Requesting Lawsuit Against Croatia for WWII Genocide

Jasenovac Monument, in memory of more than 750,000 Serbian, Jewish and Roma victims of Croat WWII genocide.

Genocide Croats Committed in WWII Must Be Fully Acknowledged and Punished

Participants of the Fourth International Conference on Jasenovac, held in the city of Banja Luka, Republika Srpska, have adopted a Declaration requesting a lawsuit to be brought against the state of Croatia for genocide committed over Serbs, Jews and Gypsies during the Second World War.

Declaration demands that Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina and governments of Republika Srpska and Serbia bring up charges against Croatia for the genocide of Serbs, Jews and Roma committed in the Jasenovac system of death camps in the fascist Independent State of Croatia (NDH).

The document recommends that Council of Ministers of BiH, RS and Serbian government seek compensation for victims of Croat genocide and for their descendants before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague. It further requests the governments of Croatia, Republika Srpska and Serbia to start a procedure for unifying the Jasenovac Complex, currently divided between Bosnia and Croatia, and to put it under UNESCO protection.

Conference participants also requested immediate investigation of the Ustice area — the location of the mass grave of more than 12,000 Roma victims, according to the document.

With the adoption of the Declaration the two-day Fourth International Conference on Jasenovac in which over 170 members participated, submitting more than 50 reports and documents, has ended.

Jasenovac Holocaust, First Day of the Conference

“The numbers are important, but holocaust can be a one, single victim. My mother was suffocated and then burned in Auschwitz for no other reason but because she was Jewish. Isn’t that horrendous in and of itself?” — Arie Livne, representative of the World Jewish Congress, addressed the present with this testimony on Wednesday, on the first day of the Fourth International Conference on Jasenovac, held in Banja Luka’s Ban Court. His reminder about the horrific fate of any of hundreds of thousands of Jasenovac martyrs was a comment on the discussions over the past years, mainly between Serbs and Croats, regarding the numbers and scope of the Jasenovac holocaust.

During the two-day conference of historians, theologians, politicians and survivors of the Croat death camps, Republika Srpska Prime Minister Milorad Dodik warned that this massive crime was never officially condemned or punished.

“Spreading the falsities and distorting the facts about Jasenovac is part of the vile campaign to politicize and minimize the victims of these monstrous death camps,” said Dodik.

On Wednesday, the Orthodox Christian and Jewish religious services were held for the souls of the cruelly slaughtered Jasenovac Complex prisoners. Memorial Liturgy was served by the Serbian Bishop of Bihac-Petrovac Diocese Chrysostom, and the prayers for the killed Jews were read by the Belgrade Rabbi Isak Asiel.

Vladimir Umeljic, Belgrade historian and theologian, has put forward a proposal to send a resolution to the European power centers demanding that Croatia’s EU membership be conditioned by the full acknowledgment of the Croat Jasenovac genocide.

Croat Government Keeps Covering Up the Genocide

“The new Croat government is using different means in an attempt to do the same as Franjo Tudjman: cover up their crimes committed in the WWII,” said Professor Srboljub Zivanovic, President of the British Department of the International Slavic Academy of Arts and Science and one of the regular guests of the international conferences on WWII genocides, in the interview with Vecernje Novosti.

“They are now presenting Jasenovac as a ‘labor camp’ or, as they say ‘concentration and labor camp’,” notes Zivanovic. “This, of course, is only an interim stage and in a year or two it will turn into a nice and clean ‘labor camp’ only.”

“The entire cover-up campaign started when, during the operations ‘Flash’ and ‘Storm,’ Croats re-captured Jasenovac, but also since the Republika Srpska government headed by Milorad Dodik handed over to Washington all the archives and material from Jasenovac kept in Banja Luka, without even listing the inventory. Americans gave everything back to Croats, and we now have the entirely new ‘exhibit’ setup where, for example, there are no Roma victims at all.”

Jasenovac Death Camp Took More Than 730,000 Lives

“Out of 80,000 Gypsies who lived in the fascist Independent State of Croatia, only 422 were left in Croatia and 457 in Bosnia-Herzegovina!”, said professor. “In five or six books published in Croatia recently, one author claims no more than thousand people were killed in Jasenovac, the other that there may have been two thousand Jasenovac victims and the third one cites these two and concludes this is not quite correct, that there could have been up to 5,000 people killed in Jasenovac death camps.”

“Is it possible for anyone to be that brazen, when I held in my own hands at least that many children skeletons and only from the few graves,” asks professor Zivanovic who, in 1964, was a member of the team of court’s forensic anthropologists, assigned to determine the approximate number of the Croat genocide victims buried in Jasenovac mass graves.

“Our report was first published only in 1992 and it clearly states: 730,000 human skeletons on the territory of this death camp,” says Zivanovic, explaining that this research did not include the scores of victims whose bodies were sent to Serbia down the rivers of Sava and Danube, that he had personally seen as a six year old child in Serbian city of Smederevo.

The Full Truth is Only 50 Inches Below the Ground

Srboljub Zivanovic notes that the commission was set to fail, so all of the Belgrade and Zagreb professors refused to take part in it and he, as a young assistant professor was assigned to work with another three young men, two from Slovenia and one from Croatia.

“Before us, there was a group of court-assigned medical doctors from Ljubljana (Slovenia), who drilled the soil with electric drills and would mark as the grave site each place where they found human remains. Our group of forensic anthropologists opened parts of those grave sites, and that is how we established the number of 730,000 skeletons. On average, there were 27 skeletons per 2 square meters/yards,” says professor Zivanovic, adding that the sophisticated modern methods allow for much more precision, since “the full truth is no further than 120 centimeters [47 inches] below the ground.”

Vatican Policy of Exterminating Orthodox Serbs Alive and Well Since the 19th Century

“In the 19th century Vatican made a decision to exterminate the ‘heretical, schismatic’ Eastern Orthodox Serbs,” says Dr. Zivanovic. “The same policy is still in force, since the Serbian nation has to be in numbers, militarily and economically weaker than the Roman Catholic Croats and Slovenes. The common state was imposed on us two times, because we had to save these Roman Catholic nations twice from paying reparations after their defeat in two world wars,” stresses Oxford professor.

“Serbian teachers do not teach our children that this same policy is being enforced since the First Serbian Uprising [against the Ottoman Turks]; nowhere in Serbian textbooks is it written that Serbia was under Western sanctions since the Balkan wars until the First World War… Everyone is surprised when I tell them that France had sent 3,000 of its well-armed soldiers who, with La Marseillaise on their lips, were helping Muslim Turks to wipe out Karadjordje’s rebels freeing Serbia from Muslim occupation.”

Vatican’s Saints of Croatia

Recently, Vatican has proclaimed three Croats the saints of Roman church, says Dr Zivanovic.

“The first one is ‘blessed’ Dominik Mandic who headed the Croatian Confraternity of San Girolamo in Vatican. The entire work of this ‘saint’ was dedicated to the destruction of Yugoslavia and he seemed to have been successful. This man was one of the main organizers of the transport of Pavelic, Artukovic, Sakic and the other Croat WWII war criminals through the so-called ratlines to safety, to South America and United States,” says professor Zivanovic.

“The second major ideologue of the Croat slaughterhouse, who was continuously blessing ustasha bloody hands, was Alojzije Stepinac. He is now declared ‘blessed’ by the Vatican [by the previous pope Karol Wojtyla], he is being bowed to and people kneel in front of his grave in Zagreb.”

The Unspeakable Swineishness

“The third, latest Croat ‘saint,’ is Ivan Merc who educated butcher-friars, as a teacher in the monastery Petricevac near Banja Luka. In that very monastery Merc’s student, the infamous evil-incarnate known as Father Satan Majstorovic, organized a group of 12 ustashas headed by himself as the 13th, like Christ, and took them to a Serbian primary school to an unimaginable slaughter.”

“He asked teacher to bring forward her smartest pupil and when the little girl started to recite a poem, the Merc’s student slowly cut her throat in front of her teacher and all the other children, instructing his ustashas: ‘See how I am baptizing Serbian bastards. Let this blood fall on my soul, and I will forgive all of your sins for everything you do today.’ And more then 1,400 children, men and women were butchered by their knives during that day alone.”

Croat Genocide, Since Ustashi Were Croats

Slavko Goldstein, the president of the Croat whitewashed Jasenovac memorial who recently determined offhand that the final number of the victims in this death camp complex is 80,000 at the most, asked professor Srboljub Zivanovic during the Third International Conference on Jasenovac held in Jerusalem to stop using the term “Croat genocide” and speak about “Ustasha genocide” instead.

“I told him that Ustashi were Croats, not Nazis. Nazis were in Germany, Nazis were in Serbia because they occupied Serbia. There were Nazis in Croatia too, but only in the region occupied by Mussolini. Therefore, the Croat genocide is the correct term, and I am very sorry that it is so,” said Oxford professor.

Jasenovac in pictures, genocide against Serbs during the 1990s civil wars.

Potsdam: Russia Will Not Cave Under Pressure

Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov

Lavrov: Time and Direct Talks the Only Way to Lasting Solution

Russia believes that direct talks between Belgrade and Pristina are the only way to resolve the future status of Kosovo and Metohija, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in Potsdam on Wednesday.

The day-long meeting of foreign ministers of the world’s richest nations, designed to fine-tune the political agenda for the Group of Eight Summit hosted by Chancellor Angela Merkel in the Baltic resort of Heiligendamm from June 6-8, took place in the Potsdam’s Cecilienhof hotel.

According to the Western reports, while Western diplomats said they had expected no major breakthrough over southern Serbian province at the Potsdam meeting, they later claimed they were “surprised by the tough stance” of Russia. Minister Lavrov asked his Western colleagues why they were in such a hurry to grant independence to Serbian Kosovo province, while for 40 years they had never supported or worked on granting independence to Palestine.

Minister Lavrov said that Belgrade and Pristina need time to continue the talks and that only when the sides reach an agreement, in case of Serbia as in all the other similar cases around the world, it is possible to support what they agree to. The most important thing is that the Serbs and Pristina’s representatives of Albanian minority have to talk, said Lavrov, adding that no crisis may be solved without reaching an agreement. Underscoring that the talks have yet to produce results, Minister Lavrov said that Russia’s partners within the Group 8 are aware of Moscow’s stand.

“The fate of Kosovo and the fate of Serbia as a whole should not be decided in New York, Potsdam or within any other formats. It should be done through direct talks,” Russia’s Foreign Minister said.

Lavrov stressed that the “Kosovo case” is not the only such conflict among those that are being discussed for years and that it is the most important conflict under the control of the international community, that could set a dangerous precedent for a number of other regions in the world.

Stands of US, Russia On Kosovo-Metohija Province Irreconcilable

The stands of Russia and the United States on Kosovo are diametrically opposite and there is no way that they could be reconciled, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in Potsdam on Wednesday, as quoted by the Russian news agency Itar-Tass.

Addressing a press conference following a meeting of the G8 foreign ministers, Lavrov expressed hope that “Russia won’t have to exercise its right to veto” on Serbian Kosovo province in the United Nations Security Council, Itar-Tass said.

“But there must be no situation where the UN Security Council supports a resolution that is unacceptable to one of the parties in the conflict,” Russian Foreign Minister was quoted by the news agency as saying, adding that “Russia wants a lasting solution to be found for Kosovo province.”

West May Wish to Forget, But China Remembers

Chinese embassy in Belgrade in the early morning hours on May 8, 1999, after being hit by three Tomahawk missiles flown straight from Denver, Colorado, during the U.S.-led NATO aggression on Serbia.

China Supports Serbia’s Stand on Kosovo-Metohija Province

Chinese Ambassador Li Guobang said on Wednesday that China supports Serbia’s stand on the resolution of the future status of its southern province of Kosovo-Metohija.

During a meeting with the new Serbian parliament speaker Oliver Dulic, China’s representative emphasized the necessity to find a compromise solution acceptable to Serbia, the Serbian parliament said in a statement.

Ambassador Li and Dulic said that both countries will continue to develop traditionally good relations, especially at the parliament level, by setting up a friendship group and exchanging parliamentary experience.

Belgrade Massacre Neither Forgotten Nor Forgiven

While the smallest, most insignificant banana-republics practically beg to be allowed to join Western military alliance NATO, the big ones remain quite reserved towards the U.S.-led pact, mainly due to its poor record acquired during the recent history, when it served as an air force to a separatist Muslim Albanian minority in Serbian Kosovo-Metohija province, launching a three-month military aggression on a sovereign state in order to seize part of Serbian territory.

NATO wants “military-to-military” relations with Chinese Army.

Intensely courting China, the bloc’s Military Committee Chairman Gen. Ray Henault told Xinhua on Wednesday that NATO wants to establish “direct military-to-military relations” with Chinese armed forces, seeking to “shake off the embassy-bombing shadow,” i.e. NATO’s air strike on a Chinese embassy in Belgrade, when the embassy building was completely destroyed and three Chinese citizens killed.

“Just as NATO Secretary General (Jaap de Hoop Scheffer) put it, NATO is open to develop relations with China whenever there is opportunity,” NATO general said.

Responding rather coolly that China is willing to “maintain contact” and “intensify exchanges” with NATO on the basis of equality and mutual respect, Chinese Foreign Minister Jiang Yu asserted that the alliance’s bombing of Chinese embassy in Belgrade eight years ago is neither forgotten nor forgiven.

Speaking at the regular news briefing on Tuesday, Minister Jiang Yu once again rejected official Western explanation that the attack on Chinese embassy was a result of mistake, since NATO did not have the proper maps and did not know the building for which they flown Tomahawk missiles straight from Denver, Colorado, on a U.S. bomber was, in fact, China’s embassy.

“The conclusion was already drawn 8 years ago. We have been very clear about our position on this issue. The so-called ‘accident’ theory is untenable and unacceptable,” said Chinese Foreign Minister.

EU: Croat Jutarnji List’s Report Total Fabrication

P.S. On Croat Hallucinations and Lies: EU Appalled

VIENNA, May 30 (Tanjug) – All elements in the report published by Croatia’s Jutarnji List on Russia’s alleged requests relating to the Kosovo-Metohija issue are pure fabrication, European Union representative in the talks on the future status of Kosovo and Metohija Stephan Lehne said in a statement to Vienna-based daily Der Kurier on Wednesday.

Referring to a source “close to Moscow’s political leadership,” the Zagreb daily on Tuesday published a claim that Brussels and Washington had agreed to a two-year moratorium on Kosovo province’s membership in the United Nations, deployment of Russian troops in Serbian-populated enclaves and delaying (or giving up, according to the Reuter’s edition of the Croat article) NATO expansion to Ukraine and Georgia in return for Russian “Yes.”

“It is a complete nonsense. Each element of that newspaper report has been fabricated,” said appalled EU representative Lehne.

Croat Hallucinations and Albanian Threats

Russian UN Ambassador: Mushrooms In Croatia Must be Super-Trippy

Russian United Nations Ambassador Vitaly Churkin rejected as “wild speculations” the nonsensical article by the Croat Vlado Vurusic published by the Croatian daily Jutarnji List and blindly republished by the Reuters, Washington Times and Scotsman, among others, which claimed that Russian Federation has agreed to allow the adoption of Western resolution in the UN Security Council enabling severing of Serbian Kosovo-Metohija province, for close-to-nothing.

“These reports are false,” said Churkin to the reporters at the UN New York headquarters, referring to the tall tale Croats peddled. “Things are exactly where they were yesterday or the day before yesterday… As far as those fundamental differences (between Russia and the West) are concerned, they have not changed at all,” said Ambassador Churkin, adding that the positions of Moscow and the authors’ of the resolution draft —U.S., Germany, Britain and France — will be brought closer when those who have put together the resolution proposal agree with the Russian stand. All the while, the Russian position regarding southern Serbian province has remained unchanged, emphasized Churkin according to the Itar-tass report.

According to RIA Novosti, Churkin also stressed that Russia is not interested in bargaining over Kosovo province, reminding that Moscow wants the continuation of real negotiations and creation of conditions for decent, safe and secure environment for Serbs and other non-Albanians in the Serbian province.

“We are concerned with the objectivity and standards, keeping the classical approach. We have pointed it all out, everything is as before and there are no breakthroughs,” said Vitaly Churkin.

Unlike Croats, Albanians are Not Tripping: Threats to Serbia and Warnings to the World

Belgrade daily Vecernje Novosti reports about the angry reactions of the Albanian-language media to the fact that Kosovo independence — trumpeted throughout as a done deal during the past years and promised to Serbia’s Albanian minority in Kosovo-Metohija province by a number of Western administrators — seems to be drifting further away.

The fading prospects of ethnic Albanians seizing part of Serbia’s territory have stirred up the resentment both in southern Serbian province and in neighboring Albania to such a degree that their media is nowadays intensely concerned with what should be done in case Serbian province does not get severed, as they demanded.

Kosovo Albanian war criminal Agim Ceku, assigned the lofty position of a “prime minister” within the province’s temporary self-government under the NATO auspices, has repeated numerous times during the past months that Kosovo-Metohija status will be solved “by the end of month.” Alongside Kosovo Albanian assessments that “Ceku says so in order to calm them down, while the independence is barely visible,” press from Albanian capital Tirana claims that “Kosovo independence is nowhere in sight,” underscored with the threat: “See you in the next war!”

Although some believe such warnings from Albania serve to add pressure ahead of the announced visit of President George Bush to Albanian capital, scheduled for June 10, separatist media in Pristina is filled with statements by the Western analysts throwing doubts on hoped-for solution, combined with wild accusations that “Serbia wants to draw Europe into a new religious war.”

At the same time, along the headlines like “Is Kosovo Ready for the Worst,” some secessionist papers on Sunday assessed that Kosovo-Metohija province has “unwittingly become a strategic parcel of Russia’s international influence,” begun with Russian opposition to the U.S. missile shields in Eastern Europe. Accusing Russia of “blackmailing even the EU” Albanian secessionists in southern Serbian province ask to what degree “is Kosovo ready for the worst” — being denied an independent status.

Therefore, they warn their followers not to believe the whole thing is settled, since “nothing is solved.” Instead, Albanian press insists Kosovo-Metohija Muslim separatists should ask “what are Albanians willing to do” in the event the solution they lobbied for, the second Albanian state on the territory of Serbia, is not reached.

Infectious Croat Lies Spread Through Western Agitprop Agencies

Reuters, Washington Times Succumb to Croat Liar-Virus Accompanied by High Fever, Malice and Outlandish Blabber

If anyone still doubts that mainstream media is largely just a well oiled propaganda machine spewing lies, disinformation and loads of crap most of the time, here comes the latest proof in the shape of a rather ludicrous article by someone named Vlado Vurusic published in yesterday’s Croat daily that was readily accepted by British Reuters and Washington Times among others, and republished almost word-for-word without a single shred of evidence or an independent confirmation by any of distinguished news editors or reporters employed by their respective Agitprop Agencies.

It did not bother them in the least that some Croat Vurusic appeared to be the only man on Earth in possession of information that would certainly be a front page headline fit for any respectable news agency; they did not think it suspicious that this Best Informed Man on Earth (sadly employed only by the Croatian Jutarnji List), instead of citing one reliable, verifiable source claims his “information” comes from “semi-official sources” that are also “close to the Russian leadership” (?!); they didn’t stop to ponder the ridiculous claims this Croat came up with — no siree Bob! — they grabbed it with both hands and ran with it, shaking in their boots of sheer excitement and pleasure the Croat Lump of Coal produced, because it looked so shiny, whispering the sweet nothings in their ears, that the Serbs have been left out to hang by the Russians after all.

Supposedly respectable supposedly newspaper Jutarnji List’s supposedly journalist Vlado Vurusic wrote that Russians have suddenly agreed to let the US-French/German/British resolution pass in the UN Security Council, i.e. they have decided to allow the amputation of Serbian province of Kosovo-Metohija in exchange for the following trifles: to have Russian troops stationed in Serbian ghettos in southern province (?), to stipulate that newly independent Kosovo State will not be allowed to join the United Nations for two years (the preposterous idea was already suggested two weeks ago by the Albanian Brussels-stationed lobbying group ICG, only to be instantly rejected as border-line offensive by Russia) AND to have Ukraine and Georgia not accepted to NATO in June (?!).

Now, one can understand if Croat Vlado Vurusic is either stupid or so ill-informed he actually thinks that “Russian conditions” he conjured out of thin air would seem plausible, and it is easy to understand if Jutarnji List is run by stupid or ignorant editors who thought Vurusic’s figment of imagination seems fine, but it is really hard to understand Reuters, Washington Times and B92 editors would be THAT stupid, careless and uninformed about Russian position regarding Serbia and its southern province, to actually translate Vurusic’s steaming pile of cow dung and proudly exhibit it for their readers.

If they were not blinded by wishful thinking, perhaps they would have realized that, at this point, it would take WAY more for Russia to even consider betraying its firmly held principled, well-argued and highly ethical position, reiterated few thousand times thus far, certainly much more than being allowed to send few of their soldiers to Kosovo-Metohija, more than merely postponing independent Serbian province’s entry into the UN for two measly years and way more than delaying Ukraine’s and Georgia’s NATO membership for what? another month or two? The whole thing reads like idiot’s guide to political idiocy, but apparently Reuters, Washington Times, Scotsman and the rest thought it swell.

Russia: No Haggling — New Negotiations and Solution Acceptable to Belgrade

And, sure enough, early last evening representative of Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Andrey Vladimirovich Krivtov interrupted his dinner to have a good hearty laugh over Croat/UK hallucinations. “It is absolutely out of the question for Moscow to accept anything less than new negotiations and the compromise solution! Those are ludicrous disinformations, without a single grain of truth — Moscow does not even consider anything similar. We have not changed our position confirmed many times over. We have no intention to send our troops to Kosovo-Metohija province, but we do intend to push for new, direct talks between Belgrade and Pristina,” stressed Krivtov.

Regarding the more often floated Western suggestion of partitioning the province, Krivtov said he heard it for the first time from some German commentator, but believes those are merely personal opinions and nothing more. “We are preparing to discuss Kosovo-Metohija issue during the G-8 Summit,” said Krivtov, adding that southern Serbian province will doubtlessly be one of the main subjects of talks between presidents and government representatives during the meeting at the highest level in German seaside resort Heiligendamm. “We expect to be exposed to a severe pressure once again in order to speed up the process, but we also expect a Samara-repeat in that regard,” emphasized Krivtov.

Serbia’s daily Glas Javnosti (which sticks to reporting, rather than inventing the news, a practice Reuters might consider adopting) writes that, contrary to Croat, UK et al. wet dreams, Moscow diplomatic circles are discussing a plan according to which Russian Ambassador in Belgrade would take the document Serbian government adopted Friday — the Initiative for opening a new stage of talks — and submit it to Kremlin, after which Russia would present that document in Heiligendamm as a platform for the new negotiations between Belgrade and Pristina.

Kosovo Timely Warnings

Veto-wielding China resists EU pressure: Kosovo solution must be acceptable to Serbia, Chinese FM Yang Jiechi (EU’s Solana and Steinmeier in the background).

China: Kosovo Province Solution Must Be Acceptable to Belgrade

China’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Yang Jiechi asserted in Hamburg that China wants the solution for Serbian Kosovo-Metohija province that would be acceptable to both Serbs and Serbia’s ethnic Albanian minority concentrated in the province.

Minister Jiechi, whose country is one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council with the power of veto, is attending the Asia-EU meeting (ASEM) of foreign ministers, which opened in Hamburg, Germany, on Monday. Reporting from this gathering of 27 EU and 16 Asian foreign ministers, German media claims that “according to the diplomatic sources, there is no unity regarding the possible UN SC decision on the Kosovo-Metohija status.”

Cato Institute: Ahtisaari Plan Represents Dangerous Precedent

Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies at the Cato Institute Ted Galen Carpenter assessed that Serbia’s Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica is absolutely correct regarding the international law and history in relation to the issue of status of Kosovo-Metohija province.

Speaking for Washington radio station Voice of America, Carpenter noted that acceptance of the plan drafted by Martti Ahtisaari in the UN Security Council would have at least two alarming consequences: creation of a dangerous precedent with further impact on the region and Europe in general and, secondly, the imposed breaking up of a sovereign and democratic state would also serve as a precedent that, in the long run, could be a source of problems for the European Union and United States.

French Defense Minister: March 2004 Pogrom of Serbs Urges Caution

According to Tanjug news agency, the new French Minister of Defense Herve Morin assessed in the city of Mitrovica that Serbian Kosovo province needs a solution that will bring peace to its population.

On his first official trip abroad since he took up the job in the newly elected French government, Morin told reporters that it is of the utmost importance to solve the Kosovo-Metohija issue in a way which would guarantee the peaceful and safe environment for all of the Kosovo residents.

The French Minister emphasized that the pogrom of Serbs during March 2004 riots is “urging caution and unceasing vigilance.”

During his one-day visit to Serbian southern province, Morin met with some 2,800 French peacekeepers stationed in the northern part of Kosovo-Metohija.

“At this delicate stage, your role is essential in securing the peace and safety, and in preventing the crisis that could jeopardize the important negotiating process,” said Morin to his country’s soldiers deployed in Serbian province.

Descent of the Holy Spirit—Pentecost

Descent of the Holy Spirit: Birthday of The Church

“When the day of Pentecost had come they were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed as resting upon each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit…” (Acts 2:1-4).

The Holy Spirit that Christ had promised to his disciples came on the day of Pentecost (Jn 14:26, 15:26; Lk 24:49; Acts 1:5). The apostles received “the power from on high,” and they began to preach and bear witness to Jesus as the risen Christ, the King and the Lord. This moment has traditionally been called the birthday of the Church.

Day of the Holy Trinity

In the liturgical services of the Feast of Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit is celebrated together with the full revelation of the divine Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The fullness of the Godhead is manifested with the Spirit’s coming to man, and the Church hymns celebrate this manifestation as the final act of God’s Self-disclosure and Self-donation to the world of His creation. For this reason Pentecost Sunday is also called Trinity Day in the Orthodox tradition. Often on this day the icon of the Holy Trinity — particularly that of the three angelic figures who appeared to Abraham, the forefather of the Christian faith — is placed in the center of the church. This icon is used with the traditional pentecostal icon which shows the tongues of fire hovering over the Twelve Apostles, the original prototype of the Church, who are sitting in unity surrounding a symbolic image of “cosmos,” the world.

On Pentecost we have the final fulfillment of the Christ’s Mission and the first beginning of the messianic age of the Kingdom of God mystically present in this world in the Church of the Messiah. For this reason the fiftieth day stands as the beginning of the era which is beyond the limitations of this world, fifty being that number which stands for eternal and heavenly fulfillment in Jewish and Christian mystical piety: seven times seven, plus one.

Pentecost Has Happened to Us

Thus, Pentecost is called an apocalyptic day, which means the day of final revelation. It is also called an eschatological day, which means the day of the final and perfect end (in Greek eschaton means the end). For when the Messiah comes and the Lord’s Day is at hand, the “last days” are inaugurated in which “God declares: … I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh.” This is the ancient prophecy to which the Apostle Peter refers in the first sermon of the Christian Church which was preached on the first Sunday of Pentecost (Acts 2: 1 7; Joel 2: 28-32).

The feast of Pentecost is not simply the celebration of an event which took place centuries ago. It is the celebration of what must happen and does happen to us in the Church today. We all have died and risen with the Messiah-King, and we all have received his Most Holy Spirit. We are the “temples of the Holy Spirit.” God’s Spirit dwells in us (Rom 8; 1 Cor 2-3, 12; 2 Cor 3; Gal 5; Eph 2-3). We, by our own membership in the Church, have received “the seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit” in the sacrament of chrismation. Pentecost has happened to us.

Volunteer Squads for Kosovo-Metohija Defense

“We are, from baptism, signed up in the Army of Holy Archistratig Michail,” St. Justin of Celije.

Volunteer Squad for Kosovo-Metohija Defense Set Up in Montenegro

Montenegrin Patriotic Movement for Kosovo-Metohija said in a statement on Thursday that the first volunteer squad for Kosovo defense, which will be based in one of the coastal towns, had been set up at the patriotic assembly in the city of Ulcinj.

The Movement rallies the refugees from Kosovo province and all people in Montenegro who have some connections with Serbia’s southern province and want it to remain within Serbia, the organization said.

After its May 23 assembly in Ulcinj, the movement said it “did not set up a paramilitary unit or an armed group, but a patriotic squad of volunteers who would join Serbian patriots in case of a need to defend the southern province.”

St. Tsar Lazar Guard, Serbia’s Volunteers for Kosovo Province Defense

The gathering of volunteers in Montenegro follows the formation of the St. Tsar Lazar Guard in Serbia, at the beginning of the month.

Although the Serbian volunteer assembly hosted by the Serbian National Movement in the Lazarica church in the city of Krusevac on May 5 was interrupted by the police and subsequent public gathering of the Guard was prohibited by the Serbian authorities, the organizers claim that the swear-in ceremony went as planned and the Guard vowed to liberate Kosovo-Metohija province in case it is forcefully seized from Serbia.

A hundred veterans have attended the Serbian volunteer assembly and, according to the Serbian Veterans Movement president Veljko Vasiljević, the number of eager volunteers in Serbia has topped 5,000 mark at the beginning of May, before the Assembly was scheduled to take place.

Like the Montenegro volunteers, the St. Tsar Lazar Guard formed in Serbia emphasized they are not an armed squad of paramilitaries, but a patriotic assembly of men who would submit to the command of regular Serbian Army in the event Kosovo-Metohija is severed from Serbia.

Kosovo, a Noose Around Both U.S. and EU Necks

U.S. Expert: Autonomy for Kosovo-Metohija Within Serbia is the Best Solution

Editor of The National Interest Nikolas Gvosdev said in an interview with Tanjug that independence of Kosovo-Metohija province, supervised or any other would not bring stability to the region.

The result of independence would be authorities in the province that would not be recognized by the neighbors, including Serbia, and which would not have a way or motivation to fight the problems which are the basis of the instability, such as organized crime, human trafficking, terrorist incursions, evaluated Gvosdev.

The U.S. expert believes that the best solution for the future status of Kosovo and Metohija would be broad autonomy of the province within Serbia.

The best solution would be maximum degree of autonomy, preserving territorial integrity of Serbia, within which Kosovo would have an ability to be independently present, to a certain degree, in the international scene, said Gvosdev.

Undermining the Principle of Inviolability of Borders Could Harm USA Itself in Future

Gvosdev also commented on the reference to Chapter VII of the UN Charter by the West, as a possible basis for a new resolution on Kosovo and evaluated that the Security Council is in that respect on untested grounds.

The idea that the Security Council or the UN could change borders and bypass the inviolability of borders of their member states without any need is a major precedent, said Gvosdev.

If you decide today to break up one state, we will find ourselves on slippery grounds, because we do not know where would that lead the world, which is still based on sovereign states, said Gvosdev, warning that undermining those principles in the future could harm the United States of America itself.

Gvosdev’s interview with Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs is available at The National Interest Online.

Primakov Surprised EU Does Not Seem Worried Over Proposed Dismemberment of Serbia

Former Russian Premier and Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov has warned that as soon as Kosovo-Metohija province would become independent, other parts of the world will be faced with heightened separatist tendencies all over.

“The stand of other countries surprises me,” he said in an interview for the Austrian daily Wiener Zeitung. “Are there no separatist tendencies elsewhere?”, he wondered.

“There are, and there are lots of them,” he pointed out, stressing that Europe was full of such secessionist movements and drives.

“As soon as Kosovo becomes independent, similar aspirations will present themselves everywhere — all the way from Montenegro and Bosnia to other regions in Europe — and the unity of not only Balkan countries would be threatened,” Primakov explained.

He wondered why are the hasty solutions forced, reminding that former Austrian Chancellor Franz Vranitzky had also warned of such moves.

Cartoon by Zoran Matic—Mazos (Serbia)