Partija rada
Belgrade, March 22, 2004
The escalation of clashes in Kosova is evidence once again that nationalism and the nationalist evil not only bring pain and suffering to other nations, but are also an obstacle for ones own nation to achieve its freedom and prosperity. The Albanian people in Kosova, after the suffering caused by the Belgrade regime, are in a position to liberate themselves from that regime. However, that liberation cannot be achieved by clashes with the Serbian people living in Kosova, but in the first place by attempts to build a free and prosperous Kosova together with the Serbian people.
Belgrade, whoever has been in power, has taken an extremely reactionary and colonial stance toward Kosova, as if this province had to be governed from Belgrade, treating Albanians as a hostile nation whose people are considered second-class citizens. Even after the arrival of NATO forces in Kosova, the regime in Belgrade postponed solving the question of Kosova, and benefited from contradictions between the imperialists, just to get Kosova back under its administration. By using their emissaries in the Kosova Parliament, by the influence of the secret services, by preventing the creation of a united city of Kosovska Mitrovica, and by pleading for the break up of Kosova into cantons, Belgrade, in fact, is trying to prevent Kosova from gaining independence.
The Albanian movement, after rejecting the ideological platform on which it grew up, and after asking for help from the NATO forces, won its "freedom" at a very high price, by exchanging Belgrade's oppression for Imperialist oppression. The Albanian movement is now at a crossroads, at which progressive forces within the movement must raise their struggle to a higher level, or they will end up like the Serbian nationalists, as chauvinists and Imperialist servants.
The Serbian people in Kosova have been brought into a situation where they are exposed to the hostility of the Albanian people. This is not only a heritage of the historical past, in which Serbian people in Kosova were in the service of the colonial policy of Belgrade toward Kosova, but it is also a consequence of the non-existence of progressive forces among the Serbian people in Kosova who would build up a different relationship toward the Albanian people, and a different attitude toward their role in building a free and democratic Kosova. The Serbian people in Kosova are led by reactionary forces which are continuing the position of Great-Serbian nationalism, and which are in the service of the authorities in Belgrade. The Serbian people in Kosova now have a historical task: to get rid of the colonial policy of Serbia toward Kosova, and to defeat those forces in Kosova which serve the reactionary regimes in Belgrade. For this historical role of the Serbian people in Kosova it is necessary to give full support to the progressive forces in the Albanian movement.
At the present moment, the regime in Belgrade is using the events in Kosova to strengthen its unitary project, to mobilize the people on a united "patriotic" platform, and to please the Imperialists more than ever, acting as their faithful servant.
The USA will not give up its leading role in creating policy in the Balkans. They want, by incorporating Serbia and Montenegro into the service of NATO, to make it impossible to lose control over Belgrade, so that Belgrade would fall under the influence of Russia, or that the European Union would endanger the influence of the USA in the Balkans. At the same time, the USA will try to continue to control the Albanian movement to achieve its broader aims, and it would try to suppress any sign of anti-American militant Islam, or revolutionary internationalism within the movement.
The current clashes in Kosova, beside the damage which they cause to the struggle of the Albanian people, also prove that the regime in Belgrade, after suffering defeat, is again intensifying its aspirations toward Kosova, which is leading to a split within the Albanian movement, and more than ever there are emerging differences between the Albanian movement and the Imperialist forces in Kosova.
Partija rada is of the opinion that Kosova belongs to the peoples who live there. Partija rada is of the opinion that these peoples must achieve their freedom. That means that the struggle against the policy of Belgrade must develop into a fight against the presence of the Imperialists in the Balkans, and against the Albanian capitalists in Kosova. For such a historical role it is necessary that the progressive sector of the Albanian movement build ties with the Serbian people in Kosova. And not only in Kosova, but with all the peoples in the Balkans.
For the defeat of nationalism in Serbia and in Kosova!
For the freedom of the Kosova peoples!
For joint struggle against the Imperialists and their servants in the Balkans!
Click here to return to the Yugoslavia Index