USSR2 File: Serbia and ally Russia decisively reject UN Security Council resolution supporting Kosovo independence; Ukraine reds protest NATO exercise

The KGB-managed collapse of the Soviet Union and the East Bloc provided a window of opportunity by which Moscow lured EU/NATO into the political vacuum of Central and Southeastern Europe (Balkans), thereby creating a pretext for defending itself against the "aggressive" North Atlantic alliance. The ruse worked. Fast forward to NATO's 1999 bombing of Serbia over the issue of Kosovar separatism, the current deployment of the USA's National Missile Defense system in the Czech Republic and Poland, and Russia's moratorium over the implementation of the old Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty.

On July 5, 2007 Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov cautioned: "We do not think NATO's expansion is necessary, and believe the policy is a relapse into the Cold War." The Soviet position is very clear: "The USA is guilty of re-starting the Cold War." Meanwhile, the Kremlin's Western propagandists, like Justin Raimondo, lambaste opponents of Russian President Vladimir Putin for "wishing the Soviet Union back into existence."

Pictured above is Prime Minister Vojislav Koštunica, who holds membership in the Democratic Party of Serbia (DPS) and has no apparent connection to old communist regime. Nevertheless, Koštunica does not spurn Russia's patronage and, indeed, is carefully following the Kremlin line, which insists upon the territorial integrity of its Slavic cousin. Moscow's rationale is evident in the article below: "Russia has said granting Kosovo sovereignty would violate Serbia's territorial integrity, setting a precedent for other breakaway regions, including in the former Soviet Union."

The putatively conservative DPS governs in coalition with conservative ally New Serbia, monarchist ally Serbian Democratic Renewal Movement, and United Serbia. The war-mongering Socialist Party of Serbia, formerly League of Communists of Serbia, holds the balance of power in parliament.

Serbia decisively rejects draft resolution on Kosovo status
19:0311/ 07/ 2007

BELGRADE, July 11 (RIA Novosti) - Serbia decisively rejects a new draft resolution on the status of Kosovo introduced by Washington for UN Security Council approval as the draft has independence for the province as its main aim, the prime minister said Wednesday.

"Kosovo will not gain independence. And no U.S. officials making daily statements in support of Kosovo's independence can obviate that fact," Vojislav Kostunica said, adding that Belgrade will never agree to a 15% reduction of his country's territory.

Kostunica said Kosovo would remain a component and integral part of Serbia, as written in the UN Charter and the country's Constitution.

The UN Security Council has been holding closed debates on a resolution drafted by Britain, the United States and France giving Belgrade and Pristina four months for more talks before automatically granting independence to Kosovo.

It is the third draft resolution based on special envoy Martti Ahtisaari's plan to grant Kosovo independence without the prior consent of Serbia.

Russia, a longtime ally of fellow Slavic Serbia, has insisted on a decision that would satisfy both Belgrade and Pristina, and threatened to veto a resolution setting the province on a path to independence.

Russia has said granting Kosovo sovereignty would violate Serbia's territorial integrity, setting a precedent for other breakaway regions, including in the former Soviet Union. It has also expressed concern about the future of the impoverished province's Serbs and other minorities, who number about 180,000 in all.

Kosovo Albanians have meanwhile warned they will take independence unilaterally.

Kosovo has been a UN protectorate since NATO's unsanctioned 78-day bombing campaign against the former Yugoslavia ended a war between Serb forces and Muslim Albanian separatists in 1999.

Source: Novosti

With the same context in mind, Soviet communists perceive East-West military cooperation, such as the joint Ukraine-NATO naval exercise Sea Breeze-2007, as an attempt by the West to subjugate the Not-So-Former Soviet republics when, in fact, East-West convergence advances Moscow's Plan A: conquest without war. (Plan B, of course, is Missile Day.) Will Soviet communists protest the second Sino-Soviet military exercise in August, Peace Mission 2007? Not likely.

According to Kommersant, the protest in Odessa drews supporters of the Communist Party of Ukraine, Progressive Socialist Party (communist), United Fatherland, and the Black Sea Cossacks. New Europe reports that authorities had banned the protest against Sea Breeze-2007. "When courts ban peaceful assemblies and rallies for all political parties and public organizations," complained Odessa Communist Party leader Yevgeny Tsarkov stated on July 6, "and when they do not allow people to express their view on aparticular event, then Ukraine under [President]Yushchenko has turned into a police state." And yet again, Soviet communists are portrayed as the valiant underdogs, while the "pro-Western" regimes in Moscow and Kiev are depicted as oppressing the Soviet peoples.

Ukraine-NATO exercises draw protests
11.07.2007, 16.48

ODESSA, July 11 (Itar-Tass) - The Odessa region’s administrators and chiefs of the NATO information and documentation center discussed Ukraine’ s integration in NATO at a roundtable meeting in the regional administration on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, several hundreds of supporters of the Progressive Socialist Party picketed the building of the regional administration with posters “Hands away from Ukraine”, chanting: “We will not let NATO lead the Ukrainian people to slaughter!”

The protests against the conduction of NATO-Ukraine exercises Sea Breeze-2007 in have been continuing for the sixth day.

Main rallies moved to the Chabanka Range located 25 kilometers from Odessa.

The protesters set up a tent compound at which over 1,500 citizens of Lugansk, Sevastopol, Lvov, Poltava, Odessa, Kharkov, Simferopol and Kiev are staying.

Organizers expect more supporters to come from all regions of Ukraine.

Opponents of the exercises suspended their protest actions for two daysi in Odessa, because the Ukrainian football supercup is held, drawing great crowds of fans from Donetsk and Kiev, the chief of the anti-NATO committee, Valery Kaurov said.

However, the protests of a still larger scale will resume on Thursday, he said.

Members of the public organization Oko also take part in pickets near a sea terminal in Odessa.

The organization’s press secretary Anatoly Petrov said provocateurs were constantly sent to the protesters. “They tried to provoke a fight with the protesters, but nothing came of it. The picketers are law-abiding people and will not take provocations,” he said.

Source: ITAR-TASS