 |
Al-Ahram Weekly 27 May - 2 June 1999 Issue No. 431 
|
||
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
 |
 |
|
|
Al-Ahram Weekly 27 May - 2 June 1999 Issue No. 431
|
||
| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
|
|
|
Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Profile Living Features Travel Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Saving the right lives
The NATO bombing campaign has entered its third month without any sign of a solution to the ongoing crisis in the Bal-ans. The declared goal of the campaign was to stop the atroc-ties being carried out by Serb dictator Slobodan Milosevic against the Muslim population of Kosovo. Thus far, however, the results of the campaign have been more massacres of Kosovars, a growing exodus of refugees, and the eviction of most of Kosovo's Muslim population.Even Milosevic, who has long dreamed of "purifying" Kosovo to satisfy his expansionist ambitions, could not have hoped for this much. With more than one million people now scattered throughout the countries bordering Yugoslavia, and some even taken as far as the United States, many are wondering whether this is a human catastrophe similar to that of Palestine in 1948, when more than a million Palestinians were made into refugees. Fifty years hence, will we look back and remember Kosovo? Will its Muslim population still be wandering the globe?
Meanwhile, the indiscriminate bombing of civilian targets in Serbia, including hospitals, embassies and even buses carrying Albanian Kosovars, can only lead to increasing opposition to the NATO campaign. Claims that these were mistakes and that "collateral damage" cannot be avoided in such operations are, unfortunately, unconvincing.
The truth of the matter is that the world's sole superpower, the United States, wants to conduct a "clean" war, in which no American troops will risk their lives. To achieve this goal, the US does not mind killing hundreds of innocent civilians and then apologising. The US's strategy, it seems, should be reconsidered. In Serbia, Iraq and any other country seen as a "threat to international peace and security", air strikes have done nothing but cause misery and devastation among the population, while leaving the dictatorship intact. When US planes indiscriminately bomb targets in such countries, it is not the regime that pays the price, but the people.
If the US wants to end this catastrophe, it should consider the immediate deployment of ground troops. Otherwise, we will continue to see US officials apologising and more civilians getting killed, for no reason except that they are not US citizens.
