Outside Intelligence

Radio B92 announced on the evening of June 30 that foreign observers had begun arriving in Kosovo and that for the moment they are solving “technical problems” such as lodging.

International observers, who were agreed upon during the Yeltsin/Milosevic meeting in Moscow and whose arrival Richard Holbrooke announced as one of the results of his talk with the Yugoslav president, arrived in Pristina from the dregs of society, looking for lodging as if it was for tourists or teenagers on some overbooked holiday.  Which observers and with what mandate—what do they need to monitor now in Kosovo?

According to what we’ve been able to learn up to now from different sources, there should be approximately 100 total military-political observers who are attached to foreign diplomatic missions in Belgrade.  In a press conference on the occasion of his last visit to Belgrade, Holbrooke mentioned that American and Russian observers will “ride in the same car,” and that the observers will represent a “multi-national team” that will work together.  The problem with that is that it isn’t clear at all right now what they should be supervising.

That is to say, international practice dictates that observers, which can be sent by one state, a group of states, or an international organization, are usually sent to a territory in order to supervise something concrete, let’s say the enactment of an agreement for a cease-fire.  In Kosovo, there is no agreement concerning a cease-fire and it does not look like there will be one in the future.  A cease-fire would need to be preceded by a statement of the conflict, but until now that hasn’t been done because it would mean something like recognizing the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) as a party in the conflict (a political recognition but not an  international right as emphasized by professor of international law Konstantin Obradovic).

Additionally, observers set off for terrain because there is a security agreement from both sides and because it is defined in the mandate.  In the case of Kosovo, none of these preconditions exists.  Therefore, where will the Russians and Americans drive to in the same car and what will they look at?  Police action lifting the blockading of the roads?  The abduction of groups of Serbian civilians by the KLA?  Would someone protest because of those abductions when Slobodan Milosevic has not done so already—even though that would be the strongest argument of use to the Serbs being that taking hostages is strictly forbidden by international conventions dating from 1907?

Experience with international observers on the territory of the former Yugoslavia nevertheless dictates that they essentially don’t contribute to the job because of who brought them even when they know what that job is.  It is known that trains, tugboats, ships loaded with gasoline, and according to some versions even weapons passed through at the end of international observation which controlled the embargo on the export of all that wasn’t humanitarian aid from SRJ to Republika Srpska on the Drina before Dayton.  Periodically, they fell into picturesque situations like the one which took place somewhere in the hills at Banja Doviljaca when in the dark of night a farmer with a pistol rushed one group, yelling “what are you doing on my mountain?”  In Belgrade port, a man who traveled to Republika Srpska with a truck loaded with condoms ordered observers to take as many condoms as they needed and in whatever color they liked.  One Scandinavian asked for only black condoms.  In Sremoka Raca, they sat in the cafe “At Kareta’s” and defined the following list of drinks:  “brutal coffee” was bitter Turkish coffee, “normal coffee” was coffee with cognac, while “exclusive coffee” was the name for straight cognac.  When one older, non-commissioned American officer was going home, he organized a farewell evening in the same cafe.  Customs officers, policemen, chauffeurs, and observers all drank, and when the American explained for the 100th time that he was going home, one Dane who drank in silence the whole time murmured, ”yes, now he’s doing that which all of Europe desires--Yankee go home.”

The Yankees, however, haven’t gone home, rather to Kosovo, an integral part of Serbia and Yugoslavia, the whole of Serbdom; and as they have already informed him, with Milosevic’s consent, they create policies that are enacted mainly outside international standards and diplomatic rules. There exists an evident possibility that mentioning other observers in Kosovo is simply becoming a facade behind which the USA is solving the Kosovo problem according to its own plans.  It looks as if it is difficult for many in Washington to follow immediate American policy such that one journalist at a press conference held at the State Department  June 29, noticed in relation to Holbrooke and Gelbard’s accidental meeting with members of KLA that earlier in the United States a practice of never negotiating with terrorists existed and that Andrew Jang, one of Holbrooke’s predecessors, lost his job as ambassador to the UN because he “accidentally came across” an official of the PLO.  Spokesperson Lee MacKlaney stated that the US hadn’t changed its policy toward terrorists.  In truth, the KLA isn’t on the list of organizations that Washington defines as terrorist, but, let’s say, the IRA was never on that list.
Before, the official version of the meeting was that Holbrooke “accidentally came across” the KLA, which is notoriously illogical, that in a period of only a few weeks time it has happened that an unnamed, high ranking member of the State Department stated in a briefing that he was surprised that Milosevic’s minister for information complained about those meetings with the KLA when “President Milosevic urged us to contact them,” repeating that “we met them.” Milosevic asked the Americans to establish contact with the Kosovo Liberation Army?  Perhaps.  Milosevic, you must remember, only asked the people in the referendum if they agree to the involvement of international negotiators in solving the Kosovo question.  He never said that he wouldn’t let the Americans solve that problem by themselves, just as they are used to doing.