Albanians and have packed up and left the region. The exodus of Serbs is admittedly one of the main problems that the authorities have to contend with in Kosovo, an autonomous province of Yugoslavia inhabited largely by Albanians. Rioting Brought Awareness Last year's riots, in which nine people were killed, shocked not only the troubled province of Kosovo but also the entire country into an awareness of the problems of this most backward part of Yugoslavia, which is made up of many ethnic groups. In June a 43-year-old Serb, Miodrag Saric, was shot and killed by an Albanian neighbor, Ded Krasnici, in a village near Djakovica, 40 miles southwest of Pristina, according to the official Yugoslav press agency Tanyug. It was the second murder of a Serb by an Albanian in Kosovo this year. The dispute reportedly started with a quarrel over damage done to a field belonging to the Saric family. The local political and security bodies condemned the murder as "a grave criminal act" that could have serious repercussions, according to the press agency. Five members of the Krasnici family have been arrested and investigations are continuing. The authorities have responded at various levels to the violence in Kosovo, clearly trying to avoid antagonizing the Albanian majority. Besides firm security measures, action has been taken to speed political, educational and economic changes. Past Errors Acknowledged Privately, some officials acknowledge that the rise of Albanian nationalism in a society that is based on the principle of the equality of nationalities is the result of past errors - at first neglect and discrimination, and more recently failure to act against divisive forces or even recognize them. "The [Albanian] nationalists have a two-point platform," according to Becir Hoti, an executive secretary of the Communist Party of Kosovo, "first to establish what they call an ethnically clean Albanian republic and then the merger with Albania to form a greater Albania. " Mr. Hoti, an Albanian, expressed concern over political pressures that were forcing Serbs to leave Kosovo. "What is important now," he said, "is to establish a climate of security and create confidence." The migration of Serbs is no ordinary problem becuase Kosovo is the heartland of Serbian history, culture and religion. Serbs have been in this region since the seventh century, long before they founded their own independent dynasty here in 1168. 57,000 Serbs Have Left Region Some 57,000 Serbs have left Kosovo in the last decade, and the number increased considerably after the riots of March and April last year, according to Vukasin Jokanovic, another executive secretary of the Kosovo party. Mr. Jokanovic, former president of the Commission on Migration set up after last year's disturbances, said the cause of Serbian migration was "essentially of a political nature." The commission has given four basic reasons for the departures: social-economic, normal migration from this underdeveloped area, an increasingly adverse social-political climate and direct and indirect pressures. Mr. Jokanovic, a Serb, called the pressures disturbing and said they included personal insults, damage to Serbian graves and the burning of hay, cutting down wood and other attacks on property to force Serbs to leave. The 1981 census showed Kosovo with a population of 1,584,558, of whom 77.5 percent were ethnic Albanians, 13.2 percent Serbs and 1.7 percent Montenegrins. The population in 1971 of 1,243,693 was 73.8 percent Albanian, 18.4 percent Serbian and 2.5 percent Montenegrin. Ex-Defense Minister Concerned In a recent visit to Kosovo, Nikola Ljubcic, head of the Serbian Presidency and a former Minister of Defense, expressed particular concern about the continuing exodus of Serbs. "An ethnically clean Kosovo will always be cause for instability," Mr. Ljubicic said, adding that Yugoslavia "will never give up one foot of her land." Conversations with Serbs and Albanians in different parts of the province showed that that they were generally troubled about the Serbian migration but did not know what to do about it. Some people described it as "psychological warfare" but were at a loss to explain who was at fault. In Pristina, the provincial capital, with its skyscrapers and bustling streets, people said they felt relatively secure because the authorities maintained "a close watch." Although the army remains at a distance and has not had to intervene, there is a strong militia presence. Things appear relaxed on the Corso, Pristina's main street. As in other Yugoslav cities, every night from about 6 to 10 the main thoroughfare is closed to traffic and practically everyone turns out for a stroll, encounters and discussions. Different Sides of Street What is special about Pristina is that it has always been Serbs on one side of the street and Albanians on the other. Residents say Albanians have been encroaching on Serbian "territory" since the disturbances. After the crackdown on Albanian nationalists - about 300 have been sentenced - they are said to have changed tactics, moving to the villages, where there is less security control. In some mixed communities, there were reports of [Serbian] farmers being pressured to sell their land cheap and of Albanian shopkeepers refusing to sell goods to Serbs. "We don't want to go because we have a large farm," a Serbian farmer's wife said in a village near Pristina. "Our property hasn't been touched, but there are the insults and the intimidation, so we feel uncomfortable." Several neighbors have left, she said, and her own sons who were planning to build a new house have stopped "to see how things will turn out." There have been many changes since the riots, but most people in Pristina agree with Mr. Ljubicic that more could be done. The main thrust of the changes is economic. "We're going to change the economic structures with more emphasis on agriculture, the processing industry, small business and handicrafts," Aziz Abrashi, the Economics Minister, said in an interview. "Ninety-nine percent of the Albanians have no wish to live in Albania," Mr. Abrashi, an Albanian, said, "but they view the rest of Yugoslavia and are aware of the higher living standards. Our young people want the same good life, the nice houses and cars, and they can't get them if they can't get jobs." * * * * Facts on File World News Digest; September 10, 1982 SECTION: OTHER NATIONS; Yugoslavia PAGE: Pg. 670 E3 10. Serbs in Kosovo Exodus Some 57,000 Serbs had left the Yugoslav autonomous province of Kosovo within the past decade, it was reported July 12. A great number had left after the riots of March and April 1981, according to local officials. The region's economic problems and the ethnic Albanian nationalism that had sparked the riots were mentioned as the principal reasons behind the Serbian migration. [See 1981, p. 261G1] "The nationalists have a two-point platform, first to establish what they call an ethnically clean Albanian republic and then the merger with Albania to form a greater Albania," said Becir Hoti, a kosovo.netmunist Party official and an ethnic Albanian. Officials cited widespread harassment of Serbs by Albanians, including two recent murders, personal insults, defacing of graves, burning of hay and other attacks on property. Economic problems in the country's poorest region were also stressed. "Ninety-nine percent of the Albanians have no wish to live in Albania," Aziz Abrashi, the economics minister, was quoted as saying. "But they view the rest of Yugoslavia and are aware of the higher living standards. Our young people want the same good life, the nice houses and cars, and they can't get them if they can't get jobs," Aziz added. Copyright 1982 Facts on File, Inc. * * * * The New York Times; November 9, 1982, Tuesday, Late City Final Edition SECTION: Section A; Page 6, Column 3; Foreign Desk 11. YUGOSLAVS SEEK TO QUELL STRIFE IN REGION OF ETHNIC ALBANIANS By DAVID BINDER, Special to the New York Times DATELINE: PRISTINA, Yugoslavia In Belgrade, three muscular men in black windbreakers boarded a night train to Kosovo, the southern province where nearly all of Yugoslavia's more than 1.5 million ethnic Albanians live. In a conversation with a visitor in the aisle, the three men said in Serbian that they were headed for the provincial capital, Pristina, for a few days of what they called ''service work.'' On arrival near dawn, they were picked up by a van marked ''Militia.'' The three were plainclothesmen of the Yugoslav Federal Security Service, apparently sent here to help prevent acts of violence by Albanian nationalists. An official in Belgrade, 150 miles to the north, said that since the rioting in March 1981 when nine people were killed, the Yugoslav Government had spent more than $30 million to maintain order in the Kosovo Autonomous Province, which abuts Albania. The province, which is dominated by ethnic Albanians, contains only about 180,000 Slavs. Both the Yugoslav Army and the militia maintain a large visible presence here. Yet acts of violence, mostly attacks on Kosovo Serbs or their property, continue to be reported every week in the Belgrade press. Non-Albanians Flee Area A few days ago a newspaper reported that a young Albanian had splashed gasoline in the face of a 12-year-old Serbian boy and ignited it with a match. The boy avoided serious injury by pulling his sweater over his head, extinguishing the flames. Such incidents have prompted many of Kosovo's Slavic inhabitants to flee the province, thereby helping to fulfill a nationalist demand for an ethnically ''pure'' Albanian Kosovo. The latest Belgrade estimate is that 20,000 Serbs and Montenegrins have left Kosovo for good since the 1981 riots. The hatred that has developed between ethnic Albanians and the Slavic inhabitants is reflected in slogans painted overnight on walls here. In an interview, Ismaili Bajra, a husky 53-year-old ethnic Albanian who is a member of the province's Communist Party presidium, spoke with pride of progress in the industrialization of the province, but he spoke scornfully of the Kosovo nationalists as ''traitors.'' Terming the political situation good, he said it was getting ''more stable'' every day. ''Now the school year has begun,'' he said, adding that, with ''500,000 youngsters enrolled,'' there have been ''no hostile actions, though of course you do find slogans painted here and there.'' The ethnic turmoil in Kosovo has origins that go back more than five centuries when the Serbian nation developed in this region and created a brief-lived empire that was ended by the Ottoman Turks in 1389. As the Turkish grip tightened, Serb peasants gradually migrated northward, and Albanians moved in. Tito Ruled With Strong Hand After Serbia became independent again in the 19th century, Belgrade asserted dominance over the Albanians of Kosovo. After Marshal Tito's Communists took power in the 1940's, Kosovo's Albanians were ruled with an iron hand by the Serbian authorities of Belgrade for nearly 21 years. A minority in Serbia as a whole, the Albanians were already a majority in Kosovo. Copyright 1982 The New York Times Company * * * * BBC Summary of World Broadcasts; May 4, 1985, Saturday SECTION: Part 2 Eastern Europe; B. INTERNAL AFFAIRS; YUGOSLAVIA; EE/7942/B/1; 12. Serbian Presidency discusses emigration from Kosovo Belgrade home service 1300 gmt 29 Apr 85 Today's debate [29th April] on the emigration of Serbs and Montenegrins from Kosovo has in many respects gone beyond the schematic framework according to which the situation in Kosovo is better, but emigration has not been curbed. Or, as Presidency President Dusan Ckrebic put it, it is good that the discussion is not held within familiar formulae, because what is at stake is equality of peoples and nationalities, and that is, according to him, an issue that goes deep into the foundations of the Constitution; so, in this context, emigration from Kosovo is Yugoslavia's most difficult problem, which is casting a dark shadow on the democratic achievements of socialist self-management. Nobody calls into question the efforts of the subjective forces in Kosovo that are fighting against Albanian nationalism and irredentism, but practice and results in curbing emigration are the only measure of efficacy. Therefore, the statements on positive trends in Kosovo can be understood as efforts on the mobilisation of forces, but by no means as a definite evaluation of the situation. True, Ckrebic said, there are no demonstrators in the streets, but a heavy atmosphere of pressure has been created on a broader front. Therefore, new forms of struggle and support against the irredentists' intentions must be sought in the municipalities, local communities, work organisations and among the intelligentsia. All these communities, without exception, have to be preoccupied by questions of equality, and efficacious measures have to be undertaken against any form of discrimination. Dusan Ckrebic then pointed out that the Kosovo political leadership must concern itself with cadre policy, which is now such that entire spheres have been covered by Albanian cadres, especially in culture and education, spheres that are most sensitive in view of equal expression of national identity. Serb and Montenegrin cadres should especially contribute to bettering the situation in Kosovo. The forthcoming elections should be used for disposing of careerists and those who do not enjoy confidence in the ranks of their own peoples. Copyright 1985 The British Broadcasting Corporation * * * * The Economist; November 9, 1985 SECTION: World politics and current affairs; EUROPE; Pg. 66 (U.S. Edition Pg. 62) 13. Yugoslavia; Is fair unfair? Yugoslavia has run into trouble with what some people in the West call reverse discrimination. The problem involves Kosovo, an autonomous province of the Serbian republic, where nearly 80% of the population are ethnic Albanians. (The rest are mainly Serbs and Monte negrins.) For several years the provincial government's policy has been to share out jobs among the nationalities in Kosovo by means of ethnic quotas. Now the constitutional court of Serbia has struck down this practice as unconstitutional. The court's president, Mr Radosin Rajovic, a Serb, held that proportional representation was contrary to the principle of equality embodied in Yugoslavia's 1974 constitution, "because it facilitates the suppression of members of numerically smaller nations and nationalities." The court's decision was not unanimous; one judge, a non-Serb, argued that proportional representation of nationalities was needed to put the principle of equality into practice. Behind this dispute lies a bitter conflict about the future of Kosovo. Yugoslavia's Serbs think that they are being deliberately squeezed out of Kosovo, once the centre of Serbia's medieval state. There has been a steady emigration of Serbs and Montenegrins from the province, particularly since the riots there in 1981. The Albanians retort answer that positive discrimination hasn't gone far enough. In 1966, before the policy was introduced, Serbs and Montenegrins occupied just over half the public-sector jobs in Kosovo, although their share in the population was 27%. Now 22.5% of those employed in the public sector are Serbs, but this is still far greater than the Serbian share of Kosovo's population, which has fallen to 13.2%. The Albanians say Serbs and Montenegrins tend to emigrate in search of better opportunities outside Kosovo, Yugoslavia's poorest province. What happens now? It is unlikely that the authorities in Kosovo will pay much heed to what the Serbian constitutional court says. But Serbia's party leaders are under strong pressure from Serbian public opinion to demand a closer integration of Kosovo into Serbia. Ironically, the Serbs who have emigrated from Kosovo to Serbia proper are not finding life easy. According to the Belgrade weekly Nin, the old (also Serbian) residents accuse them of getting preferential treatment for jobs and housing. They are even called "Siptars", a pejorative Serbian word for Albanian. Copyright 1985 The Economist Newspaper Ltd. * * * * The New York Times; April 28, 1986, Monday, Late City Final Edition SECTION: Section A; Page 13, Column 1; Foreign Desk 14. IN ONE YUGOSLAV PROVINCE, SERBS FEAR THE ETHNIC ALBANIANS By HENRY KAMM, Special to the New York Times DATELINE: PRISTINA, Yugoslavia The ethnic Albanian majority in the autonomous province of Kosovo is feared by the minority population of Serbs and Montenegrins, who believe the Albanians are seeking to drive them out of the province. A 1981 fire that gutted the medieval nunnery of the Serbian Orthodox Patriarchate in Pec, a center of Serbian national feeling, has been officially ascribed to bad construction. An aged nun at the Patriarchate said she and her sisters were convinced that the fire had been set to chase them from Kosovo. But she said the nuns would never leave, and three Serbian or Montenegrin visitors agreed with her. The provincial leadership, dominated by ethnic Albanians, has said it believes that a Serb grossly mutilated last May by a broken bottle inflicted his injuries himself while performing an auto-erotic act. The maiming of Djordje Martinovic, a 56-year-old farmer and father of three, has become the most widely discussed Yugoslav criminal case in years, debated in Parliament and covered in full detail by television and the press. Yugoslavs Blame the Albanians The case remains unsolved, but Yugoslavs' minds seem mainly made up on both incidents. They blame ethnic Albanians. They also blame them for continuing assaults, rapes and vandalism. They believe their aim is to drive non-Albanians out of Kosovo. ''A legitimized genocide against the Serbian people is being carried out in Kosovo,'' said Dobrica Cosic, a dissident novelist published here and in the United States, in an interview in Belgrade. ''More than 200,000 Serbs have been forced to leave their home in the last 10, 20 years.'' A steady exodus continues. Since Albanian nationalists went on a rampage in 1981, leaving at least nine people dead, the level of violence has declined. But enough agitation continues, punctuated by acts of violence, to make a burning issue of the antagonism between the 1.4 million ethnic Albanians and the little more than 200,000 Serbs. Under the federal Constitution, Kosovo is part of the Serbian Republic. In effect, it is as self-governing as the six republics of the nation. It is also the poorest region of Yugoslavia. Men in their 20's line the main street of Pristina - a stretch of grandiose modern buildings that separates near-slums on either side - offering to shine the shoes of passers-by who can hardly afford such luxury. Begging children accost diners in restaurants. Use of Funds Criticized The overambitious buildings, such as a recent, prematurely rundown, 300-room hotel with 3 restaurants in a little-visited town of 100,000, sustain criticism of the provincial leadership a a misuse of federal development funds. To many, the aid represents a futile effort to solve an intractable problem through financial bounty. Mohammed Mustafa, director of the Provincial Economic Planning Instititute, said there were 115,000 registered unemployed out of a potential work force of 804,000. The economic growth rate has been 1.5 percent a year since 1980, while the population is growing at 2.5 percent, he said. The average wage is 20 percent below the national average. ''Kosovo is Yugoslavia's single greatest problem,'' said a Western diplomat. ''They can pay off their huge debt, but Kosovo defies solution.'' Serbs and Montenegrins feel beleaguered. Communists and non-Communists express distrust of the provincial leadership and chagrin over the federal and Serbian authorities who in their opinion do nothing to halt increasing Albanian domination over a multi-national population and lands that are historically inseparable from Serbian national identity. Restrictive Atmosphere Non-Albanian Yugoslav residents and visitors characterize the atmosphere of Kosovo as frighteningly restrictive and its Communist leadership as so dogmatic as to resemble the rigorously Stalinist regime that holds power in nearby Albania. In contrast to officials elsewhere in Yugoslavia, who readily acknowledge problems and errors and de-emphasize ideology in favor of pragmatism, a leading Kosovo official, Ekrem Arifi, offered an entirely ideological explanation of Kosovo's problems. In prepared statements that took the place of replies to questions, he blamed outside forces for all difficulties -agents of Albania and emigres in the West. Mr. Arifi, executive secretary of the provincial party, spoke in Albanian and in stock phrases long out of use in Yugoslavia, such as ''proletarian internationalism,'' ''the class enemy'' or ''the solidarity of the working class.'' They are not echoed by the non-Albanian population. Asked whether the nuns felt safe in their rebuilt convent, the old nun replied, ''Yes, with God's help.'' Copyright 1986 The New York Times Company * * * * Reuters; May 27, 1986, Tuesday, BC cycle SECTION: International News 15. KOSOVO PROVINCE REVIVES YUGOSLAVIA'S ETHNIC NIGHTMARE By Peter Humphrey DATELINE: PRISTINA, Yugoslavia Ethnic conflicts are boiling again in Yugoslavia's wayward Kosovo Province, reviving nightmares that the country's federation may split at the seams. In recent months serious nationalist tension has resurfaced between Kosovo's 1.7 million majority of ethnic Albanians and the region's minority of 200,000 Serbs and Montenegrins. Authorities have smashed a plethora of separatist groups, and scores of Albanians have been jailed for activities allegedly aimed at bringing about Kosovo's secession from Yugoslavia. The subject has filled the Belgrade press and dominated public debate, with fears expressed that the tensions could lead to a repeat of the kind of fierce nationalist riots which broke out here in 1981. Troops were then put on the streets and martial law was clamped on Kosovo. Over 1,000 people have been convicted here since 1981 on charges of activities aimed at illegally changing Kosovo's status in the Yugoslav constitution, according to police figures. Western diplomats are watching the troubled region, along the sensitive border with Albania, with great interest. "It's Yugoslavia's 'Northern Ireland' -- a powder keg," one diplomat said, "and they're struggling to keep the lid on." He echoed a view aired in official circles that Kosovo is Yugoslavia's single most pressing problem and will be one of the thorniest issues for the Communist Party Congress in June. Some of the secessionist groups recently uncovered here were hoarding guns and explosives, official reports said. Yugoslav officials have blamed Albanian and overseas emigres for funding such groups in the region, where ethnic Albanians outnumber the other nationalities eight to one. Tensions rose to a peak this year over alleged Albanian harassment of Serbs and Montenegrins, who sent petitions to Belgrade or flocked there to protest and seek official help. Protesters said Albanians were trying to create a pure Albanian Kosovo by driving others from their homes and land. Belgrade, anxious to hold the fragile balance of races making up Yugoslavia's hodge-podge federation of six republics and two autonomous provinces, has played down the conflict. It urged restraint among both Serbs and Albanians, warning that Serb militancy could solve Kosovo's problems no more than Albanian militancy could. Last month, at Kosovo Polje, near Pristina, it was Serb nationalism that almost sparked the prairie fire, when Kosta Bulatovic, a popular Serb leader, was arrested on "hostile propaganda" charges after organizing petitions. Some 6,000 Serbs flocked to protest at Bulatovic's home and Belgrade had to fly down Serbian Communist Party leader Ivan Stambolic to defuse the tense confrontation with local police. "If one Albanian policeman had opened fire on those Serbs, it would have been 1981 all over again," a Yugoslav said here. Thousands more Serbs, meanwhile, organized protest trips to Belgrade and poured out their complaints to the authorities. An official inquiry later found their grievances justified and a purge of the Kosovo judiciary and police was ordered. It was found that local security and justice bodies had let Albanian offenses against Serbs go unchecked, including rape, assault, arson, intimidation and property offenses. At ground level here it is hard to get to the truth. Both Serb and Albanian citizens told Reuters of similar charges against each other. The other side, each group said, was taking land and jobs. Albanians said Serbs took the best farmland and got all the plum jobs. The region has around 50 per cent unemployment and a poll of local residents showed it was mainly Albanians who were out of work, while unemployment was rare among Serbs. Belgrade argues it has in recent years poured funding amounting to millions of dollars into the region, Yugoslavia's poorest, to subsidize development and raise living standards. As a result, Pristina is one of Yugoslavia's most impressive cities, with mosque minarrettes blending in among modern skyscrapers. A few years ago, Albanians out for an evening stroll would stay on one side of the street and Serbs on the other, a tense line of animosity dividing them. Today it is in the cafes. "Serbs don't drink in Albanian cafes and we keep away from theirs," said one Albanian. "We want a republic," said his unemployed friend, sipping Turkish tea with a group of colleagues. It is Belgrade's great nightmare because federal authorities fear that if Kosovo wins republic status, it will break away. Kosovo is a heartland of the Serbs who originally populated it but many moved north after Ottoman onslaughts in the 14th century, leaving a vacuum filled by Turks and Albanians. It became part of Serbia in 1945 and won autonomous status after widespread rioting in 1968. "We know they will drive us out completely if they get their republic," said a middle-aged Serb whose ancestors have lived for centuries at Kosovo Polje, the site of the landmark 1389 battle when the Serbs were defeated by the Turks. The Serbs' present battle seems faced with defeat also -- in the long term. The Albanian population is multiplying rapidly, while several thousand Serbs quit the province each year. "It's just a question of time," said one Albanian. "It's dangerous to talk about this. But we will get a republic." Copyright 1986 Reuters Ltd * * * * 16. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-SENATE; June 18, 1986 Page 14439 (Vol. 132 Part 10, June 11-19, 1986) SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION 150 - EXPRESSING CONCERN OVER THE CONDITION OF ETHNIC ALBANIANS LIVING IN YUGOSLAVIA Mr. DOLE submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations: S. Con. Res. 150
Whereas there are more than two million ethnic Albanians living within the borders of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia; Whereas the ethnic Albanians constitute one of the largest ethnic groups within Yugoslavia; Whereas there are reports that several hundred ethnic Albanians have been killed in communal violence and the Government's efforts to control it Whereas there is evidence that several thousand more have been arrested by the Yugoslavian Government for expressing their views in a non-violent manner; Whereas most political prisoners within Yugoslavia are ethnic Albanians; Whereas many of those arrested have been sentenced to harsh terms of imprisonment ranging from one to fifteen years; Whereas many ethnic Albanians have been denied access to full economic opportunity because of alleged "Albanian nationalist" activities; Whereas Amnesty International, a respected international human rights organization, has published allegations of torture and assassination of ethnic Albanians in exile by the Yugoslav secret police; Whereas the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia is a signatory to the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe [CSCE, now OSCE], known as the Helsinki Final Act; Whereas one of the provisions of the Act states that "the participating States on whose territory national minorities exist will respect the rights of persons belonging to such minorities to equality before the law, will afford them full opportunity for the actual enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms and will, in this manner, protect the legitimate interests in this sphere;" Whereas the Government of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia has failed to protect fully the rights of ethnic Albanians, in accordance with its obligation under the Act; Resolved by the Senate, the House of Representatives Concurring, That Congress:
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I rise today to submit a concurrent resolution expressing the concern of the Congress about the conditions of ethnic Albanians in Yugoslavia. Congressman DIO GUARDI of New York has introduced a similar resolution in the House, and I am pleased to be working with him to focus attention on this important matter. Mr. President, there are approximately two million ethnic Albanians living in Yugoslavia, making them the third largest ethnic group in that country. They have extensive ties of ancestry and common culture with the growing ethnic-Albanian community in the United States. Regrettably, the Yugoslav Government has not granted to the Albanian community the full protection of their political and economic rights. While many ethnic groups in Yugoslavia have suffered at the hands of the government, the Albanian community has been singled out for particularly harsh treatment. Under the guise of responding to the greatly exaggerated threat that ethnic Albanians might try to assert political independence from Yugoslavia, the government in Belgrade has arrested thousands of Albanians, hundreds this year alone, often for doing no more than peacefully expressing their commitment to the preservation of Albanian culture. In fact, the Helsinki Commission and other knowledgeable, independent observers have reported that more than one-half of all political prisoners in Yugoslavia are Albanian. And when arrested these ethnic Albanians face the harshest kind of penalties. Prison sentences of from 1 to 15 years are common for offenses that may be no more than holding up a placard at a public gathering pledging to uphold elements of Albanian culture. Many Albanians have also been fired, or denied access to particular jobs, because in some way they have expressed their Albanian heritage or manifest some element of Albanian culture. A number of university professors, for example, have been fired solely for teaching courses on Albanian history or culture. Finally, and most disturbing of all, hundreds of ethnic Albanians have died in recent years as a result of communal strife and the government's often violent efforts to put down communal unrest. These dead have become martyrs within the ethnic Albanian community. Even admitting that the government's actions in all cases were not unprovoked, the strong evidence is that the government has vastly overreacted, as part of a conscious campaign to stamp out even any sign of Albanian ethnocentrism or any inclination for ethnic Albanians to develop a stronger political self-identification. Mr. President, as I noted, the Albanian populations [sic!] is not the only group that suffers. But it appears that it may well be the group that suffers the most. For that reason, I believe we have a responsibility to express our deep concern about the plight of these suffering people, in the hope that the influence we can bring to bear will encourage the Yugoslav Government to meet its solemn commitments under the Helsinki Accords to grant ethnic Albanians --and all other ethnic groups in Yugoslavia-- their full rights and freedoms. Mr. President, I send the concurrent resolution to the desk and ask for its appropriate referral. * * * * The New York Times; July 27, 1986, Sunday, Late City Final Edition SECTION: Section 1; Part 1, Page 6, Column 1; Foreign Desk 17. MINORITIES ARE UNEASY IN YUGOSLAV PROVINCE By HENRY KAMM, Special to the New York Times DATELINE: BELGRADE, Yugoslavia The Yugoslav Government is keeping a watch on Serbs and Montenegrins in Kosovo Autonomous Province to prevent them from staging protest marches on Belgrade. The two groups charge that the region's Albanian ethnic majority is trying to force them from their ancestral homes. The Serbs and Montenegrins of Kosovo began agitating during a Communist Party convention in June. The police blocked roads to forestall planned marches to dramatize the issue. But even without marches, ethnic tension in Kosovo was a topic of debate at the convention. Speakers said that Albania was fomenting agitation in the autonomous province with the intent of detaching it from Yugoslavia. The convention also heard an attack on Bulgaria and Greece over the longstanding issue of Macedonian nationality. Macedonians, a Slavic group with historical links both to Bulgaria and to Greece, form one of the constituent republics of Yugoslavia. Turkish Minority in Bulgaria Along with the persecution of the Turkish minority in Bulgaria and resentment among ethnic Hungarians in Rumania, ethnic issues that have marked Balkan history are returning to the fore. ''We have to say how dangerous the Kosovo problem is to the integrity of our country,'' said Ivan Stambolic, President of the Serbian Republic, which includes Kosovo Autonomous Province. Kosovo's population of 1.6 million is 78 percent ethnic Albanian. ''It is the most delicate problem we have ever had,'' said Mr. Stambolic in a meeting with Western reporters at the convention hall. ''It is a problem of long duration that cannot be solved overnight.'' Since earlier this year, hundreds of Serbs living in Kosovo have staged marches in Belgrade to protest what they consider the failure of the Government to protect them from attacks and threats by Albanians against them and their property. 'Unfavorable Trends' Vidoje Zarkovic, head of the party's collective presidency, spoke at the convention about ''continuing unfavorable trends in the province'' and said, ''We have not succeeded in stabilizing the disturbed interethnic relations and in developing trust.'' In a resolution, the convention accused Albania of fomenting ethnic conflict. ''Albania |
