Had the king of Saudi Arabia or a member of the House of Saud been insulted by the western media, chances are that all hell would have broken loose. There would be diplomatic protests and the Saudi ambassador from the offending country’s capital--London, Paris etc--would be recalled to Riyadh for consultations.
As confused as they have always been regarding their stance in world conflicts, many Muslims seem unable to form a coherent and comprehensible position on NATO’s bombardment of Yugoslavia
Some Muslims have a tendency to look at events through rose-tinted spectacles. The Nato bombing campaign against Yugoslavia falls under this category. Legitimate concern for the plight of Muslim Kosovars has led to profuse thanking of the US and European governments for acting to ‘save’ the Kosovars.
The war in Bosnia was a defining chapter in the development of the global Muslim Ummah. The sight of Muslims being slaughtered by the thousand for their religion in the heart of Europe moved Muslims to previously unimagined feelings of solidarity and brotherhood.
An estimated 1.7 million Kosovar Muslims have been expelled from their homes in the three weeks since NATO launched its airstrikes to protect them on March 25. Tens of thousands of men have been killed, and at least 100,000 men more are missing, feared dead.
The west left the Muslims of Kosova to the Serbs’ mercy on February 23 when the threat of NATO air strikes was withdrawn at the end of 17 days of peace talks in Paris without any political agreement or sending NATO troops but with the Kosovars forced to agree to disarming.
The US admitted on December 3 that its troops in Kosova are helping the Serbs to maintain control of the region and to prevent local people from returning to their homes. That is the upshot of the US confirmation that they are providing armoured escorts to Serb police patrols in the Malisheva region, and a telling reflection of their true role in Kosova.
Fighting in Kosova continued apparently unabated despite last month’s supposed ‘withdrawal’ of Serbian forces after the Holbrooke-Milosevic pact of October 13 and the lifting of the threat of NATO airstrikes against the Serbs.
Serbia’s ethnic cleansing of parts of Kosova was stepped up again early this month, in the west of the country. The epicentre of the latest drive appears to be Decan, a town of some 60,000 Kosovars and an estimated 500 Serbs.
Kosova went to the polls on March 22, to re-elect Dr Ibrahim Rugova as president and to elect 130 members to the country’s second Parliament, even though the first Parliament, elected in 1992, was never able to meet.
The long awaited and feared Serb assault on the Muslims of Kosova was feared to have begun earlier this month. In scenes eerily reminiscent to the beginning of the Serb assault on Bosnia-Herzegovina...
Two Kosovar activists died at the hands of Serb police last month, shortly before they were due to go on trial charged with terrorism and other offences against state security. Adrian Krasniqi was gunned down in the street on October 16, and Jonuz Zeneli died two days later in a prison hospital in Belgrade...
