Saturday, August 16, 2003

Yugoslavia, Iraq: A pattern of aggression: "In Yugoslavia, as in Iraq, the ultimate goal of the aggressor nations was regime change. In Iraq, the justification for aggression was the possession of weapons of mass destruction; in Yugoslavia, it was the prevention of a humanitarian crisis and genocide in Kosovo. In both cases, the evidence for such accusations has been lacking: but while this is now widely accepted in relation to Iraq, the same is not true of Yugoslavia.

"In retrospect, it has become ever clearer that the justification for war was the result of a calculated provocation - and manipulation of the legitimate grievances of the Kosovan Albanians - in an already tense situation within the Yugoslav republic of Serbia. The constitutional status of Kosovo had been long contested and the case for greater Kosovan Albanian self-government had been peacefully championed by the Kosovan politician, Ibrahim Rugova."

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