88

Sunday, 01.06.2008.

11:56

Putin in Kosovo spar with French reporter

Vladimir Putin has criticized the daily Le Monde for referring to South Ossetia and Abkhazia as separatist regions, while not using the same phrase for Kosovo.

Izvor: Tanjug

Putin in Kosovo spar with French reporter IMAGE SOURCE
IMAGE DESCRIPTION

88 Komentari

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Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

Johny, ok let's finish it. I understand you are from Albania yet you live in US. You speak well in defense of Albanians, but I have problems considering you the representative sample of Albanian population, especially the one settled in Kosovo. I avoided say it straight, but when I was talking about unclear origin of Albanians in Kosovo, I was of course referring to very smart changes in Kosovo population over the last decades, when representation of serbian population declined very dramatically to nearly 5% of these days. What happened to that peoples? Isn't that about what Stefan wrote in #86 about clan society and violent tendencies of Albanians? I wasn't perhaps enough clear about what I meant by oppression of Albanians and their islamisation. But isn't that so that once repressed people have tendencies to become oppressors themselves? Isn't that what Albanian absolute and deliberate behavior came from? It seems mostly absurd to me if I see talking about Albania as nearly cradle of entire civilization (viz comments above) and its inhabitants descendants of "Constantine the Great", "Mother Theresa" and so on. Even if Albanians might have had these traits, they are obviously long gone.

This is not about persuading me or about some "Serbian propaganda". Affairs in central Europe are not subject to Balkan events or to Serbian agenda. But it doesn't mean we are blind. You know, here in Slovakia, if we come into some people from Albania, we usually come into organized groups of drug or weapon smugglers. It is well known that organized criminal paths coming from Turkey and directed to entire Europe flow through Albania and Kosovo.

Now I would like very much to trust you about your words, about two independent and democratic countries, Albania and Kosovo. As I'd like to trust the words of representatives of Kosovo about guarantees of minorities rights, but one thing are words and one thing are actions. Representatives of Kosovo miss credibility, their past is connected with criminal actions and, as far as I noticed, they deny any explanations. Most of Kosovo's population is now albanian, and still, permanent international presence is necessary to protect even the rest of serbian population. What guarantees can we talk about.

PS:

"Again speaking of differences. If you have all the Slavic countries in the Balkans who have so many similarities among each other and so few differences, being separate and independent countries; and Kosova having so many differences with Serbia and so very few similarities, then according to your differences theory Kosova should be separate from Serbia. "

No it's not about my "differences theory". If you read what I wrote carefully, I was talking about mutual affiliation of inhabitants of Kosovo and Albania. I also stated that Serbia was ripped off from Kosovo and this happened somewhat by the fact (say we don't know how) that albanian population in Kosovo strongly outnumbered the serbian one. I never said it should happened as it happened at the expense of Serbia and in favor of Albanians, like Kosovo would represent some additional value to Albania itself or to Albanians. If there are some differences about which nik wrote in #87 between Albanians from Kosovo and from Albania, than maybe there are, but still they are all Albanians, waving albanian flags, tourning to Albania for help. In Kosovo, there was established one of the biggest US military bases abroad. There are no such bases in Europe, nor soviet bases. We won't allow such bases on our territories, but Kosovo government did. As I said, Kosovo government miss credibility and that's not something they can buy.

nik

pre 15 godina

Martin SVK: "I don't see, however, any of these differences between Albanians from Kosovo (calling themselves "Kosovars") and Albanians living in Albania".

There is a huge difference!
Religion: Albanians in Kosvo are 100% Muslims. Since they had to live in Christian dominated land for almost a century, they find it necessary to expose their Islam. In Albania 30% of the peaple are Chistians. To soften the differences Enver Hoxha banned all religions. Now Worship is free, but it has a marginal role in the society.
Language: The official Albanian was based on the souther dialects. It differs from the dialects spoken in Kosovo more that Serbian differs from Croatian, or Bulgarian from macedonian.
History. 3-4 generations had completly different life experiance. Citizens of Yugoslavia had much mor freedoms and much higher standart of living than citizens of Albania. Albania will never annex Kosovo, not because of the Ahtisaari plan, but because the ordinary Albanians see Kosovars as a threat.

Stevan

pre 15 godina

“…I'm also well aware that it might be consequence of previous centuries of oppression…”

Martin, there are incredible mountains of propaganda produced about the Balkan through the 90’s. Balkan was and still is remote, unknown place for average westerner. Western public does not have any clue about this part of Europe, its history, cultures, relations …
That’s why professional propagandists had such an easy job. Public believes everything they’ we been told. West deliberately distorted reality to a very large extent, demonizing Serbs and victimizing all others. One of the biggest fairy tales is story about peaceful, freedom loving Albanians, that were victims of the Serb genocide through the centuries. In reality it was exactly the opposite. They were not oppressed, they were oppressors. As majority converted to Islam they got all the privileges and power against the Serbs. (Serbs stayed Christians, so they had no rights during long centuries of Turkish terror). Turks were very aware of importance of Kosovo for Serbs, so they by all means tried to destroy them in Kosovo and settle Albanians instead. Turks usually used Albanian troops to terrorize Serb population after numerous (unsuccessful) uprisings. So, over the centuries number of Serbs declined and number of Albanians grow. (So much for the genocide stories).

Albanian culture is incredibly violent. It is a clan society. Every young boy is trained in using guns, and every man is armed. Guns are routinely used for “settling” of the disputes. Clans are often practically in the war with each other. That can last for generations. Blood feuds are widely spread, and are practiced according to Kanun, that Ben is so proud off. Here are few links about the subject, see for yourself how that works and make your own conclusions. After seeing how cruel they often are to each other, ask yourself what can minorities expect.

http://meero.worldvision.org/news_article.php?newsID=527

http://www.shqiperia-etnike.com/she82/she82eng.htm

http://www.shqiperia-etnike.com/fillo.htm

http://judgments.fedcourt.gov.au/2004/J040860.yes.doc.htm

http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1aGqtBPLOs

johny

pre 15 godina

Martin those statistics you mention, the latest of them are from 1938, during King Zog's time. That said, if somebody was conducting a statistics tomorrow I would tell them that I am a Christian (catholic) depending on the day i might have described myself as someone who follows no church or religion but believes in God and Jesus Christ. Having said that I myself have never been in a catholic church and I don't intend to go there any time soon. Let me tell you about my orthodox and muslim part of my family. They like me have never been in a church or a mosque but if they were being asked for statistical purposes about their religion they might say they were orthodox or muslim, then depending on the day they might also say what I said. What I just described to you is not an isolated case. In fact it is the majority of us. If you dared me to put my hand on fire to confirm the veracity of my statement I would. You can chose to believe what you want. You can believe me or you can believe what you read from other people. The choice is yours. I had the money I would sponsor you and anyone who doubts what I am saying to go and visit Albania and Kosova itself so that you could see for yourself and make your mind up based on your own experiences and not on what you read on some online boards.

Second, read a little more about the times when Germany and Austria became states.You will discover that there is no difference between them, in terms of culture, and Kosova and Albania.
Speaking about differences.
All these countries you mentioned to me, the Slav countries, the Germanic countries etc, most of them developed their differences after they were separated from each other (eve though they might have differences at first). The split and being less in contact with each other emphasizes differences. Rest assured that in the case things remain as they are you will see many differences between Albanians in Kosova and Albania in the future, the same differences you are looking for. As a matter of fact up until 2003-2004 the Serbs themselves and the propaganda coming from the Serbian state was that Kosova Albanians are completely different form Albanians in Albania. It doesn't take much to find just a google away. When time for negotiations started they completely overhauled their propaganda, now emphasizing on the similarities between the Albanians of Kosova and those of Albania.
Again speaking of differences. If you have all the Slavic countries in the Balkans who have so many similarities among each other and so few differences, being separate and independent countries; and Kosova having so many differences with Serbia and so very few similarities, then according to your differences theory Kosova should be separate from Serbia.

P.S There are some Albanians from Kosova who consider themselves Kosovar first and foremost then Albanian. As time passes by we might be able to see more and more of those. Will you then be able to say that they are not different enough from Albania to be an independent country?

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

johny: #78

I'm acquainted with certain antipathy that Albanians show (at least at surface) when it comes to questions of religion. I'm also well aware that it might be consequence of previous centuries of oppression. I see too how much they prefer to identify themselves as Albanians and Albanians above all, exactly like you said. Still, if I look at last (official) statistics, even from several decades ago, I see majority of population considered themselves muslims. It's very difficult for me to deny influence of this on Albanian behavior, especially when I see how able they are to push their cause through all that stays in their way. Like in the Kosovo problem.

About what you said in second part I must categorically disagree. We can talk about nations, we can talk about ethnical groups, we can talk about right of self-determination of nations. But we can't talk about one nation owing two state formations created in this circumstances. See. What is nation? Nation is considered a group of people possessing certain common traits. These are usually: common language, common culture, common history.. Germany and Austria may use common language but they have different history and even their cultures differ as they were parts (and even creators) of their own empires in the past. Australia is country of immigrants and located far from England lived its own life for centuries. Same for Belgium and Netherland, these countries have their own histories. Countries speaking "slavic languages" possess differences in their cultures too.. Slavic languages subdivide to several branches and mutual understanding is by far not that automatic as you might thing of it.

I don't see, however, any of these differences between Albanians from Kosovo (calling themselves "Kosovars") and Albanians living in Albania. Origin of inhabitants of Kosovo is mostly questioned. What I see in fact is artificially created state and certain effort to find (or create) some differences, even uniqueness, which doubtly stay on firm ground..

And, well even these waren't among cases you mentioned, there can be found some cases that suit to Kosovo problem: in fact there's resemblance to former Federal Republic of Germany and German Democratic Republic or to South Korea and North Korea today. So to speak in terms of mutual affiliation of their inhabitants, these cases are very familiar. Except that these two countries were divided and Kosovo was ripped off from Serbia. We all know stories of these countries, as we all know there was nothing natural about it. And there's nothing natural about Kosovo too.

Endri, Albania

pre 15 godina

I have to correct a refernce to my post as the order of comments has recently changed. For info about religion please take a look at comment 78# from johny.

ben

pre 15 godina

don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization

(Peter Sudyka, 2 June 2008 20:09)

Please don't forget that your Slavic contribution to the WESTERN civilization was made possible only and ONLY after that the NATIVES teached you to right in CYRILIC the (NATIVE Balkans- Greeks) and in LATIN (The Native Latin’s). You are Christian because NATIVES- an Albanian made you Christian St. Albani.

Your civilization has the roots and was made possible by laying your roots in OURS- the NATIVES.

Said that, no one denies your contribution but don't you dear to put in question ours- it simply unfair to the history, to the truth and to yourselves (see above).

P.S. comment on the fact of what was incorrect in my post #64???

Mother Theresa is not Albanian? you have a similar Person iin your culture?

Constantine- you have similar in your culutre?

Pope Albani?

Saint Albani the one that made teh central Europe Christian- you have similar persons in you culture?

P.P.S. hearing teh RACIAL argument that you mentioned I need to say Peter: thank you for being NEUTRAL :)))

ben

pre 15 godina

Peter: it's quite obvious that you don't know a thing about Albanian culture.

The music you here in Kosova is influenced by teh Serbian Turbo-Folk style- that's why the independence is prerogative - to preserve teh Albanian culture.

The Albanian culture is teh POLYOHONIC songs in south the one that you can find ONLY in the Northern Mediterranean- Sardegna, Corsica and Iberian peninsula.

It is the lahuta in North teh one taht was described from teh Homers times,

It is teh KANUN (the oldes European civil and pean code- you can find similar in Italy but not extensive as the Kanun) with teh moral values of the Albanian culture- teh CONSITUTION the mafiest of independence of the Albanian culture, moral values and rules that you can see in Homer texts and other ancient authors,

It is in Besa the holly word- that today you can find only in the Albanian culture and it was part of the Balkanik cultures in the past- BESA was the linking factor/leverage of the coalition of teh Greek cities in the war with Troy.


All these EUROPEN values, europen culture, of ILLYRIAN you can find in the Albanian culture NOT in YOURS. This is FACT.

The ancient values and culture of the Balkans the ILLYRIAN culture has very much survived in the Albanian culture- and it’s not a case.

And you cannot see no trace in YOUR culture- this is FACT.

I can continua for more but I will leave something for later after that YOU show something of YOUR EUROPEAN values on which your today culture and nation was build upon.

Regarding the anthropological issue- Albanians are the WHITEST in the ENTIRE Northern Mediterranean- much more European anthropologically than Italians (at least the one of south), much more than Greeks (or maybe you will put into question their Europeism) or Spanish etc...

So you see that what you say makes little sense. Moreover if you visit Albanins of the Alps where the influence of various invaders was small or inexistent you will find them all BLONDS.

Again Peter & Co you show that you know nothing about the Albanian culture- the economical emigrant in UK the Princip is just hilarious.

It a fact my dear that our contribution in the WESTERN civilization is not marginal- I am not sure about yours.

The ancient theaters, icons, music, poems, art are al around my country, not sure that you have something of it in yours.

Cheers,

Endri, Albania

pre 15 godina

Peter,

"Slovakians show nothing but the purest traits European culturally (dress, cuisine, music, architecture etc.), racially (generally blond hair and blue/green eyes) and religiously (Roman Catholic). Can you say the same for Albanians? Albanian music sounds Turkish, their religion is Islam and they look racially closer to the Near East than to most Europeans."

If you compare our music with it of the other countries in Balkan you will find (to the other countries) surely much more sign of Turkish music. What I can distinguish to that music are only some oriental elements which where brought to our music in the last years (mainly imported) but they disappeared very soon. This was some kind of balkanization of the music. You can often listen the same song played in 3 or more different languages for example Serbian, Bulgarian, Greek even Albanian.

Religion Islam means nothing to me (the same for Christianity), and it has never been a hurdle to me and the majority of Albanians. It doesn't mean that we don't believe in God but the church or the mosque is not necessary the house of GOD. For more info about that please refer to 73#.

I don't know how did you come out to this kind of conclusion. If you refer to the propagandistic materials then the next time you better select the proper ones. We have racially absolutely nothing in common with near east or whatever. The only dark or slightly dark-skinned are the people of Roma ethnicity which are sometimes considered racially related to Egyptians.

"Indeed, Slovakia as such is not a major contributor to the world, but don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization…"

This is very much generalised. I am not very familiar with Slovak history but it would be kind of you to provide us some more detailed info about Slovaks who are portraying their self as a height level race and society. The only thing I remember about Slovakia, Bratislava is the movie "Eurotrip" which is of course exaggerated.

kufr

pre 15 godina

The video that was mentioned is now available with english subtitles at youtube: http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=Faktastick

johny

pre 15 godina

"What I meant to say is that as Albania has been exposed to hard islamisation in the past, this religion prevails in some parts of Albania and also prevails in present Kosovo."

When I become rich I will sponsor your travel to both Albania and Kosova. I hope B92 still exists then so I can contact you. The reason why I am saying this is that it would be a great eye opener for you; you could go and see for yourself rather than believe what someone who has never been there tells you. I want to be explicit, as much as I can and I hope B92 editors publish this. We Albanians see religion as a divider force and pushed down our throats by those who have occupied our lands in the past (enemies). That does not mean we don't believe in God. To not follow a religion does not mean you don't believe in God. Most of us see no point in Churches or Mosques as from our point of view they are man made and they are there to make monetary profit and usurp power. Again that does not mean we don't believe in God. Of course there are those who do and those who do not believe. Our belief in God is very personal and most of us, as I said earlier, see no point in churches and mosques. When I say most of us, I mean roughly 90-95% of us. I know its hard for other cultures to even get the notion but that is us. We are Albanian first and everything else second. Most of us believe that. I know other cultures do not get this, and put religion first. We don't. We ( I mean most of us) believe that you could be a really good believer in God without needing to be a Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Jew etc. If you chose to be you can and that's fine with us. Its your own personal choice. As long as you do not use religion against our national harmony.
I believe that if you go to either Kosova or Albania you will be able to see this yourself, without needing to even trust or believe any of the words I said.

"There are obviously many questions for which even its current inhabitants don't seem to be able provide appropriate answers. Most of them consider them to be Albanians. But Albanians already have one state - Albania. And now they have two. What will be the next move? It's really not that hard to predict you see..
(Martin, Bratislava, SVK, 2 June 2008 19:29) "

Ok the argument that because there is Albania there can't be another state that has a majority of Albanian speakers holds no water. For example: We have Germany and Austria. England and Australia. Or we have all the Slavic speaking states in the Balkans and in Europe. We have Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia etc etc. all slav speakers. Also we have Switzerland (where just like Kosova different languages are spoken and different ethnicities live) and you have France and Germany and Italy. You have Belgium and France. Belgium and the Netherlands. So if there are so many countries in our region and in the world that speak the same language and are of the same ethnicity, then just like Germany and Austria there should be no problem having Albania and Kosova. Your argument does not hold. Vuk Draskovic tried it before you and he was shut down the next day.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka

OK Piotr ! Let's remain neutral to each other. Each of us expresses common views for the countries we represent. The only thing I ask you to do is to be more careful with the facts. Most of the folks here are not experts in the things that happened East to Visla River so they cannot judje what you say. Please be delicate.

I know that nothing can improve our reputation in Europe. Whatever we do we'll remain a consolidating factor for the West. I guess the confrontation may last 3-4 years needed for the Europeans to realize that strong Russia is something they have to live with and Poland will be the last one to accept this reality.

johny

pre 15 godina

"If your "logic" holds then Mexico's population would have declined over the past 50 years due to emigration to the US when in fact the opposite is true and Mexico's population has continued to grow at a fast rate.
(PJD, 2 June 2008 14:45) "

So many things wrong with your logic.
First of all, you're comparing a population 1 million with one of 107 million. If Mexico's population increased only by 2 % hundreds of thousands of Mexican could come to the US and the population would still show growth. Now compare that to a population of 1 million (Albania's population when Tito came to power. There is now way that if we had hundreds of thousands of Albanians leaving for Kosova that in a population of 1 million you would see growth.
Second in these legends of yours I have seen no Serb so far give exact numbers as how many supposed immigrants made it to Kosova. The reason for that is simple. You don't have any numbers, all of what you have come up with is a fabrication. If you were to give numbers it would be very easy to verify them and your myth wouldn't be bough by eve you compatriots. This way at least you are able to convince simpletons and naives who want to believe in myths.
Third, thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of those Mexicans you mention are seasonal workers. They work here in the US for a couple of months and then they go back to Mexico for the rest of the year. So they are still part of the Mexican population even though they work here for a couple of months.
Fourth, not every hispanic that you see here or hispanic looking person that you see here is a Mexican. So having millions of hispanics here does not mean that all of them came from Mexico.
Fifth, in the case of this lie propagated by the Serbs it is very easy to verify,as we can compare the population for consecutive years

Brian

pre 15 godina

There are more Albanians in Kosovo today than there were before Milosevic came to power. Albanians make-up 95% of the population in Kosovo, anybody who believes that they were victims of genocide and ethnic cleansing is a hopeless moron. If Albanians were victims of genocide there would be less of them, not more of them. After the Holocaust there were fewer Jews, than before. The number of Jews in Europe still has not recovered to pre-war levels. So what kind of genocide is this in Kosovo where we wind-up with more Albanians than we started with before the genocide in 1999? Something isn't right with the story NATO and the Albanians are telling us, and you don't have to be a rocket scientist to see.

ronaldo USA

pre 15 godina

Putin did you ask your poor Russian people to stay in power or not.
Only Dictators like you (Milisevic Mugabe) elect themselfs.
You have no right to talk in EC

BR USA

pre 15 godina

To Putin, ZK UK, Princip, Jovan and the likeminded;
Kosova Republic is an independent state with its own constitution and all other stae atributes recognized by more than 40 states and more to come . Russia nor Serbia nor any other country in the world can do anything about it.

Putin can say whatever he'd like.

ZK and Princip in UK need to be reminded their host country was one of the first to recognize the Republic of Kosova. It is precisely because you live (I assume) in UK you have the right to express yourself, otherwise if in Russia, your dear Stalin oooops Putin would have had you executed just some reporters and opposition leaders who did not agree with his policies.

Long Live the Republic of Kosova and may God Almighty Bless the countries who recognize it.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

ORTHODOX.RU

"Because you said no good bye I never dared to make any remarks for your posts here."

I did say so Sergey, the reason they did not continue is simply because we reached the stage that our kind always do when trying to get our points across, and we both know what we know and we will not budge. Best to leave it and discuss things cordially.

"But because you are a Pole you have to do the things that doesn't meet your own stance. You have to do something to stop "those Russians" and this is the only thing that makes you come here."

I don't know how else to say this Sergey, really, I have nothing against the Russian people whatsoever (one of my best and closest friends is Russian), I have more against people who think they need to choose between the "Russian side" or the "Western Side" and insult the other.

"The Serbs are smart enough to see that you are a Pole who doesn't care of them and it is Russia you are always fighting here with. "

I do sympathize with the Serbian side regarding Kosovo, but I am not completely on their side, because I do not believe they are completely innocent. I try be neutral, and it's nothing to do with Russia or any other country.

"You also amuse me with the false stories of the lost Polish lands. "

Sorry Sergey, I am not listening. Regarding this I have said my piece, you have said yours, let us respect our opinions as our own and not push it further please with such offense remarks.

"Piotr if you are so ignorant in the matters of Caucasus why don't you stop discussing the matters concerned ? Best if you ask but not insist on something you have no idea. "

To say I have absolutely no idea is also incorrect, I know enough to express an opinion here, but I am not as educated on this matter as you are, I admit, it is quite new to me.

"The last thing I'd like to tell you is that nothing can stop Russia on the Earth and best if you get it sooner. Then we can be partners"

If this were to happen cordially and peacefully, it would be the greatest thing for both of our "sides". I have been saying this all along, and I hope to see it come into being one day.

Have a good evening.

kufr

pre 15 godina

ben: Don't forget that albanians also built the Egypt pyramids, lived in Atlantis and when it sunk conquered albanian stronghold Jerusalem led by the pure albanian warlord Alexander the Great :)

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

Martin,

please excuse Ben he just wanted to prove your point for you with regrdas;

"Albanians which came to Kosovo only prove how strange and different their thinking is to the rest of the Europe. It's practically immpossible to change them all. "

- of course Ben is talking of the Ilyrian culture that the Albanians seem to have adopted wholeheartedly just as whole heartedly as them being US "best-friends" . I guess in this regard pretty much like the "best-friends" the Afghan mhuajedin - and we all know how that friednship ended up. Of course don't be surprised to find Ben is is not impressed with this last comment either!!!

I sure would hope that there can be much more tourism and trade between Serbia and Slovakia with many simlarities between the countries on many aspects be it food, folklore, culture and outlook and of course both make very fine Slivovica and beers - Slovakia's Zlaty Bazant or Urpin (12 or 10 which ever is at hand) are favourite tipples!!!

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

ben

"You are pointing finger to probably the oldest civilizations of Europe as being a non-European culture- forgetting that your Slovakian contribution in the western civilization is NIL."

Slovakians show nothing but the purest traits European culturally (dress, cuisine, music, architecture etc.), racially (generally blond hair and blue/green eyes) and religiously (Roman Catholic). Can you say the same for Albanians? Albanian music sounds Turkish, their religion is Islam and they look racially closer to the Near East than to most Europeans.

Indeed, Slovakia as such is not a major contributor to the world, but don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization, not any less than Germanic and Romance peoples in Western Europe.

"Your culture compared to ours is Third World. "

Your economy compared to theirs is Third World.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka, 2 June 2008 12:39)

Hi Piotr !

Because you said no good bye I never dared to make any remarks for your posts here. Sure deep in your heart you feel sympathy for the Serbs and joining the people like Joe , Ben , Ahmed , Albanicum and Pejoni abuses you. But because you are a Pole you have to do the things that doesn't meet your own stance. You have to do something to stop "those Russians" and this is the only thing that makes you come here.

I follow your posts and what I can see is that you agree with the Serbs in most of the things. Bur in the end you say :"Yes it's unjust yes I agree that ... but you have to do ...and best if you ... " Then comes your piece of adwice that doesn't meet interests of Serbia. The Serbs are smart enough to see that you are a Pole who doesn't care of them and it is Russia you are always fighting here with.

You also amuse me with the false stories of the lost Polish lands. Stop cheating people with the 16-th century stories ! And next time you write " As a Pole, sure, I should be demanding all the lands we lost at the end of WW2 to Belarus and Ukraine, where there are still a total of about half a million Poles living" please don't forget to mention that those were RUSSIAN TERRITORIES occupied in 1920 where 90% of people hated you and prayed to get rid of Polish Gestapo they lived in !

================
"Regarding the history of the peoples of the Caucasus, I need to read more, I agree, as I am not completely familiar, but I am interested in the history."

Piotr if you are so ignorant in the matters of Caucasus why don't you stop discussing the matters concerned ? Best if you ask but not insist on something you have no idea.
===================
The last thing I'd like to tell you is that nothing can stop Russia on the Earth and best if you get it sooner. Then we can be partners. I also predict that the starting strategic partnership talks with EU will last 3-4 years needed for the Europeans to accept the changed status quo. It will be hard to do but Russia will leave you no other way.

Be happy !

nik

pre 15 godina

ZK UK wrote: South Ossetia and Abkhazia becoming independent is a consequence of the Kosovo precedent. It just shows that Kosovo is not unique"...

South Osetia, Abhazia, the "Pridnestrovie" and Chechnia declared independence and gained control; over their territories, often brutally cleansing all indesirables, long befor Kosovo.
Chenchnia was reincorporated within Russia after two wars, and what made it possible was the hugeness of Russia and the tininess of Chechnia.
Neither Georgia nor Moldova, nor Serbia have the resourses and the sheer mass to reincorporate their breakaway regions!
The dilema in fron of their government is: !. to use their formal sovereign right as a negotiating chi and strike a baragin: recognition of independence against..... ( Serbia had from 1996 to 1999 to negotiate Kosovo for Srpska)
2. The second option is to succumb to the self deception that the respective regions could be reincorporated... and waste away all their resources in the proces.

Martin, Bratislava, SVK

pre 15 godina

ben:

I'm not sure I understand why you pointed out exactly this. I won't tell you any tales about Slovakia as I obviously don't have ready ones. I guess thought you are from Kosovo. Items you picked up refer to the people which lived over 2 thousands years ago and I seriously doubt these ones were exactly your predecessors.

I was rather referring to actual situation and, if you are so eager about it, I was pointing my finger to islam itself (religion) rather than any particular nation. What I meant to say is that as Albania has been exposed to hard islamisation in the past, this religion prevails in some parts of Albania and also prevails in present Kosovo. There are obviously many questions for which even its current inhabitants don't seem to be able provide appropriate answers. Most of them consider them to be Albanians. But Albanians already have one state - Albania. And now they have two. What will be the next move? It's really not that hard to predict you see..

ben

pre 15 godina

(Martin, Bratislava, SVK, 2 June 2008 14:21)

Martin I haven't heard more nonsense things for a while.

You are pointing finger to probably the oldest civilizations of Europe as being a non-European culture- forgetting that your Slovakian contribution in the western civilization is NIL.

Your culture compared to ours is Third World.

FYI

1. Constantine the Great was KOSOVAR ruling in central Albania where he become Christian later become the Emperor of Rome and proclamed Christianity the official religion of Roman Empire.

2. Pope Clemente XI (Pope Albani) was Albanian

3. Mother Theresa (Anjez Bojaxhiu) is Albanian

I can continuo more if you wish.

Now tale us about your Slovakian contribution to the WESTERN civilization please.

But as far as you are happy with your stereotypes...

Martin, Bratislava, SVK

pre 15 godina

ZK, Princip:

Right, i see, people in the film of course talk in serbian. I was just referring to UK (United Kingdom) abbreviation, from which it wasn't that sure you could have comprehend it. But as I see now the documentary is well understood even without translation or subtitles. The commentator however says lots of interesting stuff and I hope that the film will be shown on czech TV in regular time yet. It cannot be excluded because czech TV is running some negotiations about making combined night including this documentary and some other probably from UK production (as I mentioned before) which would paint it in favor for albanians. Than they wanted to make some common discussion about two documentaries (That's information from czech newspapers). I don't know however, these plans might have been halted because of realasing film on internet without permission, czech TV was very irritated for that for breaking co-producer's warrants..

Thank you for invitation, that's very nice of you. I must say that even I and surely most of Slovaks would very much prefer to welcome Serbians here in Slovakia over some Albanians from so called Kosovo. For that I'm really glad that Slovakia will not recognize Kosovo visa, we really don't need to grow numbers of thiefs, criminals and probably murderers here, we have enough our problems to solve.

I see whole Kosovo problem however as a small piece of much bigger problem. Not even one really dangerous precedent based on "ethnical" basis, which it's indeed. The problem of present days here is about interaction of modern european culture and Islam culture, which is extraordinary aggressive and expansionist even to these days. Albanians which came to Kosovo only prove how strange and different their thinking is to the rest of the Europe. It's practically immpossible to change them all. That lots of western countries fail to recognize and on behalf of their good will let the immigrants in. These immigrants then create inner enemy in their countries who will certainly grow in time. God help us if Turkey is allowed to access EU.

PJD

pre 15 godina

johny: "I am talking about the myth that Albanians came to Kosova during Tito's time from Albania.
During Tito's time the population in Albania grew and did not decrease. I would believe that if hundreds of thousands of Albanians left Albania and made it to Kosova, that the population of Albania would have considerably decreased especially considering the fact that when Tito came to power Albania had a population of around 1 million."

If your "logic" holds then Mexico's population would have declined over the past 50 years due to emigration to the US when in fact the opposite is true and Mexico's population has continued to grow at a fast rate.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

Dragan

I never denied that the Albanian side ethnically cleansed much of the Kosovo Serbian population in 1999, though in the same light, one would be a fool to claim that they did this for no reason apart from hatred of Serbs and NATO support.

Obviously something must have happened in the years 1996-1999 to the Kosovo Albanians that led to NATO intervention and the post-war ethnic cleansing of the Serbian population.

While I am disgusted by how the Albanians have treated the Serbian population and religious monuments the after 1999 war, but I would be a fool to claim that this came about with reason.

ORTHODOX.RU

I never said anything Russophobic here, nor do I lose reason when the thought of Russia comes to mind, I don't know why you said that.

"If summerised both the Albanians and the Georgians has settled the lands that historically (like 40% of modern Poland ) had never belonged to them and tried to steal those lands away."

We settled in those lands because somebody took away our other lands on the other side of the country and gave us these lands in return.

Though to say that these lands that we got were never ours is also incorrect, as you should know that Polabian, Kashubian and Silesian tribes have been living there and even further East since before Germanic tribes (Ostrogoths) even expanded into them from what is now Southern Denmark/Northern Germany and were assimilated either by Germans or Poles in our wars which led to all the border shifts. I am sure you know this, but you would not like to admit it here to me.

Regarding the history of the peoples of the Caucasus, I need to read more, I agree, as I am not completely familiar, but I am interested in the history.

Gunnar

pre 15 godina

More facts about the real situation on Kosovo, this time not from the Czech Republic but from Germany! (shown on the german 1st national TV some years ago)

http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=9022337190221762301

Definitely a must-see for german-speaking population!

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

Martin, I understood the documentary because the people were talking in Serbian although the commentator was speaking in Czech.

Let me just say that I have yet to see any Western media report anything positive about Serbia and Serbians - even till this day, however, they paint the Albanians as angels in Kosovo.

Well, it's good to know that the mojority of Czechs still support the Serbian cause even if that documentary was not aired.

Kroni

pre 15 godina

Telling the truth; this is something you the serbs have all praised about Putin, the man who's country's democracies has dropped by 35% since he took over! the man that will not go away as he only changes post to remain in power for the rest of his life... the man who claims success by selling Russia natural wealth and giving it to the fortunate 10% who now account for the richest 10% in the world...

this is all politics but please be assured that Russia is no friend of serbia its political games a spreading around the world... and i can assure you they are games that they cannot win...

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

Martin,

yes your right it has been blocked from being aired as I mention in the comment just before yours. - We can only speculate why. But, it is clear that "it wouldn't do to mention such facts" hence why Biased Broadcasting Corp (BBC) are now trying to aid in the "story telling" and adding their "spin" - since it would't do to tell the truth as it really is!!! In time the truth will out and all the spin and deceit will entangle those who weave...

"I'm surprised that you understood it cause film is in czech language only"

Martin, as I am sure your aware slavic languages are very similar and if you have not vistied Serbia yet you should as you will be made very welcome and would be able to comprehend and converse more then you might have thought.

Martin - you wouldn't be from Martin (Svk) by any chance - must get that all the time sorry! Much prefer BB myself! Djakujem na pomoc, Dovi.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Dragan, 1 June 2008 20:01

Dear Dragan !

You don't have to take Peter's words so serious cause there are no Poles that are not Rusofobs. They all stop to be reasonable when it comes to anything to do with Russia. I know it for sure that Peter is rather educated to know the difference between the K-Albanians and the Ossetians and the Abkhasians. Strange as it is but Georgians should be compared with the K-Albanians cause after WW2 both of them have settled on the lands that had never belonged to them.

Both Abkhasians and the Ossetians had joined Russia long before Georgia. Only God knows who called the Kartli tribes Georgians first ! Those were few hostile to each other Kartli tribes ( Imeretians , Mengrelians , Svans , Kahetians , Gurians ect.) that Russia has united and declared to be one nation. Then Russia fought 3 wars against Turkey and Iran to defend the Kartli tribes.

During last 5000 years Georgia has existed as a separate state less than 3 years in 1918-1921 when with German support they tried to break away. But the 11-th Army headed by a Georgian Communist has put an end to it. At that time neither Abkhasia nor Osetia were not included in Georgia. It became real only after WW2 when thousands of Georgians settled here. Especially it strike at the Abkhasia cause it is the most beautiful place in the world.

When in 1991 Georgia has broke away they violated all the rules available. According to the Constitution they should have referendums within the minorities if they are ready to leave with the Georgians. But because the results were quite predictable the Georgians did not. Their Presidents father in 1914 as a volunteer joined the German Army and for 2 years fought the Russians. So his son was nothing better.

If summerised both the Albanians and the Georgians has settled the lands that historically (like 40% of modern Poland ) had never belonged to them and tried to steal those lands away. The only difference is that the Georgians has already failed while the K-Albanians are only expected to drinks this bitter cup.

Cheers !

johny

pre 15 godina

"What was it like to be a Serb in Croatia? Or even in Kosovo when Serbs were being treated as foreigners and ethnically targeted in the 80’s?"

It is kinda hard to imagine how you can be ethnically cleansed and yet hold all the official and public positions, also hold and have all the state jobs. That is exactly what the Serbs had in the '80's, all the public and official jobs and all the state jobs. Kinda hard to imagine how we cleansed the Serbs since all the policemen were Serbs, all the military men were Serbs, all the officials were Serbs. Its like the whites claiming in south Africa during Apartheid that they were being cleansed at a time where all the government and all the military force was held by the whites.

Also I think the Serbs, at least those who don't wanna believe in tales, myths, and old women stories should do a little more research. I am talking about the myth that Albanians came to Kosova during Tito's time from Albania.
During Tito's time the population in Albania grew and did not decrease. I would believe that if hundreds of thousands of Albanians left Albania and made it to Kosova, that the population of Albania would have considerably decreased especially considering the fact that when Tito came to power Albania had a population of around 1 million.
At least when some of you try to lie or be the mouth of propaganda for your country be smarter, and more creative. What you guys have come so far with, is so easily verifiable. I can take any of you guys who are interested and go to the state archives in Tirana and see the population for all the years Tito was in power. Our famous dictator made sure he knew how many people he had in his control because according to him we were gonna fight the bourgeoisie and the capitalists. He kept great records. If you want you can also find how many sheep and cows we had during Tito's years. Its not a problem at all to verify your lies.

veki

pre 15 godina

Dear Cees,
you misunderstood what Frans said-
he didn't call Albanians stupid. He called the opinion of the Dutch folks most stupid of all.
I can't but absolutely agree with him.

Dorcol

pre 15 godina

Putin pulled out the Russian troops citing financial reasons. Fair enough Oil was trading at US$25 per barrel then (2003) and is now at US$125. Russia is reaping the benefits of its natural resources right now. The US is also reeaping the benefits of Iraqi oil but has to pay for an expensive mission in Iraq to keep that money flow. If oil stays over $100 the US will attack Iran on some flimsy pretext. Then it gets juicy with Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan holding huge reserves and thats where the Russia/US line will be drawn. Not Kosovo .. although if the Russians could control the pipeline from the caucusus to Europe through Bulgaria/Serbia they will have a gold mine of earnings for the next century.

Kreshnik Bejko

pre 15 godina

With Kosovo's independence, Stalin's veto just burned in Putin's hand. The post-WWII will soon be re-engineered, and his anger is visible in this interview.

Someone said "In Putin we trust". Putin will spell your long term doom.

Let go of Kosovo and you will prosper.

Nello

pre 15 godina

Mr. Putin has been a political anomoly. Put in power by god to save the Slavonic peoples of the world from an unprecendented, well orchestrated, multi-pronged attack on their independence and Orthodox by those who seek to enslave her people and pimp her women and girls to western sex tourists who behave like uneducated thugs who eat fast junk food and are loaded with euro$$. In her long history Serbia has always chosen right over wrong. She has always chosen the hard road which can involve short to mid term economic suffering but which is enriched with longer term rewards. Serbia should trust Russia and seek to join the CIS which unlike the EU will respect her religion, economic independence, and unique cultural values. Thank you Mr. Putin & Mr. Medvedev for sending aid flights to Kosovo and thank you again for supporting Serbia in her historic fight for what is right as opposed to those who seek to divide & conquer her.

Ari

pre 15 godina

If Putin is so concerned for the K-Serbs how come he withdrew the Russian peacekeepers from Kosova? I guess he didn't care much after all and that's just a useful, albeit nonexistent, argument.

Joe

pre 15 godina

One thing is sure. Putin got a lesson of free journalism so different from sub-serviant Russian one, which did not change from soviet times due to Putin. This French journalist was pretty well informed about the ethnic cleansing in Georgia. On the German Spiegel I learned today the same story. The so-called PM of Abkhazia was interviewed by a German journalist. This "PM" admitted that they allowed the return of 55,000 refugies in the border region of Galatian but they can not allow 150,000 refugies to return to the other regions because in that case there would be a majority for Georgia.
Anyway it appears that only Serbs and Belorussians support Putin in Europe. This is a pretty poor track record. It shows that you can not fool democratic countries and their free media. It also shows the continuous divide - an invisible wall - between democratic Europe and the autocratic one composed of Russia, Belarus and pseudo-democratic Serbia.

Aleks

pre 15 godina

Some interesting comments.

Re: Cees and Frans, Cees is actually exposing his predjudice by not reading what Frans actually said, i.e. it is the Dutch visitors to the Balkans who are the most stupid. Cees either misread frans comments or didn't bother to read them probably having already decided what frans opinions were.

So, absolutely nothing to do with the Albanians!

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

To Princip&ZK:

That film wasn't aired on czech TV yet. In fact czech TV althought participated in its production has rejected to show it because as they say it is very much one sided and would break objectivity of czech TV. After several months the director has released film on internet recently where it became hit. This is the subject of legal dispute now in CR because of law violation. It's possible that film will be shown on czech TV in the future but it might be togather with other document showing albanians, probably from BBC production.. I'm surprised that you understood it cause film is in czech language only. I found it hovewer very educational..

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

ZK UK,

the film was produced for Czech TV but the propaganda machine has halted its showing hence the producers have placed it online - imagine now why and to what extent the truth is being obfuscated in so called "free" Europe and "free" media!!!! Yet ironically and hypocrtically label Russia when the west is clearly just as equally propagandist.

Orwell himself had his preface to Animal Farm censored because it " 'it wouldn't do' to mention that particular fact." but eventually the truth comes out too! You should read it he evene mentions the shenaigans in second world war Yugoslavia!http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/83481.html

Jovan

pre 15 godina

"It is not just the Russians who know the real story the Czechs have produced a film about the real events there too;

Uloupene Kosovo (Robbed Kosovo)
[link]&
(Princip, UK, 1 June 2008 13:07)"

very good link, Princip.

especially because even without knowledge of the czech-language, this film shows the albanian terror upon non-albanians in simple pictures of unbelievable atrocities...

what was extraordinary sad: the picture of an albanian criminal killing a serbian priest.

my dear albanian friends, denying won´t help you... since THIS says it all about your hate-driven society...

it becomes clearer and clearer that you have to be liberated again, since most Albanians are opposing to animal-like crimes like that... but the criminal clan-structures won´t go away themselves, I guess.

probably many Albanians will be quite happy, when they will be liberated from those animals among them.

PJD

pre 15 godina

Ben, the 1991 census showed there was 360,000 non-Albanians in Kosovo. Assuming your figures are correct then there are now only 200,000 non-Albanians in Kosovo so 160,000 Serbian citizens have gone.

Peter RV

pre 15 godina

Attention our spineless Europe-starved politicians! Putin is giving you exemple of how to talk to the Western double-standard hypocrites (Can anybody imagine Tadic defending Serbia like this?)

SP

pre 15 godina

I can only laugh at Putin and how simple he is.

It's so clear that he doesn't care an ounce about Serbs or Serbia. He only uses them to advance his own agenda.

Right now, he's using Serbs to soften the blow that's coming against Russia. Why? Because Putin is getting ready to attack Georgia. He already sent in 300 troops there to "fix" the railroads the other day. Right, of course, to "fix" the railroads. While fixing the railroads, the Russian troops might as well send in the trains with weaponry into Georgia.

Putin please. We've seen all of your tactics before. What more do you expect from a KGB agent turned dictator?

And by the way, that journalist plowed right through Putin and put him in his place. Putin's response was: "I know what's going on there." Oh really? Were you in Kosovo yourself? Maybe you were the driver of those trucks with partially expired medicine that you "donated" to Serbs in Kosovo. Or did you send in your friends at the KGB to check things out?

Like I said, I only laugh at such comments because it's so clear that Serbs aren't even in Putin's rear mirror.

Dragan

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka.... you wrote 'Abkhazians declared independence and ethnically cleansed the Georgians, while in Kosovo the Albanians declared independence and the Serbs ethnically cleansed them..'

Quit lying. That is a flat out lie and you know it. There was absolutely no ethnic cleansing of albanians by Serbs, NONE. In fact, life was so much better for albanians in Serbia than in albania that their population exploded in Kosovo (illegal immigration which Tito allowed), and they slowly ethinically cleansed the Serbs out of their ancestral homeland, Kosovo. How do you think that they got to 90% from 50% in such a short time? Read a little and educate yourself before making ridiculous statements like the one above. There are virtually no Serbs left in Kosovo and you have the audacity to claim that it is Serbs who are the ethnic cleansers?? Go visit Belgrade where you will see thousands of albanians living in peace among Serbs. Then go to Kosovo and see the Serbs in ghettos behind barbed wire, needing military escorts to go grocery shopping.
Your statement is a complete lie, and you should be ashamed, as a Pole, for spreading such mistruths.

Daki

pre 15 godina

It's a funny thing calling Putin a dictator. I don't recall Putin starting a war in the Middle East over false pretenses.

I don't recall seeing third world immigrants rioting through the streets of Moscow like I did in Paris. Now I ask, who are the real dictators?

cees

pre 15 godina

frans, you are right, Belgrade is a hell of a city, but just like other capitals, it doesn't present the true caracter of a nation: like Amsterdam for the Dutch, Budapest for the Hungarians, Prague for the Czechs or Moscow for the Russians. Go to the country-side to learn what the real people do, think and act. But that is the difference between Bussinessmen, living in big hotels, having parties, getting told the Serbian 'TRUTH', and a poor academic that has to deal with 'real' people. That is not a party at all, but listening to a lot of sad stories from all sides on the Balkans. And calling Albanians stupid shows already your prejudice.
Cees

proud2bkosovar

pre 15 godina

Dear all;
Putin has every right to express himself just as Sarkozy, Brown or Bush do. The only difference Kosovo is independent now and it doesn't matter what is said. What matters the most is where we are. No one is stoping Kosovar Serbs to return (at least the ones without blood in their hands), no one is killing them, no one is isolating them.
Let Kosovo struggle with their problems needed to be solved. Let it be based on the treatment toward minorities Kosova should be treated in return; and the day that Serbs or any minority is treated even to a fraction the Kosovars themselves were treated under the Serbian rule than I'll be the first one to protest and request statehood to be taken back.
Again, this is were we are. Let that be a lesson to all that by looking back you may not steer to the future.
Concerning the Georgian problem: If Georgia treated the residents of Ossetia and Abkhazia as the Serbs did Kosovars than who is as naive as not to support their demands for independence.
ZK- you are an ardent supporter for Serbian clause and I admire you. But, closing your mind to other argument makes one brainwashed.
B-92 thanks for the opportunity to comment.

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

nik, South Ossetia and Abkhazia becoming independent is a consequence of the Kosovo precedent. It just shows that Kosovo is not unique and that attempting to make it independent opens a large can of worms.

As for Serbian opinions, I believe they are generally indifferent to the issue as it really is a matter for Russia and Georgia to sort out. If Georgian joins NATO then it loses those two regions.

Georgia needs to consider its national interests carefully and its support for Serbia on Kosovo is welcome as far as I'm concerned.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

Putin is right when we mentions the refugee situation, but he technically did not elaborate on the point that the Abkhazians declared independence and ethnically cleansed the Georgians, while in Kosovo the Albanians declared independence and the Serbs ethnically cleansed them. On the other hand, if he admitted it, he would be admitting America's "sui generis" stance publicly.

Politicians on both sides are so full of it. Both Bush and Putin are the worst kind. Contradictory capitalists.

ben

pre 15 godina

"You said separatist? Why didn't you use this word about Kosovo?" - teh dicrtator.

Now the question is: why Putin is against labeling those two regions separatist??

Officially Russia does not support Abkhazia and Ossetia but at the same time he is nervous calling them separatists. (double standards??)

This is how much Russia respects the international law. An above all, how much you can trust their word.

frans

pre 15 godina

Cees (19). Well, most probably you are Dutch, behaved as a Dutchman (meaning very much in favor of Albanians, making pictures all over) as they are the most stupid of all people visiting the balkans. As I am one myself and do business in all the balkan now for ten years I dare to say that the best place to be is Serbia and more precisley in Belgrade. Please Cees, visit really all places, be objective and DON'T look at Kosovo. Where the Dutch were one of the leading countries to support Albanians in expelling Serbs!! better go home and feels ashamed what your country did instead of blaming Serbs now!

Hayabusa

pre 15 godina

Jovan

"a journalist... is being told what HE should be reporting, if he´d take his profession serious..."

Putin is of course used to Russian reporters who report what Putin wants them to report, but the civilized world does not work that way.

nik

pre 15 godina

I can not understand the reaction of the serb nationalists.
They oppose Kosovos indpendence - tha is understandable.
They are happy that Russia oposes (in words) Kosovos DUI - logical.
But it is obvious that they support the eventual Dui of Abhazija and South Osetia. Russia supports them and most probably that will be the price paid to the Russians for looking the other way as Kosovo is being recognized by more and more countries. It is a deal that suits the West, because they want Georgia to join Nato, but unburdened by undesolved problems. Like Kosovo (until the preshevo valley is under Serbian control), South Osetia and Abhazia have no strategic value of their oun. Without them Georgia could still provide the western access to Azerbeijan and The Kaspian Sea. Russia knows that and that is why it is protracting the deal.
Waht I am puzzled with is the total alck of sympaty of Serbian nationalist to Georgia, even though Georgia did not recognize Kosovos dui!
They are both Orthodox nations, whose people want to join the West, but are not to pay the perritorial price.

ben

pre 15 godina

"Thousands of Serbs can't return to Kosovo. Hundreds of thousands," he said.

The dictator PUTIN is also a liar: Kosova has 2M inhabitants of which 90% Albanian and the other 10% others: Serbs in majority, Turks, Bosnians, Croats etc.

If the math is not opinion than 10% out of 2M is 200 thousand/ of which about 140 thousand were Serbs.

Today in Northern Kosova are living about 50 thousand and other 50 thousand in the central Kosova.

So Mr dictator liar: it’s impossible your “Hundred of thousands” OK Mr Liar?

Dragan

pre 15 godina

Bravo Vlad for putting this ignorant journalist in their place! It looks like, since this journalist is completely ignorant to the 300,000 Serbs that have been ethnically cleansed from Kosovo, and the 156 churches that have been destroyed by albanian mobs, that they went to the same journalism school as CNN's Christiane Amanpour. Perhaps they should calle these people 'propogandists', not 'journalists'.
Serbia loves you Putin, and keep up the good work!!
Cheers!!

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

Princip, thanks for that video. It really puts things into perspective.

After this was shown on Czech TV, it's no surprise the Czech people support the Serbians even though the government succumbed to US pressure.

You only have to see what the Albanians are doing at the Macedonian elections to understand that nothing has changed.

May god help those people see the light one day. They cannot even rule themselves so how on earth do they expect to rule others?

Partytime

pre 15 godina

By the way,Fion means a specialpart of human anatomywhich is used as a way out for food... The exact spelling is Fillon for French P.M.

If Putin was so aware about what was happening in Kosovo, why was he that much against Nato intervention? This was said to be against Serb breach of I.L. and not the contrary.

Peace out there, even to Serbs...

ben

pre 15 godina

"Don't tell me stories, I know what is really going on there." PUTIN

A real intellectual!

When a bull remains without arguments starts to insult- don't tale me stories.

A man whose country put several free-loving nations in the iron cage is now preaching law.

peter, sydney

pre 15 godina

I have just been trying to imagine the scenario if it were George Bush being interviewed instead of Vladimir Putin in the same situation - ie: no minders to control the content of the questions being put to him & I can't help but think of a fish out of water flopping around & gasping for 'air'.

Good job Mr Putin. While your government still has a long way to go, at least it is changing. The same cannot be said of the US however - it still has the same mindset it had during the cold war.

The price of 'victory' I guess.

Michael Blairsdale

pre 15 godina

Naive Cees

What was it like to be a Serb in Croatia? Or even in Kosovo when Serbs were being treated as foreigners and ethnically targeted in the 80’s?

Where is the justice for them?

The inconsistent outcomes and neglect of one side will always cause future conflicts to immerge. Both sides can be guilty of this.

So since when has it become improper to debate with a journalist? When you choose it not to be? Also what about all the Albanians murdered by the KLA? Not every Albanian played the same tune to Thaci, some had to die for the cause. Or do you care more for an Albanian killed by a Serb than one killed by the KLA?

branco covic

pre 15 godina

you did the right thing MR. PUTIN. if these guys need to be addressed with muscles i think you are the right man to do that. 3 rounds of boxing may do or even judo, IF THEY LAST THAT LONG...cheers

cees

pre 15 godina

What did Mr Putin tell the western journalist? "The things are not all opposite", that means a bit is. For him maybe a small part, but for the western world it is a great deal: At the end of the 20th. century in a so-called civilized Europe the Milosevic regime tried to ethnically cleanse a part of his country, that from 1974 - 1991 had an autonomous status, which he one-sided wiped out, like dictators are doing. The only thing Putin can't do in this case: he can't silence the critical press like he used to do in Russia. In no country in the world are more journalists murdered in the last eight years, except Iraq, as in Russia.
By the way, it is not a safe life being a critic in Serbia too. It even can threaten your own president Tadic, or people like Natasa Kandic, Sonja Biserko, Biljana Kovacevic-Vuco. I never forget the assassination attempt on Dejan Anastasijevic on April 16 2007.
I travelled all over the world and spend a lot of my time on the Balkans, but I felt only once a real threat, that I'll never forget: I was in North-Mitrovoca. I was called a spy and a monkey and they spit on me. This atmosphere of hostility made me feel, how other Balkan nations must have feared the Serbian actions and reactions during the 20th. century.
Cees

dulo

pre 15 godina

Well Done Mr Putin..

Just you go on and show them, you could kill a few more journalists, French once you are at it, as there are no more left in Russia.. Now you have really assorted yourself in world public, one could've easy imagine if you are a real Superpower what would you do then. Can help but Stalin and Hitler comes to mind, as 5 yrs ago you were a baby chiken.

Go keep fooling yourself as much as you want, as we know what your Russia is all about.
Oops sadly the west doesn't seem to be bothered much, as we have seen this before. You will kneel down when comes to Kosova sooner than you think.
Perhaps another show of your ancient arms after the summer?? Yeah that will show them.

Sort out your poverty stricken people first then sort the world out.

ДРУГ

pre 15 godina

B-92

Thanks a lot ! I appreciate you are not deaf to reasonable arguments ! This is the missing part of the interview that the yesterday report was missing.

Regards !

kosovari

pre 15 godina

No worry Mr. Putin, beside Russian and Serbian Films made about KOsovo, there is a mountains of evidence about Serbian horror in Kosovo! Te right is on our side.! Live and let live!

Michael Blairsdale

pre 15 godina

“The journalist then remarked that "in Abkhazia, it was the Georgians who had been ethnically cleansed, while in Kosovo, the situation was quite the opposite since it was the Albanians that were exposed to this practice".”

This selective history picking has always been a problem in understanding the Balkans. Also the editors of media outlets who have pressure bestowed upon them to follow a certain line.

Since 2000 virtually Serbs alone have been cleansed, shall we start from this point or from the bombing or before?

One thing you should always ask yourself, if the truth is so compelling, why have there been so many lies. NATO’s campaign, they were caught with so many lies, surely the truth alone would have been enough if the situation was as bad as they say.

Yet many people who research the facts about Kosovo etc in the UK, many post on newspaper blogs such as the telegraph and even that horrible liberal paper, the guardian, have an entirely different perspective and we are not open to mass propaganda by the Serbian side.

lids

pre 15 godina

Telling the truth is luxury that few can afford in Europe and only ones who truly expirienced the horror from muslum terrorist can speak as loud as Mr.Putin.

Thank you Mr.Putin.

dogs that bargs are not dangerus

pre 15 godina

Then after "teaching" these westerns brats about democracy, than please beg them to by your gas, because without them you whon´t have bread on the table.

fas

pre 15 godina

Telling stories is what the western corporate media and their governments are good at, thank you for not letting them get away with it Mr Putin.

Jovan

pre 15 godina

quite interesting a "journalist"...something in the western world widely seen as the guarantor of democracy, as the fourth power in "democratic" systems... is being told what HE HIMSELF should be reporting, if he´d take his profession serious...

and he´s being told it by someone who was repeatedly portrayed as some kind of dictator by the very same western and so "civilized" journalists...

really interesting, isn´t it?

Joe

pre 15 godina

Gary,

Your Russian idol has a serious image problem in Western democratic countries. In the last few years he became a synonym of the old Russian arrogance and menace. As a result in people's mind an invisible wall got created between the democratic West and an autocratic, neo-imperialistic Russia. Sure there is increasing trade between the two sides but no friendship. This will hardly change in the next 15-20 years and the opinions of your Russian friends will be disregarded.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

It is not just the Russians who know the real story the Czechs have produced a film about the real events there too;

Uloupene Kosovo (Robbed Kosovo)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4554948078128880143&

Pejoni

pre 15 godina

"...The journalist then remarked that "in Abkhazia, it was the Georgians who had been ethnically cleansed, while in Kosovo, the situation was quite the opposite since it was the Albanians that were exposed to this practice"

Couldnt have said it better myself, well done by the French journalist putting that dictator on place.

Tex Willer

pre 15 godina

Go on Putin, thanks god that democratic society knows your intentions and your deeds.
You cannot tell west nothing about Kosovo because you were involved on opposite site, the site that claim that didn't commit crimes against Albanians.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

It is not just the Russians who know the real story the Czechs have produced a film about the real events there too;

Uloupene Kosovo (Robbed Kosovo)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4554948078128880143&

fas

pre 15 godina

Telling stories is what the western corporate media and their governments are good at, thank you for not letting them get away with it Mr Putin.

Pejoni

pre 15 godina

"...The journalist then remarked that "in Abkhazia, it was the Georgians who had been ethnically cleansed, while in Kosovo, the situation was quite the opposite since it was the Albanians that were exposed to this practice"

Couldnt have said it better myself, well done by the French journalist putting that dictator on place.

lids

pre 15 godina

Telling the truth is luxury that few can afford in Europe and only ones who truly expirienced the horror from muslum terrorist can speak as loud as Mr.Putin.

Thank you Mr.Putin.

Dragan

pre 15 godina

Bravo Vlad for putting this ignorant journalist in their place! It looks like, since this journalist is completely ignorant to the 300,000 Serbs that have been ethnically cleansed from Kosovo, and the 156 churches that have been destroyed by albanian mobs, that they went to the same journalism school as CNN's Christiane Amanpour. Perhaps they should calle these people 'propogandists', not 'journalists'.
Serbia loves you Putin, and keep up the good work!!
Cheers!!

branco covic

pre 15 godina

you did the right thing MR. PUTIN. if these guys need to be addressed with muscles i think you are the right man to do that. 3 rounds of boxing may do or even judo, IF THEY LAST THAT LONG...cheers

Dragan

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka.... you wrote 'Abkhazians declared independence and ethnically cleansed the Georgians, while in Kosovo the Albanians declared independence and the Serbs ethnically cleansed them..'

Quit lying. That is a flat out lie and you know it. There was absolutely no ethnic cleansing of albanians by Serbs, NONE. In fact, life was so much better for albanians in Serbia than in albania that their population exploded in Kosovo (illegal immigration which Tito allowed), and they slowly ethinically cleansed the Serbs out of their ancestral homeland, Kosovo. How do you think that they got to 90% from 50% in such a short time? Read a little and educate yourself before making ridiculous statements like the one above. There are virtually no Serbs left in Kosovo and you have the audacity to claim that it is Serbs who are the ethnic cleansers?? Go visit Belgrade where you will see thousands of albanians living in peace among Serbs. Then go to Kosovo and see the Serbs in ghettos behind barbed wire, needing military escorts to go grocery shopping.
Your statement is a complete lie, and you should be ashamed, as a Pole, for spreading such mistruths.

Jovan

pre 15 godina

quite interesting a "journalist"...something in the western world widely seen as the guarantor of democracy, as the fourth power in "democratic" systems... is being told what HE HIMSELF should be reporting, if he´d take his profession serious...

and he´s being told it by someone who was repeatedly portrayed as some kind of dictator by the very same western and so "civilized" journalists...

really interesting, isn´t it?

ДРУГ

pre 15 godina

B-92

Thanks a lot ! I appreciate you are not deaf to reasonable arguments ! This is the missing part of the interview that the yesterday report was missing.

Regards !

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Dragan, 1 June 2008 20:01

Dear Dragan !

You don't have to take Peter's words so serious cause there are no Poles that are not Rusofobs. They all stop to be reasonable when it comes to anything to do with Russia. I know it for sure that Peter is rather educated to know the difference between the K-Albanians and the Ossetians and the Abkhasians. Strange as it is but Georgians should be compared with the K-Albanians cause after WW2 both of them have settled on the lands that had never belonged to them.

Both Abkhasians and the Ossetians had joined Russia long before Georgia. Only God knows who called the Kartli tribes Georgians first ! Those were few hostile to each other Kartli tribes ( Imeretians , Mengrelians , Svans , Kahetians , Gurians ect.) that Russia has united and declared to be one nation. Then Russia fought 3 wars against Turkey and Iran to defend the Kartli tribes.

During last 5000 years Georgia has existed as a separate state less than 3 years in 1918-1921 when with German support they tried to break away. But the 11-th Army headed by a Georgian Communist has put an end to it. At that time neither Abkhasia nor Osetia were not included in Georgia. It became real only after WW2 when thousands of Georgians settled here. Especially it strike at the Abkhasia cause it is the most beautiful place in the world.

When in 1991 Georgia has broke away they violated all the rules available. According to the Constitution they should have referendums within the minorities if they are ready to leave with the Georgians. But because the results were quite predictable the Georgians did not. Their Presidents father in 1914 as a volunteer joined the German Army and for 2 years fought the Russians. So his son was nothing better.

If summerised both the Albanians and the Georgians has settled the lands that historically (like 40% of modern Poland ) had never belonged to them and tried to steal those lands away. The only difference is that the Georgians has already failed while the K-Albanians are only expected to drinks this bitter cup.

Cheers !

Peter RV

pre 15 godina

Attention our spineless Europe-starved politicians! Putin is giving you exemple of how to talk to the Western double-standard hypocrites (Can anybody imagine Tadic defending Serbia like this?)

Michael Blairsdale

pre 15 godina

“The journalist then remarked that "in Abkhazia, it was the Georgians who had been ethnically cleansed, while in Kosovo, the situation was quite the opposite since it was the Albanians that were exposed to this practice".”

This selective history picking has always been a problem in understanding the Balkans. Also the editors of media outlets who have pressure bestowed upon them to follow a certain line.

Since 2000 virtually Serbs alone have been cleansed, shall we start from this point or from the bombing or before?

One thing you should always ask yourself, if the truth is so compelling, why have there been so many lies. NATO’s campaign, they were caught with so many lies, surely the truth alone would have been enough if the situation was as bad as they say.

Yet many people who research the facts about Kosovo etc in the UK, many post on newspaper blogs such as the telegraph and even that horrible liberal paper, the guardian, have an entirely different perspective and we are not open to mass propaganda by the Serbian side.

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

Princip, thanks for that video. It really puts things into perspective.

After this was shown on Czech TV, it's no surprise the Czech people support the Serbians even though the government succumbed to US pressure.

You only have to see what the Albanians are doing at the Macedonian elections to understand that nothing has changed.

May god help those people see the light one day. They cannot even rule themselves so how on earth do they expect to rule others?

Jovan

pre 15 godina

"It is not just the Russians who know the real story the Czechs have produced a film about the real events there too;

Uloupene Kosovo (Robbed Kosovo)
[link]&
(Princip, UK, 1 June 2008 13:07)"

very good link, Princip.

especially because even without knowledge of the czech-language, this film shows the albanian terror upon non-albanians in simple pictures of unbelievable atrocities...

what was extraordinary sad: the picture of an albanian criminal killing a serbian priest.

my dear albanian friends, denying won´t help you... since THIS says it all about your hate-driven society...

it becomes clearer and clearer that you have to be liberated again, since most Albanians are opposing to animal-like crimes like that... but the criminal clan-structures won´t go away themselves, I guess.

probably many Albanians will be quite happy, when they will be liberated from those animals among them.

peter, sydney

pre 15 godina

I have just been trying to imagine the scenario if it were George Bush being interviewed instead of Vladimir Putin in the same situation - ie: no minders to control the content of the questions being put to him & I can't help but think of a fish out of water flopping around & gasping for 'air'.

Good job Mr Putin. While your government still has a long way to go, at least it is changing. The same cannot be said of the US however - it still has the same mindset it had during the cold war.

The price of 'victory' I guess.

dogs that bargs are not dangerus

pre 15 godina

Then after "teaching" these westerns brats about democracy, than please beg them to by your gas, because without them you whon´t have bread on the table.

Michael Blairsdale

pre 15 godina

Naive Cees

What was it like to be a Serb in Croatia? Or even in Kosovo when Serbs were being treated as foreigners and ethnically targeted in the 80’s?

Where is the justice for them?

The inconsistent outcomes and neglect of one side will always cause future conflicts to immerge. Both sides can be guilty of this.

So since when has it become improper to debate with a journalist? When you choose it not to be? Also what about all the Albanians murdered by the KLA? Not every Albanian played the same tune to Thaci, some had to die for the cause. Or do you care more for an Albanian killed by a Serb than one killed by the KLA?

Daki

pre 15 godina

It's a funny thing calling Putin a dictator. I don't recall Putin starting a war in the Middle East over false pretenses.

I don't recall seeing third world immigrants rioting through the streets of Moscow like I did in Paris. Now I ask, who are the real dictators?

cees

pre 15 godina

What did Mr Putin tell the western journalist? "The things are not all opposite", that means a bit is. For him maybe a small part, but for the western world it is a great deal: At the end of the 20th. century in a so-called civilized Europe the Milosevic regime tried to ethnically cleanse a part of his country, that from 1974 - 1991 had an autonomous status, which he one-sided wiped out, like dictators are doing. The only thing Putin can't do in this case: he can't silence the critical press like he used to do in Russia. In no country in the world are more journalists murdered in the last eight years, except Iraq, as in Russia.
By the way, it is not a safe life being a critic in Serbia too. It even can threaten your own president Tadic, or people like Natasa Kandic, Sonja Biserko, Biljana Kovacevic-Vuco. I never forget the assassination attempt on Dejan Anastasijevic on April 16 2007.
I travelled all over the world and spend a lot of my time on the Balkans, but I felt only once a real threat, that I'll never forget: I was in North-Mitrovoca. I was called a spy and a monkey and they spit on me. This atmosphere of hostility made me feel, how other Balkan nations must have feared the Serbian actions and reactions during the 20th. century.
Cees

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

Martin, I understood the documentary because the people were talking in Serbian although the commentator was speaking in Czech.

Let me just say that I have yet to see any Western media report anything positive about Serbia and Serbians - even till this day, however, they paint the Albanians as angels in Kosovo.

Well, it's good to know that the mojority of Czechs still support the Serbian cause even if that documentary was not aired.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

Martin,

yes your right it has been blocked from being aired as I mention in the comment just before yours. - We can only speculate why. But, it is clear that "it wouldn't do to mention such facts" hence why Biased Broadcasting Corp (BBC) are now trying to aid in the "story telling" and adding their "spin" - since it would't do to tell the truth as it really is!!! In time the truth will out and all the spin and deceit will entangle those who weave...

"I'm surprised that you understood it cause film is in czech language only"

Martin, as I am sure your aware slavic languages are very similar and if you have not vistied Serbia yet you should as you will be made very welcome and would be able to comprehend and converse more then you might have thought.

Martin - you wouldn't be from Martin (Svk) by any chance - must get that all the time sorry! Much prefer BB myself! Djakujem na pomoc, Dovi.

Joe

pre 15 godina

Gary,

Your Russian idol has a serious image problem in Western democratic countries. In the last few years he became a synonym of the old Russian arrogance and menace. As a result in people's mind an invisible wall got created between the democratic West and an autocratic, neo-imperialistic Russia. Sure there is increasing trade between the two sides but no friendship. This will hardly change in the next 15-20 years and the opinions of your Russian friends will be disregarded.

frans

pre 15 godina

Cees (19). Well, most probably you are Dutch, behaved as a Dutchman (meaning very much in favor of Albanians, making pictures all over) as they are the most stupid of all people visiting the balkans. As I am one myself and do business in all the balkan now for ten years I dare to say that the best place to be is Serbia and more precisley in Belgrade. Please Cees, visit really all places, be objective and DON'T look at Kosovo. Where the Dutch were one of the leading countries to support Albanians in expelling Serbs!! better go home and feels ashamed what your country did instead of blaming Serbs now!

Nello

pre 15 godina

Mr. Putin has been a political anomoly. Put in power by god to save the Slavonic peoples of the world from an unprecendented, well orchestrated, multi-pronged attack on their independence and Orthodox by those who seek to enslave her people and pimp her women and girls to western sex tourists who behave like uneducated thugs who eat fast junk food and are loaded with euro$$. In her long history Serbia has always chosen right over wrong. She has always chosen the hard road which can involve short to mid term economic suffering but which is enriched with longer term rewards. Serbia should trust Russia and seek to join the CIS which unlike the EU will respect her religion, economic independence, and unique cultural values. Thank you Mr. Putin & Mr. Medvedev for sending aid flights to Kosovo and thank you again for supporting Serbia in her historic fight for what is right as opposed to those who seek to divide & conquer her.

Tex Willer

pre 15 godina

Go on Putin, thanks god that democratic society knows your intentions and your deeds.
You cannot tell west nothing about Kosovo because you were involved on opposite site, the site that claim that didn't commit crimes against Albanians.

kosovari

pre 15 godina

No worry Mr. Putin, beside Russian and Serbian Films made about KOsovo, there is a mountains of evidence about Serbian horror in Kosovo! Te right is on our side.! Live and let live!

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

ZK UK,

the film was produced for Czech TV but the propaganda machine has halted its showing hence the producers have placed it online - imagine now why and to what extent the truth is being obfuscated in so called "free" Europe and "free" media!!!! Yet ironically and hypocrtically label Russia when the west is clearly just as equally propagandist.

Orwell himself had his preface to Animal Farm censored because it " 'it wouldn't do' to mention that particular fact." but eventually the truth comes out too! You should read it he evene mentions the shenaigans in second world war Yugoslavia!http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/83481.html

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

nik, South Ossetia and Abkhazia becoming independent is a consequence of the Kosovo precedent. It just shows that Kosovo is not unique and that attempting to make it independent opens a large can of worms.

As for Serbian opinions, I believe they are generally indifferent to the issue as it really is a matter for Russia and Georgia to sort out. If Georgian joins NATO then it loses those two regions.

Georgia needs to consider its national interests carefully and its support for Serbia on Kosovo is welcome as far as I'm concerned.

ben

pre 15 godina

"Thousands of Serbs can't return to Kosovo. Hundreds of thousands," he said.

The dictator PUTIN is also a liar: Kosova has 2M inhabitants of which 90% Albanian and the other 10% others: Serbs in majority, Turks, Bosnians, Croats etc.

If the math is not opinion than 10% out of 2M is 200 thousand/ of which about 140 thousand were Serbs.

Today in Northern Kosova are living about 50 thousand and other 50 thousand in the central Kosova.

So Mr dictator liar: it’s impossible your “Hundred of thousands” OK Mr Liar?

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

To Princip&ZK:

That film wasn't aired on czech TV yet. In fact czech TV althought participated in its production has rejected to show it because as they say it is very much one sided and would break objectivity of czech TV. After several months the director has released film on internet recently where it became hit. This is the subject of legal dispute now in CR because of law violation. It's possible that film will be shown on czech TV in the future but it might be togather with other document showing albanians, probably from BBC production.. I'm surprised that you understood it cause film is in czech language only. I found it hovewer very educational..

proud2bkosovar

pre 15 godina

Dear all;
Putin has every right to express himself just as Sarkozy, Brown or Bush do. The only difference Kosovo is independent now and it doesn't matter what is said. What matters the most is where we are. No one is stoping Kosovar Serbs to return (at least the ones without blood in their hands), no one is killing them, no one is isolating them.
Let Kosovo struggle with their problems needed to be solved. Let it be based on the treatment toward minorities Kosova should be treated in return; and the day that Serbs or any minority is treated even to a fraction the Kosovars themselves were treated under the Serbian rule than I'll be the first one to protest and request statehood to be taken back.
Again, this is were we are. Let that be a lesson to all that by looking back you may not steer to the future.
Concerning the Georgian problem: If Georgia treated the residents of Ossetia and Abkhazia as the Serbs did Kosovars than who is as naive as not to support their demands for independence.
ZK- you are an ardent supporter for Serbian clause and I admire you. But, closing your mind to other argument makes one brainwashed.
B-92 thanks for the opportunity to comment.

Dorcol

pre 15 godina

Putin pulled out the Russian troops citing financial reasons. Fair enough Oil was trading at US$25 per barrel then (2003) and is now at US$125. Russia is reaping the benefits of its natural resources right now. The US is also reeaping the benefits of Iraqi oil but has to pay for an expensive mission in Iraq to keep that money flow. If oil stays over $100 the US will attack Iran on some flimsy pretext. Then it gets juicy with Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan holding huge reserves and thats where the Russia/US line will be drawn. Not Kosovo .. although if the Russians could control the pipeline from the caucusus to Europe through Bulgaria/Serbia they will have a gold mine of earnings for the next century.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka, 2 June 2008 12:39)

Hi Piotr !

Because you said no good bye I never dared to make any remarks for your posts here. Sure deep in your heart you feel sympathy for the Serbs and joining the people like Joe , Ben , Ahmed , Albanicum and Pejoni abuses you. But because you are a Pole you have to do the things that doesn't meet your own stance. You have to do something to stop "those Russians" and this is the only thing that makes you come here.

I follow your posts and what I can see is that you agree with the Serbs in most of the things. Bur in the end you say :"Yes it's unjust yes I agree that ... but you have to do ...and best if you ... " Then comes your piece of adwice that doesn't meet interests of Serbia. The Serbs are smart enough to see that you are a Pole who doesn't care of them and it is Russia you are always fighting here with.

You also amuse me with the false stories of the lost Polish lands. Stop cheating people with the 16-th century stories ! And next time you write " As a Pole, sure, I should be demanding all the lands we lost at the end of WW2 to Belarus and Ukraine, where there are still a total of about half a million Poles living" please don't forget to mention that those were RUSSIAN TERRITORIES occupied in 1920 where 90% of people hated you and prayed to get rid of Polish Gestapo they lived in !

================
"Regarding the history of the peoples of the Caucasus, I need to read more, I agree, as I am not completely familiar, but I am interested in the history."

Piotr if you are so ignorant in the matters of Caucasus why don't you stop discussing the matters concerned ? Best if you ask but not insist on something you have no idea.
===================
The last thing I'd like to tell you is that nothing can stop Russia on the Earth and best if you get it sooner. Then we can be partners. I also predict that the starting strategic partnership talks with EU will last 3-4 years needed for the Europeans to accept the changed status quo. It will be hard to do but Russia will leave you no other way.

Be happy !

Martin, Bratislava, SVK

pre 15 godina

ZK, Princip:

Right, i see, people in the film of course talk in serbian. I was just referring to UK (United Kingdom) abbreviation, from which it wasn't that sure you could have comprehend it. But as I see now the documentary is well understood even without translation or subtitles. The commentator however says lots of interesting stuff and I hope that the film will be shown on czech TV in regular time yet. It cannot be excluded because czech TV is running some negotiations about making combined night including this documentary and some other probably from UK production (as I mentioned before) which would paint it in favor for albanians. Than they wanted to make some common discussion about two documentaries (That's information from czech newspapers). I don't know however, these plans might have been halted because of realasing film on internet without permission, czech TV was very irritated for that for breaking co-producer's warrants..

Thank you for invitation, that's very nice of you. I must say that even I and surely most of Slovaks would very much prefer to welcome Serbians here in Slovakia over some Albanians from so called Kosovo. For that I'm really glad that Slovakia will not recognize Kosovo visa, we really don't need to grow numbers of thiefs, criminals and probably murderers here, we have enough our problems to solve.

I see whole Kosovo problem however as a small piece of much bigger problem. Not even one really dangerous precedent based on "ethnical" basis, which it's indeed. The problem of present days here is about interaction of modern european culture and Islam culture, which is extraordinary aggressive and expansionist even to these days. Albanians which came to Kosovo only prove how strange and different their thinking is to the rest of the Europe. It's practically immpossible to change them all. That lots of western countries fail to recognize and on behalf of their good will let the immigrants in. These immigrants then create inner enemy in their countries who will certainly grow in time. God help us if Turkey is allowed to access EU.

ben

pre 15 godina

"Don't tell me stories, I know what is really going on there." PUTIN

A real intellectual!

When a bull remains without arguments starts to insult- don't tale me stories.

A man whose country put several free-loving nations in the iron cage is now preaching law.

Martin, Bratislava, SVK

pre 15 godina

ben:

I'm not sure I understand why you pointed out exactly this. I won't tell you any tales about Slovakia as I obviously don't have ready ones. I guess thought you are from Kosovo. Items you picked up refer to the people which lived over 2 thousands years ago and I seriously doubt these ones were exactly your predecessors.

I was rather referring to actual situation and, if you are so eager about it, I was pointing my finger to islam itself (religion) rather than any particular nation. What I meant to say is that as Albania has been exposed to hard islamisation in the past, this religion prevails in some parts of Albania and also prevails in present Kosovo. There are obviously many questions for which even its current inhabitants don't seem to be able provide appropriate answers. Most of them consider them to be Albanians. But Albanians already have one state - Albania. And now they have two. What will be the next move? It's really not that hard to predict you see..

kufr

pre 15 godina

ben: Don't forget that albanians also built the Egypt pyramids, lived in Atlantis and when it sunk conquered albanian stronghold Jerusalem led by the pure albanian warlord Alexander the Great :)

nik

pre 15 godina

I can not understand the reaction of the serb nationalists.
They oppose Kosovos indpendence - tha is understandable.
They are happy that Russia oposes (in words) Kosovos DUI - logical.
But it is obvious that they support the eventual Dui of Abhazija and South Osetia. Russia supports them and most probably that will be the price paid to the Russians for looking the other way as Kosovo is being recognized by more and more countries. It is a deal that suits the West, because they want Georgia to join Nato, but unburdened by undesolved problems. Like Kosovo (until the preshevo valley is under Serbian control), South Osetia and Abhazia have no strategic value of their oun. Without them Georgia could still provide the western access to Azerbeijan and The Kaspian Sea. Russia knows that and that is why it is protracting the deal.
Waht I am puzzled with is the total alck of sympaty of Serbian nationalist to Georgia, even though Georgia did not recognize Kosovos dui!
They are both Orthodox nations, whose people want to join the West, but are not to pay the perritorial price.

PJD

pre 15 godina

Ben, the 1991 census showed there was 360,000 non-Albanians in Kosovo. Assuming your figures are correct then there are now only 200,000 non-Albanians in Kosovo so 160,000 Serbian citizens have gone.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

Martin,

please excuse Ben he just wanted to prove your point for you with regrdas;

"Albanians which came to Kosovo only prove how strange and different their thinking is to the rest of the Europe. It's practically immpossible to change them all. "

- of course Ben is talking of the Ilyrian culture that the Albanians seem to have adopted wholeheartedly just as whole heartedly as them being US "best-friends" . I guess in this regard pretty much like the "best-friends" the Afghan mhuajedin - and we all know how that friednship ended up. Of course don't be surprised to find Ben is is not impressed with this last comment either!!!

I sure would hope that there can be much more tourism and trade between Serbia and Slovakia with many simlarities between the countries on many aspects be it food, folklore, culture and outlook and of course both make very fine Slivovica and beers - Slovakia's Zlaty Bazant or Urpin (12 or 10 which ever is at hand) are favourite tipples!!!

dulo

pre 15 godina

Well Done Mr Putin..

Just you go on and show them, you could kill a few more journalists, French once you are at it, as there are no more left in Russia.. Now you have really assorted yourself in world public, one could've easy imagine if you are a real Superpower what would you do then. Can help but Stalin and Hitler comes to mind, as 5 yrs ago you were a baby chiken.

Go keep fooling yourself as much as you want, as we know what your Russia is all about.
Oops sadly the west doesn't seem to be bothered much, as we have seen this before. You will kneel down when comes to Kosova sooner than you think.
Perhaps another show of your ancient arms after the summer?? Yeah that will show them.

Sort out your poverty stricken people first then sort the world out.

Hayabusa

pre 15 godina

Jovan

"a journalist... is being told what HE should be reporting, if he´d take his profession serious..."

Putin is of course used to Russian reporters who report what Putin wants them to report, but the civilized world does not work that way.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

ben

"You are pointing finger to probably the oldest civilizations of Europe as being a non-European culture- forgetting that your Slovakian contribution in the western civilization is NIL."

Slovakians show nothing but the purest traits European culturally (dress, cuisine, music, architecture etc.), racially (generally blond hair and blue/green eyes) and religiously (Roman Catholic). Can you say the same for Albanians? Albanian music sounds Turkish, their religion is Islam and they look racially closer to the Near East than to most Europeans.

Indeed, Slovakia as such is not a major contributor to the world, but don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization, not any less than Germanic and Romance peoples in Western Europe.

"Your culture compared to ours is Third World. "

Your economy compared to theirs is Third World.

SP

pre 15 godina

I can only laugh at Putin and how simple he is.

It's so clear that he doesn't care an ounce about Serbs or Serbia. He only uses them to advance his own agenda.

Right now, he's using Serbs to soften the blow that's coming against Russia. Why? Because Putin is getting ready to attack Georgia. He already sent in 300 troops there to "fix" the railroads the other day. Right, of course, to "fix" the railroads. While fixing the railroads, the Russian troops might as well send in the trains with weaponry into Georgia.

Putin please. We've seen all of your tactics before. What more do you expect from a KGB agent turned dictator?

And by the way, that journalist plowed right through Putin and put him in his place. Putin's response was: "I know what's going on there." Oh really? Were you in Kosovo yourself? Maybe you were the driver of those trucks with partially expired medicine that you "donated" to Serbs in Kosovo. Or did you send in your friends at the KGB to check things out?

Like I said, I only laugh at such comments because it's so clear that Serbs aren't even in Putin's rear mirror.

Aleks

pre 15 godina

Some interesting comments.

Re: Cees and Frans, Cees is actually exposing his predjudice by not reading what Frans actually said, i.e. it is the Dutch visitors to the Balkans who are the most stupid. Cees either misread frans comments or didn't bother to read them probably having already decided what frans opinions were.

So, absolutely nothing to do with the Albanians!

PJD

pre 15 godina

johny: "I am talking about the myth that Albanians came to Kosova during Tito's time from Albania.
During Tito's time the population in Albania grew and did not decrease. I would believe that if hundreds of thousands of Albanians left Albania and made it to Kosova, that the population of Albania would have considerably decreased especially considering the fact that when Tito came to power Albania had a population of around 1 million."

If your "logic" holds then Mexico's population would have declined over the past 50 years due to emigration to the US when in fact the opposite is true and Mexico's population has continued to grow at a fast rate.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

Dragan

I never denied that the Albanian side ethnically cleansed much of the Kosovo Serbian population in 1999, though in the same light, one would be a fool to claim that they did this for no reason apart from hatred of Serbs and NATO support.

Obviously something must have happened in the years 1996-1999 to the Kosovo Albanians that led to NATO intervention and the post-war ethnic cleansing of the Serbian population.

While I am disgusted by how the Albanians have treated the Serbian population and religious monuments the after 1999 war, but I would be a fool to claim that this came about with reason.

ORTHODOX.RU

I never said anything Russophobic here, nor do I lose reason when the thought of Russia comes to mind, I don't know why you said that.

"If summerised both the Albanians and the Georgians has settled the lands that historically (like 40% of modern Poland ) had never belonged to them and tried to steal those lands away."

We settled in those lands because somebody took away our other lands on the other side of the country and gave us these lands in return.

Though to say that these lands that we got were never ours is also incorrect, as you should know that Polabian, Kashubian and Silesian tribes have been living there and even further East since before Germanic tribes (Ostrogoths) even expanded into them from what is now Southern Denmark/Northern Germany and were assimilated either by Germans or Poles in our wars which led to all the border shifts. I am sure you know this, but you would not like to admit it here to me.

Regarding the history of the peoples of the Caucasus, I need to read more, I agree, as I am not completely familiar, but I am interested in the history.

cees

pre 15 godina

frans, you are right, Belgrade is a hell of a city, but just like other capitals, it doesn't present the true caracter of a nation: like Amsterdam for the Dutch, Budapest for the Hungarians, Prague for the Czechs or Moscow for the Russians. Go to the country-side to learn what the real people do, think and act. But that is the difference between Bussinessmen, living in big hotels, having parties, getting told the Serbian 'TRUTH', and a poor academic that has to deal with 'real' people. That is not a party at all, but listening to a lot of sad stories from all sides on the Balkans. And calling Albanians stupid shows already your prejudice.
Cees

veki

pre 15 godina

Dear Cees,
you misunderstood what Frans said-
he didn't call Albanians stupid. He called the opinion of the Dutch folks most stupid of all.
I can't but absolutely agree with him.

ben

pre 15 godina

(Martin, Bratislava, SVK, 2 June 2008 14:21)

Martin I haven't heard more nonsense things for a while.

You are pointing finger to probably the oldest civilizations of Europe as being a non-European culture- forgetting that your Slovakian contribution in the western civilization is NIL.

Your culture compared to ours is Third World.

FYI

1. Constantine the Great was KOSOVAR ruling in central Albania where he become Christian later become the Emperor of Rome and proclamed Christianity the official religion of Roman Empire.

2. Pope Clemente XI (Pope Albani) was Albanian

3. Mother Theresa (Anjez Bojaxhiu) is Albanian

I can continuo more if you wish.

Now tale us about your Slovakian contribution to the WESTERN civilization please.

But as far as you are happy with your stereotypes...

kufr

pre 15 godina

The video that was mentioned is now available with english subtitles at youtube: http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=Faktastick

Joe

pre 15 godina

One thing is sure. Putin got a lesson of free journalism so different from sub-serviant Russian one, which did not change from soviet times due to Putin. This French journalist was pretty well informed about the ethnic cleansing in Georgia. On the German Spiegel I learned today the same story. The so-called PM of Abkhazia was interviewed by a German journalist. This "PM" admitted that they allowed the return of 55,000 refugies in the border region of Galatian but they can not allow 150,000 refugies to return to the other regions because in that case there would be a majority for Georgia.
Anyway it appears that only Serbs and Belorussians support Putin in Europe. This is a pretty poor track record. It shows that you can not fool democratic countries and their free media. It also shows the continuous divide - an invisible wall - between democratic Europe and the autocratic one composed of Russia, Belarus and pseudo-democratic Serbia.

Kroni

pre 15 godina

Telling the truth; this is something you the serbs have all praised about Putin, the man who's country's democracies has dropped by 35% since he took over! the man that will not go away as he only changes post to remain in power for the rest of his life... the man who claims success by selling Russia natural wealth and giving it to the fortunate 10% who now account for the richest 10% in the world...

this is all politics but please be assured that Russia is no friend of serbia its political games a spreading around the world... and i can assure you they are games that they cannot win...

Brian

pre 15 godina

There are more Albanians in Kosovo today than there were before Milosevic came to power. Albanians make-up 95% of the population in Kosovo, anybody who believes that they were victims of genocide and ethnic cleansing is a hopeless moron. If Albanians were victims of genocide there would be less of them, not more of them. After the Holocaust there were fewer Jews, than before. The number of Jews in Europe still has not recovered to pre-war levels. So what kind of genocide is this in Kosovo where we wind-up with more Albanians than we started with before the genocide in 1999? Something isn't right with the story NATO and the Albanians are telling us, and you don't have to be a rocket scientist to see.

ben

pre 15 godina

"You said separatist? Why didn't you use this word about Kosovo?" - teh dicrtator.

Now the question is: why Putin is against labeling those two regions separatist??

Officially Russia does not support Abkhazia and Ossetia but at the same time he is nervous calling them separatists. (double standards??)

This is how much Russia respects the international law. An above all, how much you can trust their word.

Partytime

pre 15 godina

By the way,Fion means a specialpart of human anatomywhich is used as a way out for food... The exact spelling is Fillon for French P.M.

If Putin was so aware about what was happening in Kosovo, why was he that much against Nato intervention? This was said to be against Serb breach of I.L. and not the contrary.

Peace out there, even to Serbs...

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

Putin is right when we mentions the refugee situation, but he technically did not elaborate on the point that the Abkhazians declared independence and ethnically cleansed the Georgians, while in Kosovo the Albanians declared independence and the Serbs ethnically cleansed them. On the other hand, if he admitted it, he would be admitting America's "sui generis" stance publicly.

Politicians on both sides are so full of it. Both Bush and Putin are the worst kind. Contradictory capitalists.

Gunnar

pre 15 godina

More facts about the real situation on Kosovo, this time not from the Czech Republic but from Germany! (shown on the german 1st national TV some years ago)

http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=9022337190221762301

Definitely a must-see for german-speaking population!

Ari

pre 15 godina

If Putin is so concerned for the K-Serbs how come he withdrew the Russian peacekeepers from Kosova? I guess he didn't care much after all and that's just a useful, albeit nonexistent, argument.

johny

pre 15 godina

"What was it like to be a Serb in Croatia? Or even in Kosovo when Serbs were being treated as foreigners and ethnically targeted in the 80’s?"

It is kinda hard to imagine how you can be ethnically cleansed and yet hold all the official and public positions, also hold and have all the state jobs. That is exactly what the Serbs had in the '80's, all the public and official jobs and all the state jobs. Kinda hard to imagine how we cleansed the Serbs since all the policemen were Serbs, all the military men were Serbs, all the officials were Serbs. Its like the whites claiming in south Africa during Apartheid that they were being cleansed at a time where all the government and all the military force was held by the whites.

Also I think the Serbs, at least those who don't wanna believe in tales, myths, and old women stories should do a little more research. I am talking about the myth that Albanians came to Kosova during Tito's time from Albania.
During Tito's time the population in Albania grew and did not decrease. I would believe that if hundreds of thousands of Albanians left Albania and made it to Kosova, that the population of Albania would have considerably decreased especially considering the fact that when Tito came to power Albania had a population of around 1 million.
At least when some of you try to lie or be the mouth of propaganda for your country be smarter, and more creative. What you guys have come so far with, is so easily verifiable. I can take any of you guys who are interested and go to the state archives in Tirana and see the population for all the years Tito was in power. Our famous dictator made sure he knew how many people he had in his control because according to him we were gonna fight the bourgeoisie and the capitalists. He kept great records. If you want you can also find how many sheep and cows we had during Tito's years. Its not a problem at all to verify your lies.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka

OK Piotr ! Let's remain neutral to each other. Each of us expresses common views for the countries we represent. The only thing I ask you to do is to be more careful with the facts. Most of the folks here are not experts in the things that happened East to Visla River so they cannot judje what you say. Please be delicate.

I know that nothing can improve our reputation in Europe. Whatever we do we'll remain a consolidating factor for the West. I guess the confrontation may last 3-4 years needed for the Europeans to realize that strong Russia is something they have to live with and Poland will be the last one to accept this reality.

Kreshnik Bejko

pre 15 godina

With Kosovo's independence, Stalin's veto just burned in Putin's hand. The post-WWII will soon be re-engineered, and his anger is visible in this interview.

Someone said "In Putin we trust". Putin will spell your long term doom.

Let go of Kosovo and you will prosper.

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

johny: #78

I'm acquainted with certain antipathy that Albanians show (at least at surface) when it comes to questions of religion. I'm also well aware that it might be consequence of previous centuries of oppression. I see too how much they prefer to identify themselves as Albanians and Albanians above all, exactly like you said. Still, if I look at last (official) statistics, even from several decades ago, I see majority of population considered themselves muslims. It's very difficult for me to deny influence of this on Albanian behavior, especially when I see how able they are to push their cause through all that stays in their way. Like in the Kosovo problem.

About what you said in second part I must categorically disagree. We can talk about nations, we can talk about ethnical groups, we can talk about right of self-determination of nations. But we can't talk about one nation owing two state formations created in this circumstances. See. What is nation? Nation is considered a group of people possessing certain common traits. These are usually: common language, common culture, common history.. Germany and Austria may use common language but they have different history and even their cultures differ as they were parts (and even creators) of their own empires in the past. Australia is country of immigrants and located far from England lived its own life for centuries. Same for Belgium and Netherland, these countries have their own histories. Countries speaking "slavic languages" possess differences in their cultures too.. Slavic languages subdivide to several branches and mutual understanding is by far not that automatic as you might thing of it.

I don't see, however, any of these differences between Albanians from Kosovo (calling themselves "Kosovars") and Albanians living in Albania. Origin of inhabitants of Kosovo is mostly questioned. What I see in fact is artificially created state and certain effort to find (or create) some differences, even uniqueness, which doubtly stay on firm ground..

And, well even these waren't among cases you mentioned, there can be found some cases that suit to Kosovo problem: in fact there's resemblance to former Federal Republic of Germany and German Democratic Republic or to South Korea and North Korea today. So to speak in terms of mutual affiliation of their inhabitants, these cases are very familiar. Except that these two countries were divided and Kosovo was ripped off from Serbia. We all know stories of these countries, as we all know there was nothing natural about it. And there's nothing natural about Kosovo too.

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

Johny, ok let's finish it. I understand you are from Albania yet you live in US. You speak well in defense of Albanians, but I have problems considering you the representative sample of Albanian population, especially the one settled in Kosovo. I avoided say it straight, but when I was talking about unclear origin of Albanians in Kosovo, I was of course referring to very smart changes in Kosovo population over the last decades, when representation of serbian population declined very dramatically to nearly 5% of these days. What happened to that peoples? Isn't that about what Stefan wrote in #86 about clan society and violent tendencies of Albanians? I wasn't perhaps enough clear about what I meant by oppression of Albanians and their islamisation. But isn't that so that once repressed people have tendencies to become oppressors themselves? Isn't that what Albanian absolute and deliberate behavior came from? It seems mostly absurd to me if I see talking about Albania as nearly cradle of entire civilization (viz comments above) and its inhabitants descendants of "Constantine the Great", "Mother Theresa" and so on. Even if Albanians might have had these traits, they are obviously long gone.

This is not about persuading me or about some "Serbian propaganda". Affairs in central Europe are not subject to Balkan events or to Serbian agenda. But it doesn't mean we are blind. You know, here in Slovakia, if we come into some people from Albania, we usually come into organized groups of drug or weapon smugglers. It is well known that organized criminal paths coming from Turkey and directed to entire Europe flow through Albania and Kosovo.

Now I would like very much to trust you about your words, about two independent and democratic countries, Albania and Kosovo. As I'd like to trust the words of representatives of Kosovo about guarantees of minorities rights, but one thing are words and one thing are actions. Representatives of Kosovo miss credibility, their past is connected with criminal actions and, as far as I noticed, they deny any explanations. Most of Kosovo's population is now albanian, and still, permanent international presence is necessary to protect even the rest of serbian population. What guarantees can we talk about.

PS:

"Again speaking of differences. If you have all the Slavic countries in the Balkans who have so many similarities among each other and so few differences, being separate and independent countries; and Kosova having so many differences with Serbia and so very few similarities, then according to your differences theory Kosova should be separate from Serbia. "

No it's not about my "differences theory". If you read what I wrote carefully, I was talking about mutual affiliation of inhabitants of Kosovo and Albania. I also stated that Serbia was ripped off from Kosovo and this happened somewhat by the fact (say we don't know how) that albanian population in Kosovo strongly outnumbered the serbian one. I never said it should happened as it happened at the expense of Serbia and in favor of Albanians, like Kosovo would represent some additional value to Albania itself or to Albanians. If there are some differences about which nik wrote in #87 between Albanians from Kosovo and from Albania, than maybe there are, but still they are all Albanians, waving albanian flags, tourning to Albania for help. In Kosovo, there was established one of the biggest US military bases abroad. There are no such bases in Europe, nor soviet bases. We won't allow such bases on our territories, but Kosovo government did. As I said, Kosovo government miss credibility and that's not something they can buy.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

ORTHODOX.RU

"Because you said no good bye I never dared to make any remarks for your posts here."

I did say so Sergey, the reason they did not continue is simply because we reached the stage that our kind always do when trying to get our points across, and we both know what we know and we will not budge. Best to leave it and discuss things cordially.

"But because you are a Pole you have to do the things that doesn't meet your own stance. You have to do something to stop "those Russians" and this is the only thing that makes you come here."

I don't know how else to say this Sergey, really, I have nothing against the Russian people whatsoever (one of my best and closest friends is Russian), I have more against people who think they need to choose between the "Russian side" or the "Western Side" and insult the other.

"The Serbs are smart enough to see that you are a Pole who doesn't care of them and it is Russia you are always fighting here with. "

I do sympathize with the Serbian side regarding Kosovo, but I am not completely on their side, because I do not believe they are completely innocent. I try be neutral, and it's nothing to do with Russia or any other country.

"You also amuse me with the false stories of the lost Polish lands. "

Sorry Sergey, I am not listening. Regarding this I have said my piece, you have said yours, let us respect our opinions as our own and not push it further please with such offense remarks.

"Piotr if you are so ignorant in the matters of Caucasus why don't you stop discussing the matters concerned ? Best if you ask but not insist on something you have no idea. "

To say I have absolutely no idea is also incorrect, I know enough to express an opinion here, but I am not as educated on this matter as you are, I admit, it is quite new to me.

"The last thing I'd like to tell you is that nothing can stop Russia on the Earth and best if you get it sooner. Then we can be partners"

If this were to happen cordially and peacefully, it would be the greatest thing for both of our "sides". I have been saying this all along, and I hope to see it come into being one day.

Have a good evening.

Stevan

pre 15 godina

“…I'm also well aware that it might be consequence of previous centuries of oppression…”

Martin, there are incredible mountains of propaganda produced about the Balkan through the 90’s. Balkan was and still is remote, unknown place for average westerner. Western public does not have any clue about this part of Europe, its history, cultures, relations …
That’s why professional propagandists had such an easy job. Public believes everything they’ we been told. West deliberately distorted reality to a very large extent, demonizing Serbs and victimizing all others. One of the biggest fairy tales is story about peaceful, freedom loving Albanians, that were victims of the Serb genocide through the centuries. In reality it was exactly the opposite. They were not oppressed, they were oppressors. As majority converted to Islam they got all the privileges and power against the Serbs. (Serbs stayed Christians, so they had no rights during long centuries of Turkish terror). Turks were very aware of importance of Kosovo for Serbs, so they by all means tried to destroy them in Kosovo and settle Albanians instead. Turks usually used Albanian troops to terrorize Serb population after numerous (unsuccessful) uprisings. So, over the centuries number of Serbs declined and number of Albanians grow. (So much for the genocide stories).

Albanian culture is incredibly violent. It is a clan society. Every young boy is trained in using guns, and every man is armed. Guns are routinely used for “settling” of the disputes. Clans are often practically in the war with each other. That can last for generations. Blood feuds are widely spread, and are practiced according to Kanun, that Ben is so proud off. Here are few links about the subject, see for yourself how that works and make your own conclusions. After seeing how cruel they often are to each other, ask yourself what can minorities expect.

http://meero.worldvision.org/news_article.php?newsID=527

http://www.shqiperia-etnike.com/she82/she82eng.htm

http://www.shqiperia-etnike.com/fillo.htm

http://judgments.fedcourt.gov.au/2004/J040860.yes.doc.htm

http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1aGqtBPLOs

nik

pre 15 godina

ZK UK wrote: South Ossetia and Abkhazia becoming independent is a consequence of the Kosovo precedent. It just shows that Kosovo is not unique"...

South Osetia, Abhazia, the "Pridnestrovie" and Chechnia declared independence and gained control; over their territories, often brutally cleansing all indesirables, long befor Kosovo.
Chenchnia was reincorporated within Russia after two wars, and what made it possible was the hugeness of Russia and the tininess of Chechnia.
Neither Georgia nor Moldova, nor Serbia have the resourses and the sheer mass to reincorporate their breakaway regions!
The dilema in fron of their government is: !. to use their formal sovereign right as a negotiating chi and strike a baragin: recognition of independence against..... ( Serbia had from 1996 to 1999 to negotiate Kosovo for Srpska)
2. The second option is to succumb to the self deception that the respective regions could be reincorporated... and waste away all their resources in the proces.

Endri, Albania

pre 15 godina

Peter,

"Slovakians show nothing but the purest traits European culturally (dress, cuisine, music, architecture etc.), racially (generally blond hair and blue/green eyes) and religiously (Roman Catholic). Can you say the same for Albanians? Albanian music sounds Turkish, their religion is Islam and they look racially closer to the Near East than to most Europeans."

If you compare our music with it of the other countries in Balkan you will find (to the other countries) surely much more sign of Turkish music. What I can distinguish to that music are only some oriental elements which where brought to our music in the last years (mainly imported) but they disappeared very soon. This was some kind of balkanization of the music. You can often listen the same song played in 3 or more different languages for example Serbian, Bulgarian, Greek even Albanian.

Religion Islam means nothing to me (the same for Christianity), and it has never been a hurdle to me and the majority of Albanians. It doesn't mean that we don't believe in God but the church or the mosque is not necessary the house of GOD. For more info about that please refer to 73#.

I don't know how did you come out to this kind of conclusion. If you refer to the propagandistic materials then the next time you better select the proper ones. We have racially absolutely nothing in common with near east or whatever. The only dark or slightly dark-skinned are the people of Roma ethnicity which are sometimes considered racially related to Egyptians.

"Indeed, Slovakia as such is not a major contributor to the world, but don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization…"

This is very much generalised. I am not very familiar with Slovak history but it would be kind of you to provide us some more detailed info about Slovaks who are portraying their self as a height level race and society. The only thing I remember about Slovakia, Bratislava is the movie "Eurotrip" which is of course exaggerated.

ben

pre 15 godina

Peter: it's quite obvious that you don't know a thing about Albanian culture.

The music you here in Kosova is influenced by teh Serbian Turbo-Folk style- that's why the independence is prerogative - to preserve teh Albanian culture.

The Albanian culture is teh POLYOHONIC songs in south the one that you can find ONLY in the Northern Mediterranean- Sardegna, Corsica and Iberian peninsula.

It is the lahuta in North teh one taht was described from teh Homers times,

It is teh KANUN (the oldes European civil and pean code- you can find similar in Italy but not extensive as the Kanun) with teh moral values of the Albanian culture- teh CONSITUTION the mafiest of independence of the Albanian culture, moral values and rules that you can see in Homer texts and other ancient authors,

It is in Besa the holly word- that today you can find only in the Albanian culture and it was part of the Balkanik cultures in the past- BESA was the linking factor/leverage of the coalition of teh Greek cities in the war with Troy.


All these EUROPEN values, europen culture, of ILLYRIAN you can find in the Albanian culture NOT in YOURS. This is FACT.

The ancient values and culture of the Balkans the ILLYRIAN culture has very much survived in the Albanian culture- and it’s not a case.

And you cannot see no trace in YOUR culture- this is FACT.

I can continua for more but I will leave something for later after that YOU show something of YOUR EUROPEAN values on which your today culture and nation was build upon.

Regarding the anthropological issue- Albanians are the WHITEST in the ENTIRE Northern Mediterranean- much more European anthropologically than Italians (at least the one of south), much more than Greeks (or maybe you will put into question their Europeism) or Spanish etc...

So you see that what you say makes little sense. Moreover if you visit Albanins of the Alps where the influence of various invaders was small or inexistent you will find them all BLONDS.

Again Peter & Co you show that you know nothing about the Albanian culture- the economical emigrant in UK the Princip is just hilarious.

It a fact my dear that our contribution in the WESTERN civilization is not marginal- I am not sure about yours.

The ancient theaters, icons, music, poems, art are al around my country, not sure that you have something of it in yours.

Cheers,

ben

pre 15 godina

don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization

(Peter Sudyka, 2 June 2008 20:09)

Please don't forget that your Slavic contribution to the WESTERN civilization was made possible only and ONLY after that the NATIVES teached you to right in CYRILIC the (NATIVE Balkans- Greeks) and in LATIN (The Native Latin’s). You are Christian because NATIVES- an Albanian made you Christian St. Albani.

Your civilization has the roots and was made possible by laying your roots in OURS- the NATIVES.

Said that, no one denies your contribution but don't you dear to put in question ours- it simply unfair to the history, to the truth and to yourselves (see above).

P.S. comment on the fact of what was incorrect in my post #64???

Mother Theresa is not Albanian? you have a similar Person iin your culture?

Constantine- you have similar in your culutre?

Pope Albani?

Saint Albani the one that made teh central Europe Christian- you have similar persons in you culture?

P.P.S. hearing teh RACIAL argument that you mentioned I need to say Peter: thank you for being NEUTRAL :)))

johny

pre 15 godina

"What I meant to say is that as Albania has been exposed to hard islamisation in the past, this religion prevails in some parts of Albania and also prevails in present Kosovo."

When I become rich I will sponsor your travel to both Albania and Kosova. I hope B92 still exists then so I can contact you. The reason why I am saying this is that it would be a great eye opener for you; you could go and see for yourself rather than believe what someone who has never been there tells you. I want to be explicit, as much as I can and I hope B92 editors publish this. We Albanians see religion as a divider force and pushed down our throats by those who have occupied our lands in the past (enemies). That does not mean we don't believe in God. To not follow a religion does not mean you don't believe in God. Most of us see no point in Churches or Mosques as from our point of view they are man made and they are there to make monetary profit and usurp power. Again that does not mean we don't believe in God. Of course there are those who do and those who do not believe. Our belief in God is very personal and most of us, as I said earlier, see no point in churches and mosques. When I say most of us, I mean roughly 90-95% of us. I know its hard for other cultures to even get the notion but that is us. We are Albanian first and everything else second. Most of us believe that. I know other cultures do not get this, and put religion first. We don't. We ( I mean most of us) believe that you could be a really good believer in God without needing to be a Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Jew etc. If you chose to be you can and that's fine with us. Its your own personal choice. As long as you do not use religion against our national harmony.
I believe that if you go to either Kosova or Albania you will be able to see this yourself, without needing to even trust or believe any of the words I said.

"There are obviously many questions for which even its current inhabitants don't seem to be able provide appropriate answers. Most of them consider them to be Albanians. But Albanians already have one state - Albania. And now they have two. What will be the next move? It's really not that hard to predict you see..
(Martin, Bratislava, SVK, 2 June 2008 19:29) "

Ok the argument that because there is Albania there can't be another state that has a majority of Albanian speakers holds no water. For example: We have Germany and Austria. England and Australia. Or we have all the Slavic speaking states in the Balkans and in Europe. We have Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia etc etc. all slav speakers. Also we have Switzerland (where just like Kosova different languages are spoken and different ethnicities live) and you have France and Germany and Italy. You have Belgium and France. Belgium and the Netherlands. So if there are so many countries in our region and in the world that speak the same language and are of the same ethnicity, then just like Germany and Austria there should be no problem having Albania and Kosova. Your argument does not hold. Vuk Draskovic tried it before you and he was shut down the next day.

johny

pre 15 godina

"If your "logic" holds then Mexico's population would have declined over the past 50 years due to emigration to the US when in fact the opposite is true and Mexico's population has continued to grow at a fast rate.
(PJD, 2 June 2008 14:45) "

So many things wrong with your logic.
First of all, you're comparing a population 1 million with one of 107 million. If Mexico's population increased only by 2 % hundreds of thousands of Mexican could come to the US and the population would still show growth. Now compare that to a population of 1 million (Albania's population when Tito came to power. There is now way that if we had hundreds of thousands of Albanians leaving for Kosova that in a population of 1 million you would see growth.
Second in these legends of yours I have seen no Serb so far give exact numbers as how many supposed immigrants made it to Kosova. The reason for that is simple. You don't have any numbers, all of what you have come up with is a fabrication. If you were to give numbers it would be very easy to verify them and your myth wouldn't be bough by eve you compatriots. This way at least you are able to convince simpletons and naives who want to believe in myths.
Third, thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of those Mexicans you mention are seasonal workers. They work here in the US for a couple of months and then they go back to Mexico for the rest of the year. So they are still part of the Mexican population even though they work here for a couple of months.
Fourth, not every hispanic that you see here or hispanic looking person that you see here is a Mexican. So having millions of hispanics here does not mean that all of them came from Mexico.
Fifth, in the case of this lie propagated by the Serbs it is very easy to verify,as we can compare the population for consecutive years

BR USA

pre 15 godina

To Putin, ZK UK, Princip, Jovan and the likeminded;
Kosova Republic is an independent state with its own constitution and all other stae atributes recognized by more than 40 states and more to come . Russia nor Serbia nor any other country in the world can do anything about it.

Putin can say whatever he'd like.

ZK and Princip in UK need to be reminded their host country was one of the first to recognize the Republic of Kosova. It is precisely because you live (I assume) in UK you have the right to express yourself, otherwise if in Russia, your dear Stalin oooops Putin would have had you executed just some reporters and opposition leaders who did not agree with his policies.

Long Live the Republic of Kosova and may God Almighty Bless the countries who recognize it.

ronaldo USA

pre 15 godina

Putin did you ask your poor Russian people to stay in power or not.
Only Dictators like you (Milisevic Mugabe) elect themselfs.
You have no right to talk in EC

Endri, Albania

pre 15 godina

I have to correct a refernce to my post as the order of comments has recently changed. For info about religion please take a look at comment 78# from johny.

johny

pre 15 godina

Martin those statistics you mention, the latest of them are from 1938, during King Zog's time. That said, if somebody was conducting a statistics tomorrow I would tell them that I am a Christian (catholic) depending on the day i might have described myself as someone who follows no church or religion but believes in God and Jesus Christ. Having said that I myself have never been in a catholic church and I don't intend to go there any time soon. Let me tell you about my orthodox and muslim part of my family. They like me have never been in a church or a mosque but if they were being asked for statistical purposes about their religion they might say they were orthodox or muslim, then depending on the day they might also say what I said. What I just described to you is not an isolated case. In fact it is the majority of us. If you dared me to put my hand on fire to confirm the veracity of my statement I would. You can chose to believe what you want. You can believe me or you can believe what you read from other people. The choice is yours. I had the money I would sponsor you and anyone who doubts what I am saying to go and visit Albania and Kosova itself so that you could see for yourself and make your mind up based on your own experiences and not on what you read on some online boards.

Second, read a little more about the times when Germany and Austria became states.You will discover that there is no difference between them, in terms of culture, and Kosova and Albania.
Speaking about differences.
All these countries you mentioned to me, the Slav countries, the Germanic countries etc, most of them developed their differences after they were separated from each other (eve though they might have differences at first). The split and being less in contact with each other emphasizes differences. Rest assured that in the case things remain as they are you will see many differences between Albanians in Kosova and Albania in the future, the same differences you are looking for. As a matter of fact up until 2003-2004 the Serbs themselves and the propaganda coming from the Serbian state was that Kosova Albanians are completely different form Albanians in Albania. It doesn't take much to find just a google away. When time for negotiations started they completely overhauled their propaganda, now emphasizing on the similarities between the Albanians of Kosova and those of Albania.
Again speaking of differences. If you have all the Slavic countries in the Balkans who have so many similarities among each other and so few differences, being separate and independent countries; and Kosova having so many differences with Serbia and so very few similarities, then according to your differences theory Kosova should be separate from Serbia.

P.S There are some Albanians from Kosova who consider themselves Kosovar first and foremost then Albanian. As time passes by we might be able to see more and more of those. Will you then be able to say that they are not different enough from Albania to be an independent country?

nik

pre 15 godina

Martin SVK: "I don't see, however, any of these differences between Albanians from Kosovo (calling themselves "Kosovars") and Albanians living in Albania".

There is a huge difference!
Religion: Albanians in Kosvo are 100% Muslims. Since they had to live in Christian dominated land for almost a century, they find it necessary to expose their Islam. In Albania 30% of the peaple are Chistians. To soften the differences Enver Hoxha banned all religions. Now Worship is free, but it has a marginal role in the society.
Language: The official Albanian was based on the souther dialects. It differs from the dialects spoken in Kosovo more that Serbian differs from Croatian, or Bulgarian from macedonian.
History. 3-4 generations had completly different life experiance. Citizens of Yugoslavia had much mor freedoms and much higher standart of living than citizens of Albania. Albania will never annex Kosovo, not because of the Ahtisaari plan, but because the ordinary Albanians see Kosovars as a threat.

Pejoni

pre 15 godina

"...The journalist then remarked that "in Abkhazia, it was the Georgians who had been ethnically cleansed, while in Kosovo, the situation was quite the opposite since it was the Albanians that were exposed to this practice"

Couldnt have said it better myself, well done by the French journalist putting that dictator on place.

kosovari

pre 15 godina

No worry Mr. Putin, beside Russian and Serbian Films made about KOsovo, there is a mountains of evidence about Serbian horror in Kosovo! Te right is on our side.! Live and let live!

Tex Willer

pre 15 godina

Go on Putin, thanks god that democratic society knows your intentions and your deeds.
You cannot tell west nothing about Kosovo because you were involved on opposite site, the site that claim that didn't commit crimes against Albanians.

dogs that bargs are not dangerus

pre 15 godina

Then after "teaching" these westerns brats about democracy, than please beg them to by your gas, because without them you whon´t have bread on the table.

dulo

pre 15 godina

Well Done Mr Putin..

Just you go on and show them, you could kill a few more journalists, French once you are at it, as there are no more left in Russia.. Now you have really assorted yourself in world public, one could've easy imagine if you are a real Superpower what would you do then. Can help but Stalin and Hitler comes to mind, as 5 yrs ago you were a baby chiken.

Go keep fooling yourself as much as you want, as we know what your Russia is all about.
Oops sadly the west doesn't seem to be bothered much, as we have seen this before. You will kneel down when comes to Kosova sooner than you think.
Perhaps another show of your ancient arms after the summer?? Yeah that will show them.

Sort out your poverty stricken people first then sort the world out.

Joe

pre 15 godina

Gary,

Your Russian idol has a serious image problem in Western democratic countries. In the last few years he became a synonym of the old Russian arrogance and menace. As a result in people's mind an invisible wall got created between the democratic West and an autocratic, neo-imperialistic Russia. Sure there is increasing trade between the two sides but no friendship. This will hardly change in the next 15-20 years and the opinions of your Russian friends will be disregarded.

ben

pre 15 godina

"Thousands of Serbs can't return to Kosovo. Hundreds of thousands," he said.

The dictator PUTIN is also a liar: Kosova has 2M inhabitants of which 90% Albanian and the other 10% others: Serbs in majority, Turks, Bosnians, Croats etc.

If the math is not opinion than 10% out of 2M is 200 thousand/ of which about 140 thousand were Serbs.

Today in Northern Kosova are living about 50 thousand and other 50 thousand in the central Kosova.

So Mr dictator liar: it’s impossible your “Hundred of thousands” OK Mr Liar?

ben

pre 15 godina

"Don't tell me stories, I know what is really going on there." PUTIN

A real intellectual!

When a bull remains without arguments starts to insult- don't tale me stories.

A man whose country put several free-loving nations in the iron cage is now preaching law.

cees

pre 15 godina

What did Mr Putin tell the western journalist? "The things are not all opposite", that means a bit is. For him maybe a small part, but for the western world it is a great deal: At the end of the 20th. century in a so-called civilized Europe the Milosevic regime tried to ethnically cleanse a part of his country, that from 1974 - 1991 had an autonomous status, which he one-sided wiped out, like dictators are doing. The only thing Putin can't do in this case: he can't silence the critical press like he used to do in Russia. In no country in the world are more journalists murdered in the last eight years, except Iraq, as in Russia.
By the way, it is not a safe life being a critic in Serbia too. It even can threaten your own president Tadic, or people like Natasa Kandic, Sonja Biserko, Biljana Kovacevic-Vuco. I never forget the assassination attempt on Dejan Anastasijevic on April 16 2007.
I travelled all over the world and spend a lot of my time on the Balkans, but I felt only once a real threat, that I'll never forget: I was in North-Mitrovoca. I was called a spy and a monkey and they spit on me. This atmosphere of hostility made me feel, how other Balkan nations must have feared the Serbian actions and reactions during the 20th. century.
Cees

Hayabusa

pre 15 godina

Jovan

"a journalist... is being told what HE should be reporting, if he´d take his profession serious..."

Putin is of course used to Russian reporters who report what Putin wants them to report, but the civilized world does not work that way.

SP

pre 15 godina

I can only laugh at Putin and how simple he is.

It's so clear that he doesn't care an ounce about Serbs or Serbia. He only uses them to advance his own agenda.

Right now, he's using Serbs to soften the blow that's coming against Russia. Why? Because Putin is getting ready to attack Georgia. He already sent in 300 troops there to "fix" the railroads the other day. Right, of course, to "fix" the railroads. While fixing the railroads, the Russian troops might as well send in the trains with weaponry into Georgia.

Putin please. We've seen all of your tactics before. What more do you expect from a KGB agent turned dictator?

And by the way, that journalist plowed right through Putin and put him in his place. Putin's response was: "I know what's going on there." Oh really? Were you in Kosovo yourself? Maybe you were the driver of those trucks with partially expired medicine that you "donated" to Serbs in Kosovo. Or did you send in your friends at the KGB to check things out?

Like I said, I only laugh at such comments because it's so clear that Serbs aren't even in Putin's rear mirror.

Partytime

pre 15 godina

By the way,Fion means a specialpart of human anatomywhich is used as a way out for food... The exact spelling is Fillon for French P.M.

If Putin was so aware about what was happening in Kosovo, why was he that much against Nato intervention? This was said to be against Serb breach of I.L. and not the contrary.

Peace out there, even to Serbs...

johny

pre 15 godina

"What was it like to be a Serb in Croatia? Or even in Kosovo when Serbs were being treated as foreigners and ethnically targeted in the 80’s?"

It is kinda hard to imagine how you can be ethnically cleansed and yet hold all the official and public positions, also hold and have all the state jobs. That is exactly what the Serbs had in the '80's, all the public and official jobs and all the state jobs. Kinda hard to imagine how we cleansed the Serbs since all the policemen were Serbs, all the military men were Serbs, all the officials were Serbs. Its like the whites claiming in south Africa during Apartheid that they were being cleansed at a time where all the government and all the military force was held by the whites.

Also I think the Serbs, at least those who don't wanna believe in tales, myths, and old women stories should do a little more research. I am talking about the myth that Albanians came to Kosova during Tito's time from Albania.
During Tito's time the population in Albania grew and did not decrease. I would believe that if hundreds of thousands of Albanians left Albania and made it to Kosova, that the population of Albania would have considerably decreased especially considering the fact that when Tito came to power Albania had a population of around 1 million.
At least when some of you try to lie or be the mouth of propaganda for your country be smarter, and more creative. What you guys have come so far with, is so easily verifiable. I can take any of you guys who are interested and go to the state archives in Tirana and see the population for all the years Tito was in power. Our famous dictator made sure he knew how many people he had in his control because according to him we were gonna fight the bourgeoisie and the capitalists. He kept great records. If you want you can also find how many sheep and cows we had during Tito's years. Its not a problem at all to verify your lies.

lids

pre 15 godina

Telling the truth is luxury that few can afford in Europe and only ones who truly expirienced the horror from muslum terrorist can speak as loud as Mr.Putin.

Thank you Mr.Putin.

nik

pre 15 godina

I can not understand the reaction of the serb nationalists.
They oppose Kosovos indpendence - tha is understandable.
They are happy that Russia oposes (in words) Kosovos DUI - logical.
But it is obvious that they support the eventual Dui of Abhazija and South Osetia. Russia supports them and most probably that will be the price paid to the Russians for looking the other way as Kosovo is being recognized by more and more countries. It is a deal that suits the West, because they want Georgia to join Nato, but unburdened by undesolved problems. Like Kosovo (until the preshevo valley is under Serbian control), South Osetia and Abhazia have no strategic value of their oun. Without them Georgia could still provide the western access to Azerbeijan and The Kaspian Sea. Russia knows that and that is why it is protracting the deal.
Waht I am puzzled with is the total alck of sympaty of Serbian nationalist to Georgia, even though Georgia did not recognize Kosovos dui!
They are both Orthodox nations, whose people want to join the West, but are not to pay the perritorial price.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

Putin is right when we mentions the refugee situation, but he technically did not elaborate on the point that the Abkhazians declared independence and ethnically cleansed the Georgians, while in Kosovo the Albanians declared independence and the Serbs ethnically cleansed them. On the other hand, if he admitted it, he would be admitting America's "sui generis" stance publicly.

Politicians on both sides are so full of it. Both Bush and Putin are the worst kind. Contradictory capitalists.

proud2bkosovar

pre 15 godina

Dear all;
Putin has every right to express himself just as Sarkozy, Brown or Bush do. The only difference Kosovo is independent now and it doesn't matter what is said. What matters the most is where we are. No one is stoping Kosovar Serbs to return (at least the ones without blood in their hands), no one is killing them, no one is isolating them.
Let Kosovo struggle with their problems needed to be solved. Let it be based on the treatment toward minorities Kosova should be treated in return; and the day that Serbs or any minority is treated even to a fraction the Kosovars themselves were treated under the Serbian rule than I'll be the first one to protest and request statehood to be taken back.
Again, this is were we are. Let that be a lesson to all that by looking back you may not steer to the future.
Concerning the Georgian problem: If Georgia treated the residents of Ossetia and Abkhazia as the Serbs did Kosovars than who is as naive as not to support their demands for independence.
ZK- you are an ardent supporter for Serbian clause and I admire you. But, closing your mind to other argument makes one brainwashed.
B-92 thanks for the opportunity to comment.

Kroni

pre 15 godina

Telling the truth; this is something you the serbs have all praised about Putin, the man who's country's democracies has dropped by 35% since he took over! the man that will not go away as he only changes post to remain in power for the rest of his life... the man who claims success by selling Russia natural wealth and giving it to the fortunate 10% who now account for the richest 10% in the world...

this is all politics but please be assured that Russia is no friend of serbia its political games a spreading around the world... and i can assure you they are games that they cannot win...

cees

pre 15 godina

frans, you are right, Belgrade is a hell of a city, but just like other capitals, it doesn't present the true caracter of a nation: like Amsterdam for the Dutch, Budapest for the Hungarians, Prague for the Czechs or Moscow for the Russians. Go to the country-side to learn what the real people do, think and act. But that is the difference between Bussinessmen, living in big hotels, having parties, getting told the Serbian 'TRUTH', and a poor academic that has to deal with 'real' people. That is not a party at all, but listening to a lot of sad stories from all sides on the Balkans. And calling Albanians stupid shows already your prejudice.
Cees

Joe

pre 15 godina

One thing is sure. Putin got a lesson of free journalism so different from sub-serviant Russian one, which did not change from soviet times due to Putin. This French journalist was pretty well informed about the ethnic cleansing in Georgia. On the German Spiegel I learned today the same story. The so-called PM of Abkhazia was interviewed by a German journalist. This "PM" admitted that they allowed the return of 55,000 refugies in the border region of Galatian but they can not allow 150,000 refugies to return to the other regions because in that case there would be a majority for Georgia.
Anyway it appears that only Serbs and Belorussians support Putin in Europe. This is a pretty poor track record. It shows that you can not fool democratic countries and their free media. It also shows the continuous divide - an invisible wall - between democratic Europe and the autocratic one composed of Russia, Belarus and pseudo-democratic Serbia.

Ari

pre 15 godina

If Putin is so concerned for the K-Serbs how come he withdrew the Russian peacekeepers from Kosova? I guess he didn't care much after all and that's just a useful, albeit nonexistent, argument.

Kreshnik Bejko

pre 15 godina

With Kosovo's independence, Stalin's veto just burned in Putin's hand. The post-WWII will soon be re-engineered, and his anger is visible in this interview.

Someone said "In Putin we trust". Putin will spell your long term doom.

Let go of Kosovo and you will prosper.

peter, sydney

pre 15 godina

I have just been trying to imagine the scenario if it were George Bush being interviewed instead of Vladimir Putin in the same situation - ie: no minders to control the content of the questions being put to him & I can't help but think of a fish out of water flopping around & gasping for 'air'.

Good job Mr Putin. While your government still has a long way to go, at least it is changing. The same cannot be said of the US however - it still has the same mindset it had during the cold war.

The price of 'victory' I guess.

Jovan

pre 15 godina

"It is not just the Russians who know the real story the Czechs have produced a film about the real events there too;

Uloupene Kosovo (Robbed Kosovo)
[link]&
(Princip, UK, 1 June 2008 13:07)"

very good link, Princip.

especially because even without knowledge of the czech-language, this film shows the albanian terror upon non-albanians in simple pictures of unbelievable atrocities...

what was extraordinary sad: the picture of an albanian criminal killing a serbian priest.

my dear albanian friends, denying won´t help you... since THIS says it all about your hate-driven society...

it becomes clearer and clearer that you have to be liberated again, since most Albanians are opposing to animal-like crimes like that... but the criminal clan-structures won´t go away themselves, I guess.

probably many Albanians will be quite happy, when they will be liberated from those animals among them.

johny

pre 15 godina

"What I meant to say is that as Albania has been exposed to hard islamisation in the past, this religion prevails in some parts of Albania and also prevails in present Kosovo."

When I become rich I will sponsor your travel to both Albania and Kosova. I hope B92 still exists then so I can contact you. The reason why I am saying this is that it would be a great eye opener for you; you could go and see for yourself rather than believe what someone who has never been there tells you. I want to be explicit, as much as I can and I hope B92 editors publish this. We Albanians see religion as a divider force and pushed down our throats by those who have occupied our lands in the past (enemies). That does not mean we don't believe in God. To not follow a religion does not mean you don't believe in God. Most of us see no point in Churches or Mosques as from our point of view they are man made and they are there to make monetary profit and usurp power. Again that does not mean we don't believe in God. Of course there are those who do and those who do not believe. Our belief in God is very personal and most of us, as I said earlier, see no point in churches and mosques. When I say most of us, I mean roughly 90-95% of us. I know its hard for other cultures to even get the notion but that is us. We are Albanian first and everything else second. Most of us believe that. I know other cultures do not get this, and put religion first. We don't. We ( I mean most of us) believe that you could be a really good believer in God without needing to be a Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Jew etc. If you chose to be you can and that's fine with us. Its your own personal choice. As long as you do not use religion against our national harmony.
I believe that if you go to either Kosova or Albania you will be able to see this yourself, without needing to even trust or believe any of the words I said.

"There are obviously many questions for which even its current inhabitants don't seem to be able provide appropriate answers. Most of them consider them to be Albanians. But Albanians already have one state - Albania. And now they have two. What will be the next move? It's really not that hard to predict you see..
(Martin, Bratislava, SVK, 2 June 2008 19:29) "

Ok the argument that because there is Albania there can't be another state that has a majority of Albanian speakers holds no water. For example: We have Germany and Austria. England and Australia. Or we have all the Slavic speaking states in the Balkans and in Europe. We have Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia etc etc. all slav speakers. Also we have Switzerland (where just like Kosova different languages are spoken and different ethnicities live) and you have France and Germany and Italy. You have Belgium and France. Belgium and the Netherlands. So if there are so many countries in our region and in the world that speak the same language and are of the same ethnicity, then just like Germany and Austria there should be no problem having Albania and Kosova. Your argument does not hold. Vuk Draskovic tried it before you and he was shut down the next day.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

It is not just the Russians who know the real story the Czechs have produced a film about the real events there too;

Uloupene Kosovo (Robbed Kosovo)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4554948078128880143&

Dragan

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka.... you wrote 'Abkhazians declared independence and ethnically cleansed the Georgians, while in Kosovo the Albanians declared independence and the Serbs ethnically cleansed them..'

Quit lying. That is a flat out lie and you know it. There was absolutely no ethnic cleansing of albanians by Serbs, NONE. In fact, life was so much better for albanians in Serbia than in albania that their population exploded in Kosovo (illegal immigration which Tito allowed), and they slowly ethinically cleansed the Serbs out of their ancestral homeland, Kosovo. How do you think that they got to 90% from 50% in such a short time? Read a little and educate yourself before making ridiculous statements like the one above. There are virtually no Serbs left in Kosovo and you have the audacity to claim that it is Serbs who are the ethnic cleansers?? Go visit Belgrade where you will see thousands of albanians living in peace among Serbs. Then go to Kosovo and see the Serbs in ghettos behind barbed wire, needing military escorts to go grocery shopping.
Your statement is a complete lie, and you should be ashamed, as a Pole, for spreading such mistruths.

ben

pre 15 godina

(Martin, Bratislava, SVK, 2 June 2008 14:21)

Martin I haven't heard more nonsense things for a while.

You are pointing finger to probably the oldest civilizations of Europe as being a non-European culture- forgetting that your Slovakian contribution in the western civilization is NIL.

Your culture compared to ours is Third World.

FYI

1. Constantine the Great was KOSOVAR ruling in central Albania where he become Christian later become the Emperor of Rome and proclamed Christianity the official religion of Roman Empire.

2. Pope Clemente XI (Pope Albani) was Albanian

3. Mother Theresa (Anjez Bojaxhiu) is Albanian

I can continuo more if you wish.

Now tale us about your Slovakian contribution to the WESTERN civilization please.

But as far as you are happy with your stereotypes...

BR USA

pre 15 godina

To Putin, ZK UK, Princip, Jovan and the likeminded;
Kosova Republic is an independent state with its own constitution and all other stae atributes recognized by more than 40 states and more to come . Russia nor Serbia nor any other country in the world can do anything about it.

Putin can say whatever he'd like.

ZK and Princip in UK need to be reminded their host country was one of the first to recognize the Republic of Kosova. It is precisely because you live (I assume) in UK you have the right to express yourself, otherwise if in Russia, your dear Stalin oooops Putin would have had you executed just some reporters and opposition leaders who did not agree with his policies.

Long Live the Republic of Kosova and may God Almighty Bless the countries who recognize it.

johny

pre 15 godina

"If your "logic" holds then Mexico's population would have declined over the past 50 years due to emigration to the US when in fact the opposite is true and Mexico's population has continued to grow at a fast rate.
(PJD, 2 June 2008 14:45) "

So many things wrong with your logic.
First of all, you're comparing a population 1 million with one of 107 million. If Mexico's population increased only by 2 % hundreds of thousands of Mexican could come to the US and the population would still show growth. Now compare that to a population of 1 million (Albania's population when Tito came to power. There is now way that if we had hundreds of thousands of Albanians leaving for Kosova that in a population of 1 million you would see growth.
Second in these legends of yours I have seen no Serb so far give exact numbers as how many supposed immigrants made it to Kosova. The reason for that is simple. You don't have any numbers, all of what you have come up with is a fabrication. If you were to give numbers it would be very easy to verify them and your myth wouldn't be bough by eve you compatriots. This way at least you are able to convince simpletons and naives who want to believe in myths.
Third, thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of those Mexicans you mention are seasonal workers. They work here in the US for a couple of months and then they go back to Mexico for the rest of the year. So they are still part of the Mexican population even though they work here for a couple of months.
Fourth, not every hispanic that you see here or hispanic looking person that you see here is a Mexican. So having millions of hispanics here does not mean that all of them came from Mexico.
Fifth, in the case of this lie propagated by the Serbs it is very easy to verify,as we can compare the population for consecutive years

Endri, Albania

pre 15 godina

Peter,

"Slovakians show nothing but the purest traits European culturally (dress, cuisine, music, architecture etc.), racially (generally blond hair and blue/green eyes) and religiously (Roman Catholic). Can you say the same for Albanians? Albanian music sounds Turkish, their religion is Islam and they look racially closer to the Near East than to most Europeans."

If you compare our music with it of the other countries in Balkan you will find (to the other countries) surely much more sign of Turkish music. What I can distinguish to that music are only some oriental elements which where brought to our music in the last years (mainly imported) but they disappeared very soon. This was some kind of balkanization of the music. You can often listen the same song played in 3 or more different languages for example Serbian, Bulgarian, Greek even Albanian.

Religion Islam means nothing to me (the same for Christianity), and it has never been a hurdle to me and the majority of Albanians. It doesn't mean that we don't believe in God but the church or the mosque is not necessary the house of GOD. For more info about that please refer to 73#.

I don't know how did you come out to this kind of conclusion. If you refer to the propagandistic materials then the next time you better select the proper ones. We have racially absolutely nothing in common with near east or whatever. The only dark or slightly dark-skinned are the people of Roma ethnicity which are sometimes considered racially related to Egyptians.

"Indeed, Slovakia as such is not a major contributor to the world, but don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization…"

This is very much generalised. I am not very familiar with Slovak history but it would be kind of you to provide us some more detailed info about Slovaks who are portraying their self as a height level race and society. The only thing I remember about Slovakia, Bratislava is the movie "Eurotrip" which is of course exaggerated.

ben

pre 15 godina

Peter: it's quite obvious that you don't know a thing about Albanian culture.

The music you here in Kosova is influenced by teh Serbian Turbo-Folk style- that's why the independence is prerogative - to preserve teh Albanian culture.

The Albanian culture is teh POLYOHONIC songs in south the one that you can find ONLY in the Northern Mediterranean- Sardegna, Corsica and Iberian peninsula.

It is the lahuta in North teh one taht was described from teh Homers times,

It is teh KANUN (the oldes European civil and pean code- you can find similar in Italy but not extensive as the Kanun) with teh moral values of the Albanian culture- teh CONSITUTION the mafiest of independence of the Albanian culture, moral values and rules that you can see in Homer texts and other ancient authors,

It is in Besa the holly word- that today you can find only in the Albanian culture and it was part of the Balkanik cultures in the past- BESA was the linking factor/leverage of the coalition of teh Greek cities in the war with Troy.


All these EUROPEN values, europen culture, of ILLYRIAN you can find in the Albanian culture NOT in YOURS. This is FACT.

The ancient values and culture of the Balkans the ILLYRIAN culture has very much survived in the Albanian culture- and it’s not a case.

And you cannot see no trace in YOUR culture- this is FACT.

I can continua for more but I will leave something for later after that YOU show something of YOUR EUROPEAN values on which your today culture and nation was build upon.

Regarding the anthropological issue- Albanians are the WHITEST in the ENTIRE Northern Mediterranean- much more European anthropologically than Italians (at least the one of south), much more than Greeks (or maybe you will put into question their Europeism) or Spanish etc...

So you see that what you say makes little sense. Moreover if you visit Albanins of the Alps where the influence of various invaders was small or inexistent you will find them all BLONDS.

Again Peter & Co you show that you know nothing about the Albanian culture- the economical emigrant in UK the Princip is just hilarious.

It a fact my dear that our contribution in the WESTERN civilization is not marginal- I am not sure about yours.

The ancient theaters, icons, music, poems, art are al around my country, not sure that you have something of it in yours.

Cheers,

fas

pre 15 godina

Telling stories is what the western corporate media and their governments are good at, thank you for not letting them get away with it Mr Putin.

Michael Blairsdale

pre 15 godina

Naive Cees

What was it like to be a Serb in Croatia? Or even in Kosovo when Serbs were being treated as foreigners and ethnically targeted in the 80’s?

Where is the justice for them?

The inconsistent outcomes and neglect of one side will always cause future conflicts to immerge. Both sides can be guilty of this.

So since when has it become improper to debate with a journalist? When you choose it not to be? Also what about all the Albanians murdered by the KLA? Not every Albanian played the same tune to Thaci, some had to die for the cause. Or do you care more for an Albanian killed by a Serb than one killed by the KLA?

ben

pre 15 godina

"You said separatist? Why didn't you use this word about Kosovo?" - teh dicrtator.

Now the question is: why Putin is against labeling those two regions separatist??

Officially Russia does not support Abkhazia and Ossetia but at the same time he is nervous calling them separatists. (double standards??)

This is how much Russia respects the international law. An above all, how much you can trust their word.

ronaldo USA

pre 15 godina

Putin did you ask your poor Russian people to stay in power or not.
Only Dictators like you (Milisevic Mugabe) elect themselfs.
You have no right to talk in EC

ДРУГ

pre 15 godina

B-92

Thanks a lot ! I appreciate you are not deaf to reasonable arguments ! This is the missing part of the interview that the yesterday report was missing.

Regards !

frans

pre 15 godina

Cees (19). Well, most probably you are Dutch, behaved as a Dutchman (meaning very much in favor of Albanians, making pictures all over) as they are the most stupid of all people visiting the balkans. As I am one myself and do business in all the balkan now for ten years I dare to say that the best place to be is Serbia and more precisley in Belgrade. Please Cees, visit really all places, be objective and DON'T look at Kosovo. Where the Dutch were one of the leading countries to support Albanians in expelling Serbs!! better go home and feels ashamed what your country did instead of blaming Serbs now!

PJD

pre 15 godina

Ben, the 1991 census showed there was 360,000 non-Albanians in Kosovo. Assuming your figures are correct then there are now only 200,000 non-Albanians in Kosovo so 160,000 Serbian citizens have gone.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

Dragan

I never denied that the Albanian side ethnically cleansed much of the Kosovo Serbian population in 1999, though in the same light, one would be a fool to claim that they did this for no reason apart from hatred of Serbs and NATO support.

Obviously something must have happened in the years 1996-1999 to the Kosovo Albanians that led to NATO intervention and the post-war ethnic cleansing of the Serbian population.

While I am disgusted by how the Albanians have treated the Serbian population and religious monuments the after 1999 war, but I would be a fool to claim that this came about with reason.

ORTHODOX.RU

I never said anything Russophobic here, nor do I lose reason when the thought of Russia comes to mind, I don't know why you said that.

"If summerised both the Albanians and the Georgians has settled the lands that historically (like 40% of modern Poland ) had never belonged to them and tried to steal those lands away."

We settled in those lands because somebody took away our other lands on the other side of the country and gave us these lands in return.

Though to say that these lands that we got were never ours is also incorrect, as you should know that Polabian, Kashubian and Silesian tribes have been living there and even further East since before Germanic tribes (Ostrogoths) even expanded into them from what is now Southern Denmark/Northern Germany and were assimilated either by Germans or Poles in our wars which led to all the border shifts. I am sure you know this, but you would not like to admit it here to me.

Regarding the history of the peoples of the Caucasus, I need to read more, I agree, as I am not completely familiar, but I am interested in the history.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka, 2 June 2008 12:39)

Hi Piotr !

Because you said no good bye I never dared to make any remarks for your posts here. Sure deep in your heart you feel sympathy for the Serbs and joining the people like Joe , Ben , Ahmed , Albanicum and Pejoni abuses you. But because you are a Pole you have to do the things that doesn't meet your own stance. You have to do something to stop "those Russians" and this is the only thing that makes you come here.

I follow your posts and what I can see is that you agree with the Serbs in most of the things. Bur in the end you say :"Yes it's unjust yes I agree that ... but you have to do ...and best if you ... " Then comes your piece of adwice that doesn't meet interests of Serbia. The Serbs are smart enough to see that you are a Pole who doesn't care of them and it is Russia you are always fighting here with.

You also amuse me with the false stories of the lost Polish lands. Stop cheating people with the 16-th century stories ! And next time you write " As a Pole, sure, I should be demanding all the lands we lost at the end of WW2 to Belarus and Ukraine, where there are still a total of about half a million Poles living" please don't forget to mention that those were RUSSIAN TERRITORIES occupied in 1920 where 90% of people hated you and prayed to get rid of Polish Gestapo they lived in !

================
"Regarding the history of the peoples of the Caucasus, I need to read more, I agree, as I am not completely familiar, but I am interested in the history."

Piotr if you are so ignorant in the matters of Caucasus why don't you stop discussing the matters concerned ? Best if you ask but not insist on something you have no idea.
===================
The last thing I'd like to tell you is that nothing can stop Russia on the Earth and best if you get it sooner. Then we can be partners. I also predict that the starting strategic partnership talks with EU will last 3-4 years needed for the Europeans to accept the changed status quo. It will be hard to do but Russia will leave you no other way.

Be happy !

ben

pre 15 godina

don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization

(Peter Sudyka, 2 June 2008 20:09)

Please don't forget that your Slavic contribution to the WESTERN civilization was made possible only and ONLY after that the NATIVES teached you to right in CYRILIC the (NATIVE Balkans- Greeks) and in LATIN (The Native Latin’s). You are Christian because NATIVES- an Albanian made you Christian St. Albani.

Your civilization has the roots and was made possible by laying your roots in OURS- the NATIVES.

Said that, no one denies your contribution but don't you dear to put in question ours- it simply unfair to the history, to the truth and to yourselves (see above).

P.S. comment on the fact of what was incorrect in my post #64???

Mother Theresa is not Albanian? you have a similar Person iin your culture?

Constantine- you have similar in your culutre?

Pope Albani?

Saint Albani the one that made teh central Europe Christian- you have similar persons in you culture?

P.P.S. hearing teh RACIAL argument that you mentioned I need to say Peter: thank you for being NEUTRAL :)))

branco covic

pre 15 godina

you did the right thing MR. PUTIN. if these guys need to be addressed with muscles i think you are the right man to do that. 3 rounds of boxing may do or even judo, IF THEY LAST THAT LONG...cheers

Dragan

pre 15 godina

Bravo Vlad for putting this ignorant journalist in their place! It looks like, since this journalist is completely ignorant to the 300,000 Serbs that have been ethnically cleansed from Kosovo, and the 156 churches that have been destroyed by albanian mobs, that they went to the same journalism school as CNN's Christiane Amanpour. Perhaps they should calle these people 'propogandists', not 'journalists'.
Serbia loves you Putin, and keep up the good work!!
Cheers!!

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

Princip, thanks for that video. It really puts things into perspective.

After this was shown on Czech TV, it's no surprise the Czech people support the Serbians even though the government succumbed to US pressure.

You only have to see what the Albanians are doing at the Macedonian elections to understand that nothing has changed.

May god help those people see the light one day. They cannot even rule themselves so how on earth do they expect to rule others?

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

nik, South Ossetia and Abkhazia becoming independent is a consequence of the Kosovo precedent. It just shows that Kosovo is not unique and that attempting to make it independent opens a large can of worms.

As for Serbian opinions, I believe they are generally indifferent to the issue as it really is a matter for Russia and Georgia to sort out. If Georgian joins NATO then it loses those two regions.

Georgia needs to consider its national interests carefully and its support for Serbia on Kosovo is welcome as far as I'm concerned.

PJD

pre 15 godina

johny: "I am talking about the myth that Albanians came to Kosova during Tito's time from Albania.
During Tito's time the population in Albania grew and did not decrease. I would believe that if hundreds of thousands of Albanians left Albania and made it to Kosova, that the population of Albania would have considerably decreased especially considering the fact that when Tito came to power Albania had a population of around 1 million."

If your "logic" holds then Mexico's population would have declined over the past 50 years due to emigration to the US when in fact the opposite is true and Mexico's population has continued to grow at a fast rate.

Martin, Bratislava, SVK

pre 15 godina

ben:

I'm not sure I understand why you pointed out exactly this. I won't tell you any tales about Slovakia as I obviously don't have ready ones. I guess thought you are from Kosovo. Items you picked up refer to the people which lived over 2 thousands years ago and I seriously doubt these ones were exactly your predecessors.

I was rather referring to actual situation and, if you are so eager about it, I was pointing my finger to islam itself (religion) rather than any particular nation. What I meant to say is that as Albania has been exposed to hard islamisation in the past, this religion prevails in some parts of Albania and also prevails in present Kosovo. There are obviously many questions for which even its current inhabitants don't seem to be able provide appropriate answers. Most of them consider them to be Albanians. But Albanians already have one state - Albania. And now they have two. What will be the next move? It's really not that hard to predict you see..

nik

pre 15 godina

ZK UK wrote: South Ossetia and Abkhazia becoming independent is a consequence of the Kosovo precedent. It just shows that Kosovo is not unique"...

South Osetia, Abhazia, the "Pridnestrovie" and Chechnia declared independence and gained control; over their territories, often brutally cleansing all indesirables, long befor Kosovo.
Chenchnia was reincorporated within Russia after two wars, and what made it possible was the hugeness of Russia and the tininess of Chechnia.
Neither Georgia nor Moldova, nor Serbia have the resourses and the sheer mass to reincorporate their breakaway regions!
The dilema in fron of their government is: !. to use their formal sovereign right as a negotiating chi and strike a baragin: recognition of independence against..... ( Serbia had from 1996 to 1999 to negotiate Kosovo for Srpska)
2. The second option is to succumb to the self deception that the respective regions could be reincorporated... and waste away all their resources in the proces.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

Martin,

please excuse Ben he just wanted to prove your point for you with regrdas;

"Albanians which came to Kosovo only prove how strange and different their thinking is to the rest of the Europe. It's practically immpossible to change them all. "

- of course Ben is talking of the Ilyrian culture that the Albanians seem to have adopted wholeheartedly just as whole heartedly as them being US "best-friends" . I guess in this regard pretty much like the "best-friends" the Afghan mhuajedin - and we all know how that friednship ended up. Of course don't be surprised to find Ben is is not impressed with this last comment either!!!

I sure would hope that there can be much more tourism and trade between Serbia and Slovakia with many simlarities between the countries on many aspects be it food, folklore, culture and outlook and of course both make very fine Slivovica and beers - Slovakia's Zlaty Bazant or Urpin (12 or 10 which ever is at hand) are favourite tipples!!!

Endri, Albania

pre 15 godina

I have to correct a refernce to my post as the order of comments has recently changed. For info about religion please take a look at comment 78# from johny.

Michael Blairsdale

pre 15 godina

“The journalist then remarked that "in Abkhazia, it was the Georgians who had been ethnically cleansed, while in Kosovo, the situation was quite the opposite since it was the Albanians that were exposed to this practice".”

This selective history picking has always been a problem in understanding the Balkans. Also the editors of media outlets who have pressure bestowed upon them to follow a certain line.

Since 2000 virtually Serbs alone have been cleansed, shall we start from this point or from the bombing or before?

One thing you should always ask yourself, if the truth is so compelling, why have there been so many lies. NATO’s campaign, they were caught with so many lies, surely the truth alone would have been enough if the situation was as bad as they say.

Yet many people who research the facts about Kosovo etc in the UK, many post on newspaper blogs such as the telegraph and even that horrible liberal paper, the guardian, have an entirely different perspective and we are not open to mass propaganda by the Serbian side.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

ZK UK,

the film was produced for Czech TV but the propaganda machine has halted its showing hence the producers have placed it online - imagine now why and to what extent the truth is being obfuscated in so called "free" Europe and "free" media!!!! Yet ironically and hypocrtically label Russia when the west is clearly just as equally propagandist.

Orwell himself had his preface to Animal Farm censored because it " 'it wouldn't do' to mention that particular fact." but eventually the truth comes out too! You should read it he evene mentions the shenaigans in second world war Yugoslavia!http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/83481.html

Dorcol

pre 15 godina

Putin pulled out the Russian troops citing financial reasons. Fair enough Oil was trading at US$25 per barrel then (2003) and is now at US$125. Russia is reaping the benefits of its natural resources right now. The US is also reeaping the benefits of Iraqi oil but has to pay for an expensive mission in Iraq to keep that money flow. If oil stays over $100 the US will attack Iran on some flimsy pretext. Then it gets juicy with Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan holding huge reserves and thats where the Russia/US line will be drawn. Not Kosovo .. although if the Russians could control the pipeline from the caucusus to Europe through Bulgaria/Serbia they will have a gold mine of earnings for the next century.

Jovan

pre 15 godina

quite interesting a "journalist"...something in the western world widely seen as the guarantor of democracy, as the fourth power in "democratic" systems... is being told what HE HIMSELF should be reporting, if he´d take his profession serious...

and he´s being told it by someone who was repeatedly portrayed as some kind of dictator by the very same western and so "civilized" journalists...

really interesting, isn´t it?

Daki

pre 15 godina

It's a funny thing calling Putin a dictator. I don't recall Putin starting a war in the Middle East over false pretenses.

I don't recall seeing third world immigrants rioting through the streets of Moscow like I did in Paris. Now I ask, who are the real dictators?

Peter RV

pre 15 godina

Attention our spineless Europe-starved politicians! Putin is giving you exemple of how to talk to the Western double-standard hypocrites (Can anybody imagine Tadic defending Serbia like this?)

Nello

pre 15 godina

Mr. Putin has been a political anomoly. Put in power by god to save the Slavonic peoples of the world from an unprecendented, well orchestrated, multi-pronged attack on their independence and Orthodox by those who seek to enslave her people and pimp her women and girls to western sex tourists who behave like uneducated thugs who eat fast junk food and are loaded with euro$$. In her long history Serbia has always chosen right over wrong. She has always chosen the hard road which can involve short to mid term economic suffering but which is enriched with longer term rewards. Serbia should trust Russia and seek to join the CIS which unlike the EU will respect her religion, economic independence, and unique cultural values. Thank you Mr. Putin & Mr. Medvedev for sending aid flights to Kosovo and thank you again for supporting Serbia in her historic fight for what is right as opposed to those who seek to divide & conquer her.

Princip, UK

pre 15 godina

Martin,

yes your right it has been blocked from being aired as I mention in the comment just before yours. - We can only speculate why. But, it is clear that "it wouldn't do to mention such facts" hence why Biased Broadcasting Corp (BBC) are now trying to aid in the "story telling" and adding their "spin" - since it would't do to tell the truth as it really is!!! In time the truth will out and all the spin and deceit will entangle those who weave...

"I'm surprised that you understood it cause film is in czech language only"

Martin, as I am sure your aware slavic languages are very similar and if you have not vistied Serbia yet you should as you will be made very welcome and would be able to comprehend and converse more then you might have thought.

Martin - you wouldn't be from Martin (Svk) by any chance - must get that all the time sorry! Much prefer BB myself! Djakujem na pomoc, Dovi.

Martin, Bratislava, SVK

pre 15 godina

ZK, Princip:

Right, i see, people in the film of course talk in serbian. I was just referring to UK (United Kingdom) abbreviation, from which it wasn't that sure you could have comprehend it. But as I see now the documentary is well understood even without translation or subtitles. The commentator however says lots of interesting stuff and I hope that the film will be shown on czech TV in regular time yet. It cannot be excluded because czech TV is running some negotiations about making combined night including this documentary and some other probably from UK production (as I mentioned before) which would paint it in favor for albanians. Than they wanted to make some common discussion about two documentaries (That's information from czech newspapers). I don't know however, these plans might have been halted because of realasing film on internet without permission, czech TV was very irritated for that for breaking co-producer's warrants..

Thank you for invitation, that's very nice of you. I must say that even I and surely most of Slovaks would very much prefer to welcome Serbians here in Slovakia over some Albanians from so called Kosovo. For that I'm really glad that Slovakia will not recognize Kosovo visa, we really don't need to grow numbers of thiefs, criminals and probably murderers here, we have enough our problems to solve.

I see whole Kosovo problem however as a small piece of much bigger problem. Not even one really dangerous precedent based on "ethnical" basis, which it's indeed. The problem of present days here is about interaction of modern european culture and Islam culture, which is extraordinary aggressive and expansionist even to these days. Albanians which came to Kosovo only prove how strange and different their thinking is to the rest of the Europe. It's practically immpossible to change them all. That lots of western countries fail to recognize and on behalf of their good will let the immigrants in. These immigrants then create inner enemy in their countries who will certainly grow in time. God help us if Turkey is allowed to access EU.

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

ORTHODOX.RU

"Because you said no good bye I never dared to make any remarks for your posts here."

I did say so Sergey, the reason they did not continue is simply because we reached the stage that our kind always do when trying to get our points across, and we both know what we know and we will not budge. Best to leave it and discuss things cordially.

"But because you are a Pole you have to do the things that doesn't meet your own stance. You have to do something to stop "those Russians" and this is the only thing that makes you come here."

I don't know how else to say this Sergey, really, I have nothing against the Russian people whatsoever (one of my best and closest friends is Russian), I have more against people who think they need to choose between the "Russian side" or the "Western Side" and insult the other.

"The Serbs are smart enough to see that you are a Pole who doesn't care of them and it is Russia you are always fighting here with. "

I do sympathize with the Serbian side regarding Kosovo, but I am not completely on their side, because I do not believe they are completely innocent. I try be neutral, and it's nothing to do with Russia or any other country.

"You also amuse me with the false stories of the lost Polish lands. "

Sorry Sergey, I am not listening. Regarding this I have said my piece, you have said yours, let us respect our opinions as our own and not push it further please with such offense remarks.

"Piotr if you are so ignorant in the matters of Caucasus why don't you stop discussing the matters concerned ? Best if you ask but not insist on something you have no idea. "

To say I have absolutely no idea is also incorrect, I know enough to express an opinion here, but I am not as educated on this matter as you are, I admit, it is quite new to me.

"The last thing I'd like to tell you is that nothing can stop Russia on the Earth and best if you get it sooner. Then we can be partners"

If this were to happen cordially and peacefully, it would be the greatest thing for both of our "sides". I have been saying this all along, and I hope to see it come into being one day.

Have a good evening.

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

Johny, ok let's finish it. I understand you are from Albania yet you live in US. You speak well in defense of Albanians, but I have problems considering you the representative sample of Albanian population, especially the one settled in Kosovo. I avoided say it straight, but when I was talking about unclear origin of Albanians in Kosovo, I was of course referring to very smart changes in Kosovo population over the last decades, when representation of serbian population declined very dramatically to nearly 5% of these days. What happened to that peoples? Isn't that about what Stefan wrote in #86 about clan society and violent tendencies of Albanians? I wasn't perhaps enough clear about what I meant by oppression of Albanians and their islamisation. But isn't that so that once repressed people have tendencies to become oppressors themselves? Isn't that what Albanian absolute and deliberate behavior came from? It seems mostly absurd to me if I see talking about Albania as nearly cradle of entire civilization (viz comments above) and its inhabitants descendants of "Constantine the Great", "Mother Theresa" and so on. Even if Albanians might have had these traits, they are obviously long gone.

This is not about persuading me or about some "Serbian propaganda". Affairs in central Europe are not subject to Balkan events or to Serbian agenda. But it doesn't mean we are blind. You know, here in Slovakia, if we come into some people from Albania, we usually come into organized groups of drug or weapon smugglers. It is well known that organized criminal paths coming from Turkey and directed to entire Europe flow through Albania and Kosovo.

Now I would like very much to trust you about your words, about two independent and democratic countries, Albania and Kosovo. As I'd like to trust the words of representatives of Kosovo about guarantees of minorities rights, but one thing are words and one thing are actions. Representatives of Kosovo miss credibility, their past is connected with criminal actions and, as far as I noticed, they deny any explanations. Most of Kosovo's population is now albanian, and still, permanent international presence is necessary to protect even the rest of serbian population. What guarantees can we talk about.

PS:

"Again speaking of differences. If you have all the Slavic countries in the Balkans who have so many similarities among each other and so few differences, being separate and independent countries; and Kosova having so many differences with Serbia and so very few similarities, then according to your differences theory Kosova should be separate from Serbia. "

No it's not about my "differences theory". If you read what I wrote carefully, I was talking about mutual affiliation of inhabitants of Kosovo and Albania. I also stated that Serbia was ripped off from Kosovo and this happened somewhat by the fact (say we don't know how) that albanian population in Kosovo strongly outnumbered the serbian one. I never said it should happened as it happened at the expense of Serbia and in favor of Albanians, like Kosovo would represent some additional value to Albania itself or to Albanians. If there are some differences about which nik wrote in #87 between Albanians from Kosovo and from Albania, than maybe there are, but still they are all Albanians, waving albanian flags, tourning to Albania for help. In Kosovo, there was established one of the biggest US military bases abroad. There are no such bases in Europe, nor soviet bases. We won't allow such bases on our territories, but Kosovo government did. As I said, Kosovo government miss credibility and that's not something they can buy.

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

To Princip&ZK:

That film wasn't aired on czech TV yet. In fact czech TV althought participated in its production has rejected to show it because as they say it is very much one sided and would break objectivity of czech TV. After several months the director has released film on internet recently where it became hit. This is the subject of legal dispute now in CR because of law violation. It's possible that film will be shown on czech TV in the future but it might be togather with other document showing albanians, probably from BBC production.. I'm surprised that you understood it cause film is in czech language only. I found it hovewer very educational..

Aleks

pre 15 godina

Some interesting comments.

Re: Cees and Frans, Cees is actually exposing his predjudice by not reading what Frans actually said, i.e. it is the Dutch visitors to the Balkans who are the most stupid. Cees either misread frans comments or didn't bother to read them probably having already decided what frans opinions were.

So, absolutely nothing to do with the Albanians!

veki

pre 15 godina

Dear Cees,
you misunderstood what Frans said-
he didn't call Albanians stupid. He called the opinion of the Dutch folks most stupid of all.
I can't but absolutely agree with him.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Dragan, 1 June 2008 20:01

Dear Dragan !

You don't have to take Peter's words so serious cause there are no Poles that are not Rusofobs. They all stop to be reasonable when it comes to anything to do with Russia. I know it for sure that Peter is rather educated to know the difference between the K-Albanians and the Ossetians and the Abkhasians. Strange as it is but Georgians should be compared with the K-Albanians cause after WW2 both of them have settled on the lands that had never belonged to them.

Both Abkhasians and the Ossetians had joined Russia long before Georgia. Only God knows who called the Kartli tribes Georgians first ! Those were few hostile to each other Kartli tribes ( Imeretians , Mengrelians , Svans , Kahetians , Gurians ect.) that Russia has united and declared to be one nation. Then Russia fought 3 wars against Turkey and Iran to defend the Kartli tribes.

During last 5000 years Georgia has existed as a separate state less than 3 years in 1918-1921 when with German support they tried to break away. But the 11-th Army headed by a Georgian Communist has put an end to it. At that time neither Abkhasia nor Osetia were not included in Georgia. It became real only after WW2 when thousands of Georgians settled here. Especially it strike at the Abkhasia cause it is the most beautiful place in the world.

When in 1991 Georgia has broke away they violated all the rules available. According to the Constitution they should have referendums within the minorities if they are ready to leave with the Georgians. But because the results were quite predictable the Georgians did not. Their Presidents father in 1914 as a volunteer joined the German Army and for 2 years fought the Russians. So his son was nothing better.

If summerised both the Albanians and the Georgians has settled the lands that historically (like 40% of modern Poland ) had never belonged to them and tried to steal those lands away. The only difference is that the Georgians has already failed while the K-Albanians are only expected to drinks this bitter cup.

Cheers !

ZK UK

pre 15 godina

Martin, I understood the documentary because the people were talking in Serbian although the commentator was speaking in Czech.

Let me just say that I have yet to see any Western media report anything positive about Serbia and Serbians - even till this day, however, they paint the Albanians as angels in Kosovo.

Well, it's good to know that the mojority of Czechs still support the Serbian cause even if that documentary was not aired.

Gunnar

pre 15 godina

More facts about the real situation on Kosovo, this time not from the Czech Republic but from Germany! (shown on the german 1st national TV some years ago)

http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=9022337190221762301

Definitely a must-see for german-speaking population!

Peter Sudyka

pre 15 godina

ben

"You are pointing finger to probably the oldest civilizations of Europe as being a non-European culture- forgetting that your Slovakian contribution in the western civilization is NIL."

Slovakians show nothing but the purest traits European culturally (dress, cuisine, music, architecture etc.), racially (generally blond hair and blue/green eyes) and religiously (Roman Catholic). Can you say the same for Albanians? Albanian music sounds Turkish, their religion is Islam and they look racially closer to the Near East than to most Europeans.

Indeed, Slovakia as such is not a major contributor to the world, but don't forget that they are a very small part of the Slavic people, who on the other hand, have contributed massively to humankind and Western Civilization, not any less than Germanic and Romance peoples in Western Europe.

"Your culture compared to ours is Third World. "

Your economy compared to theirs is Third World.

kufr

pre 15 godina

ben: Don't forget that albanians also built the Egypt pyramids, lived in Atlantis and when it sunk conquered albanian stronghold Jerusalem led by the pure albanian warlord Alexander the Great :)

Brian

pre 15 godina

There are more Albanians in Kosovo today than there were before Milosevic came to power. Albanians make-up 95% of the population in Kosovo, anybody who believes that they were victims of genocide and ethnic cleansing is a hopeless moron. If Albanians were victims of genocide there would be less of them, not more of them. After the Holocaust there were fewer Jews, than before. The number of Jews in Europe still has not recovered to pre-war levels. So what kind of genocide is this in Kosovo where we wind-up with more Albanians than we started with before the genocide in 1999? Something isn't right with the story NATO and the Albanians are telling us, and you don't have to be a rocket scientist to see.

ORTHODOX.RU

pre 15 godina

Peter Sudyka

OK Piotr ! Let's remain neutral to each other. Each of us expresses common views for the countries we represent. The only thing I ask you to do is to be more careful with the facts. Most of the folks here are not experts in the things that happened East to Visla River so they cannot judje what you say. Please be delicate.

I know that nothing can improve our reputation in Europe. Whatever we do we'll remain a consolidating factor for the West. I guess the confrontation may last 3-4 years needed for the Europeans to realize that strong Russia is something they have to live with and Poland will be the last one to accept this reality.

kufr

pre 15 godina

The video that was mentioned is now available with english subtitles at youtube: http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=Faktastick

Martin, SVK

pre 15 godina

johny: #78

I'm acquainted with certain antipathy that Albanians show (at least at surface) when it comes to questions of religion. I'm also well aware that it might be consequence of previous centuries of oppression. I see too how much they prefer to identify themselves as Albanians and Albanians above all, exactly like you said. Still, if I look at last (official) statistics, even from several decades ago, I see majority of population considered themselves muslims. It's very difficult for me to deny influence of this on Albanian behavior, especially when I see how able they are to push their cause through all that stays in their way. Like in the Kosovo problem.

About what you said in second part I must categorically disagree. We can talk about nations, we can talk about ethnical groups, we can talk about right of self-determination of nations. But we can't talk about one nation owing two state formations created in this circumstances. See. What is nation? Nation is considered a group of people possessing certain common traits. These are usually: common language, common culture, common history.. Germany and Austria may use common language but they have different history and even their cultures differ as they were parts (and even creators) of their own empires in the past. Australia is country of immigrants and located far from England lived its own life for centuries. Same for Belgium and Netherland, these countries have their own histories. Countries speaking "slavic languages" possess differences in their cultures too.. Slavic languages subdivide to several branches and mutual understanding is by far not that automatic as you might thing of it.

I don't see, however, any of these differences between Albanians from Kosovo (calling themselves "Kosovars") and Albanians living in Albania. Origin of inhabitants of Kosovo is mostly questioned. What I see in fact is artificially created state and certain effort to find (or create) some differences, even uniqueness, which doubtly stay on firm ground..

And, well even these waren't among cases you mentioned, there can be found some cases that suit to Kosovo problem: in fact there's resemblance to former Federal Republic of Germany and German Democratic Republic or to South Korea and North Korea today. So to speak in terms of mutual affiliation of their inhabitants, these cases are very familiar. Except that these two countries were divided and Kosovo was ripped off from Serbia. We all know stories of these countries, as we all know there was nothing natural about it. And there's nothing natural about Kosovo too.

johny

pre 15 godina

Martin those statistics you mention, the latest of them are from 1938, during King Zog's time. That said, if somebody was conducting a statistics tomorrow I would tell them that I am a Christian (catholic) depending on the day i might have described myself as someone who follows no church or religion but believes in God and Jesus Christ. Having said that I myself have never been in a catholic church and I don't intend to go there any time soon. Let me tell you about my orthodox and muslim part of my family. They like me have never been in a church or a mosque but if they were being asked for statistical purposes about their religion they might say they were orthodox or muslim, then depending on the day they might also say what I said. What I just described to you is not an isolated case. In fact it is the majority of us. If you dared me to put my hand on fire to confirm the veracity of my statement I would. You can chose to believe what you want. You can believe me or you can believe what you read from other people. The choice is yours. I had the money I would sponsor you and anyone who doubts what I am saying to go and visit Albania and Kosova itself so that you could see for yourself and make your mind up based on your own experiences and not on what you read on some online boards.

Second, read a little more about the times when Germany and Austria became states.You will discover that there is no difference between them, in terms of culture, and Kosova and Albania.
Speaking about differences.
All these countries you mentioned to me, the Slav countries, the Germanic countries etc, most of them developed their differences after they were separated from each other (eve though they might have differences at first). The split and being less in contact with each other emphasizes differences. Rest assured that in the case things remain as they are you will see many differences between Albanians in Kosova and Albania in the future, the same differences you are looking for. As a matter of fact up until 2003-2004 the Serbs themselves and the propaganda coming from the Serbian state was that Kosova Albanians are completely different form Albanians in Albania. It doesn't take much to find just a google away. When time for negotiations started they completely overhauled their propaganda, now emphasizing on the similarities between the Albanians of Kosova and those of Albania.
Again speaking of differences. If you have all the Slavic countries in the Balkans who have so many similarities among each other and so few differences, being separate and independent countries; and Kosova having so many differences with Serbia and so very few similarities, then according to your differences theory Kosova should be separate from Serbia.

P.S There are some Albanians from Kosova who consider themselves Kosovar first and foremost then Albanian. As time passes by we might be able to see more and more of those. Will you then be able to say that they are not different enough from Albania to be an independent country?

Stevan

pre 15 godina

“…I'm also well aware that it might be consequence of previous centuries of oppression…”

Martin, there are incredible mountains of propaganda produced about the Balkan through the 90’s. Balkan was and still is remote, unknown place for average westerner. Western public does not have any clue about this part of Europe, its history, cultures, relations …
That’s why professional propagandists had such an easy job. Public believes everything they’ we been told. West deliberately distorted reality to a very large extent, demonizing Serbs and victimizing all others. One of the biggest fairy tales is story about peaceful, freedom loving Albanians, that were victims of the Serb genocide through the centuries. In reality it was exactly the opposite. They were not oppressed, they were oppressors. As majority converted to Islam they got all the privileges and power against the Serbs. (Serbs stayed Christians, so they had no rights during long centuries of Turkish terror). Turks were very aware of importance of Kosovo for Serbs, so they by all means tried to destroy them in Kosovo and settle Albanians instead. Turks usually used Albanian troops to terrorize Serb population after numerous (unsuccessful) uprisings. So, over the centuries number of Serbs declined and number of Albanians grow. (So much for the genocide stories).

Albanian culture is incredibly violent. It is a clan society. Every young boy is trained in using guns, and every man is armed. Guns are routinely used for “settling” of the disputes. Clans are often practically in the war with each other. That can last for generations. Blood feuds are widely spread, and are practiced according to Kanun, that Ben is so proud off. Here are few links about the subject, see for yourself how that works and make your own conclusions. After seeing how cruel they often are to each other, ask yourself what can minorities expect.

http://meero.worldvision.org/news_article.php?newsID=527

http://www.shqiperia-etnike.com/she82/she82eng.htm

http://www.shqiperia-etnike.com/fillo.htm

http://judgments.fedcourt.gov.au/2004/J040860.yes.doc.htm

http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1aGqtBPLOs

nik

pre 15 godina

Martin SVK: "I don't see, however, any of these differences between Albanians from Kosovo (calling themselves "Kosovars") and Albanians living in Albania".

There is a huge difference!
Religion: Albanians in Kosvo are 100% Muslims. Since they had to live in Christian dominated land for almost a century, they find it necessary to expose their Islam. In Albania 30% of the peaple are Chistians. To soften the differences Enver Hoxha banned all religions. Now Worship is free, but it has a marginal role in the society.
Language: The official Albanian was based on the souther dialects. It differs from the dialects spoken in Kosovo more that Serbian differs from Croatian, or Bulgarian from macedonian.
History. 3-4 generations had completly different life experiance. Citizens of Yugoslavia had much mor freedoms and much higher standart of living than citizens of Albania. Albania will never annex Kosovo, not because of the Ahtisaari plan, but because the ordinary Albanians see Kosovars as a threat.