ReportWire

Tag: Ethnic conflicts

  • Genocide Fast Facts | CNN

    Genocide Fast Facts | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at genocide, the attempted or intentional destruction of a national, racial, religious or ethnic group, whether in wartime or peace.

    The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was adopted by the United Nations after World War II.

    Article II of the Convention defines genocide as any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group:
    (a) Killing members of the group;
    (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
    (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
    (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
    (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

    1932-1933 – Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union inflict a famine upon Ukraine after people rebel against the imposed system of land management known as “collectivization,” which seizes privately owned farmlands and puts people to work in collectives. An estimated 25,000-33,000 people die every day. There are an estimated six million to 10 million deaths.

    December 1937-January 1938 – The Japanese Imperial Army marches into Nanking, China, and kills an estimated 300,000 Chinese civilians and soldiers. Tens of thousands are raped before they are murdered.

    1938-1945 – Nazi Germany, under Adolf Hitler, deems the Jewish population racially inferior and a threat, and kills six million Jewish people in Germany, Poland, the Soviet Union and other areas around Europe during World War II.

    1944 – The term “genocide” is coined by lawyer Raphael Lemkin.

    December 9, 1948 – The United Nations adopts the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.

    January 12, 1951 – The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide enters into force. It is eventually ratified by 142 nations.

    1975-1979 – Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot’s attempt to turn Cambodia into a Communist peasant farming society leads to the deaths of up to two million people from starvation, forced labor and executions.

    1988 – The Iraqi regime under Saddam Hussein attacks civilians who have remained in “prohibited” areas. The attacks include the use of mustard gas and nerve agents and result in the death of an estimated 100,000 Iraqi Kurds.

    1992-1995 – Yugoslavia, led by President Slobodan Milosevic, attacks Bosnia after it declares its independence. Approximately 100,000 people – the majority of whom are Muslims, or Bosniaks, – are killed in the conflict. There are mass executions of “battle-age” men and mass rape of women.

    1995 – Ratko Mladic, former leader of the Bosnian Serb army, is indicted by the UN-established International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia for war crimes and atrocities. In 2011, Mladic is arrested in Serbia. On November 22, 2017, Mladic is sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity.

    1994 – In Rwanda, an estimated 800,000 civilians, mostly from the Tutsi ethnic group, are killed over a period of three months.

    July 17, 1998 – The Rome Statute, to establish a permanent international criminal court, is adopted.

    1998 – The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) establishes the precedent that rape during warfare is a crime of genocide. In Rwanda, HIV-infected men participated in the mass rape of Tutsi women.

    1998 – The first genocide conviction occurs at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Jean Paul Akayesu, the Hutu mayor of the town, Taba, is convicted of genocide and crimes against humanity.

    July 1, 2002 – The International Criminal Court (ICC) opens at The Hague, Netherlands, as the first permanent war crimes tribunal, with jurisdiction to try perpetrators of genocide. Previously, the UN Security Council created ad hoc tribunals to try those responsible for genocide in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda.

    2003-2004 – In the Darfur region of Sudan, the United Nations estimates that 300,000 people have been killed. In July 2004, the US House of Representatives and the Senate pass resolutions declaring the crisis in Darfur to be genocide.

    2008 – Fugitive Radovan Karadzic, former Bosnian Serb leader, is arrested. He is charged with genocide in connection with the Srebrenica massacre of 1995. On March 24, 2016, Karadzic is found guilty of 10 of the 11 charges against him, including one count of genocide. He is sentenced to 40 years in prison. Three years later, the sentence is changed to life in prison by appeal judges at a UN court in the Hague, Netherlands.

    March 4, 2009 – The ICC issues an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on charges of crimes against humanity and war crimes.

    June 4, 2013 – The ICTR unseals a 2012 updated indictment against Ladislas Ntaganzwa. The former mayor of a town in south Rwanda is indicted on charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and other violations of international humanitarian law during the 1994 killings in Rwanda.

    August 2014 – ISIS fighters attack the northern Iraqi town of Sinjar, home of a religious minority group called the Yazidis. A Yazidi lawmaker says that 500 men have been killed, 70 children have died of thirst and women are being sold into slavery.

    December 9, 2015 – The arrest of Ntaganzwa is announced. On May 28, 2020, Ntaganzwa is convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and other serious violations of international humanitarian law by the High Court Chamber for International Crimes in Rwanda. He is sentenced to life in prison for his role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

    January 2016 – According to a 2016 United Nations report, ISIS is believed to be holding 3,500 people as slaves, most of which are women and children from the Yazidi community and other minority groups. On March 17, 2016, US Secretary of State John Kerry announces that the United States has determined that ISIS’ action against the Yazidis and other minority groups in Iraq and Syria constitutes genocide.

    September 18, 2018 – In its “Report of the independent international fact-finding mission on Myanmar,” the United Nations finds that “there is sufficient information to warrant the investigation and prosecution of senior officials” on charges of genocide against Rohingya Muslims.

    November 2018 – Two Khmer Rouge senior surviving leaders are found guilty of genocide and other charges against Cambodians between 1975 and 1979. Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan, now 92 and 87, are sentenced to life in prison by an international tribunal in Cambodia.

    January 23, 2020 – The UN’s top court orders Myanmar to prevent acts of genocide against the country’s persecuted Rohingya minority and to stop destroying evidence, in a landmark case at The Hague. The case was brought to the International Court of Justice by the tiny West African nation of The Gambia, which in November alleged that Myanmar committed “genocidal acts.”

    May 16, 2020 – Félicien Kabuga, one of the last key suspects in the Rwandan genocide, is captured in Asnières-Sur-Seine, a Paris suburb. Indicted in 1997 on seven counts including genocide, he has been a fugitive for more than 20 years. Kabuga is transferred to the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) October 26. In an order published June 6, 2023, the IRMCT rules that Kabuga is no longer capable of “meaningful participation” in his trial.

    March 21, 2022 – US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announces that the United States has determined that the military of Myanmar committed genocide against the country’s Rohingya population in 2016 and 2017.

    December 29, 2023 – According to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), South Africa has filed an application at the court to begin proceedings over allegations of genocide against Israel for its war against Hamas in Gaza. In a hearing on January 26, 2024, the ICJ orders Israel to prevent genocide against Palestinians in Gaza but stopped short of calling for Israel to suspend its military campaign in Gaza, as South Africa had requested.

    February 2, 2024 – The ICJ says that it will move forward with a 2022 case brought by Ukraine over Russia’s justification of its February 2022 invasion. Kyiv had asked the court to declare it did not commit genocide in eastern Ukraine – a claim made by Russia as a pretext for launching its attack.

    Remembering the Rwanda genocide, 25 years on

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Ratko Mladic Fast Facts | CNN

    Ratko Mladic Fast Facts | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Here is a look at the life of Ratko Mladic, former leader of the Bosnian Serb army, sentenced to life in prison for genocide and other war crimes.

    Birth date: March 12, 1942

    Birth place: Kalnovik, Yugoslavia (now Bosnia and Herzegovina)

    Birth name: Ratko Mladic

    Father: Nedja Mladic

    Mother: Stana Mladic

    Marriage: Bosiljka Mladic

    Children: Darko and Ana

    1965 – Graduates from a military academy and joins the Communist Party.

    1992 – As a commander in the Bosnian Serb army, Mladic leads the siege of Sarajevo.

    July 1995 – Mladic spearheads an attack on the town of Srebrenica. Approximately 8,000 Muslim men and boys are killed.

    1995 – Mladic is indicted by the UN-established International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for war crimes and atrocities.

    July 1996 – An international warrant is issued for his arrest.

    1996-2001 – He takes refuge in Belgrade with the protection of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.

    2001 – Mladic goes into hiding after Milosevic is arrested.

    October 12, 2007 – Serbian officials offer one million euros for information leading to the capture of Mladic.

    May 26, 2011 – Mladic is arrested in Serbia.

    July 4, 2011 – Mladic refuses to enter a plea so the presiding judge enters not guilty pleas to all counts against him.

    May 16, 2012 – Mladic’s trial begins. He’s charged with two counts of genocide, nine crimes against humanity and war crimes.

    January 28, 2014 – He refuses to testify at the genocide trial of former Bosian Serb Leader Radovan Karadzic and denounces the ICTY court as “satanic.”

    October 23, 2014 – The ICTY announces that the court will hear details about a mass grave investigators believe has ties to Mladic.

    December 7, 2016 – During closing arguments, prosecutors recommend a life sentence for Mladic.

    December 15, 2016 – Mladic’s trial is adjourned. Three UN judges begin deliberating on his fate. The process could take up to a year.

    November 22, 2017 – Mladic is sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity.

    March 22, 2018 – Appeals his conviction and sentence.

    August 25-26, 2020 – Mladic’s appeal hearing takes place.

    June 8, 2021 – A UN court upholds Mladic’s conviction and life sentence.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Thousands of minority Serbs protest Kosovo’s decision to abolish the Serbian dinar

    Thousands of minority Serbs protest Kosovo’s decision to abolish the Serbian dinar

    [ad_1]

    MITROVICA, Kosovo — Thousands of minority Serbs in Kosovo on Monday protested a ban of the use of the Serbian currenc y in areas where they live, an issue that has been the cause of the latest crisis in relations between Serbia and Kosovo.

    Tensions escalated after the government of Kosovo, a former Serbian province, banned banks and other financial institutions in the Serb-populated areas from using the dinar in local transactions, starting Feb. 1, and imposed the euro.

    The dinar was widely used in ethnic Serbian-dominated areas, especially in Kosovo’s north, to pay pensions and salaries to staff in Serbian-run institutions, including schools and hospitals.

    The ban has angered both Kosovo Serbs and Serbia. The leaders of Serbia and Kosovo sparred over the issue at a meeting last week at the United Nations Security Council.

    Protesters at the rally in the Serb part of the divided northern Kosovo town of Mitrovica said that abolishing the dinar violates the rights of the Serbs in Kosovo and is discriminatory. They urged the international community to put pressure on the Kosovo government to reverse the move.

    “This virtually means taking away food from our tables,” said Dusanka Djorovic, from a local pensioners’ association.

    Dragisa Milovic, a doctor, said that Kosovo’s decision “is aimed at abolishing Serb institutions in these areas.”

    In Pristina, Kosovo’s Prime Minister Albin Kurti dismissed such criticism in a message to the Kosovo Serbs. Kurti insisted that the new measure is aimed at curbing illegal money flow and “does not stop Serbia from financially assisting the citizens of Kosovo’s Serb community.”

    “Kosovo did not stop the dinar, or the dollar, pound, or Swiss franc,” said Kurti. “The only change from Feb. 1 is that the cash cannot cross the border in sacks … but should come through bank accounts and (be) withdrawn in euros.”

    In 1999, a 78-day NATO bombing campaign ended a war between Serbian government forces and ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo. Serbian forces were pushed out but Belgrade never recognized Kosovo’s independence and still considers it a Serbian province.

    The European Union and the United States have expressed concern that Kosovo’s ban of the dinar could raise tensions in an already volatile region and called for consultations and a delay in the ban.

    The EU has brokered negotiations between Serbia and Kosovo in a bid to normalize their relations but the talks have showed slow progress while occasional violent incidents have fuelled fears of instability in the Balkans as the war rages in Ukraine.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Kosovo’s block on the Serbian currency raises alarm in the EU and US

    Kosovo’s block on the Serbian currency raises alarm in the EU and US

    [ad_1]

    PRISTINA, Kosovo — The European Union and the United States expressed their deep concern Sunday after Kosovo banned the use of the Serbian currency and police raided the premises of organizations working with the Serb minority in the north of the country.

    In the past week, Kosovo police searched the premises of Serbia-administered institutions and of an ethnic Serb non-governmental organization, confiscating papers and computers believed to hold documentation contrary to the country’s laws.

    Some of the documents bore the emblem of the Serbian government in Belgrade, police said, while others referred to illegal parallel structures of government set up by ethnic Serbs but not accepted by Kosovo.

    Police closed some of those offices.

    Most of Kosovo uses the euro, even though the country isn’t part of the EU. But parts of Kosovo’s north, populated mostly by ethnic Serbs, continue to use the dinar. Many rely on the government of Serbia for financial support, often delivered in dinars in cash.

    The U.S. Ambassador in Kosovo, Jeffrey Hovenier, also expressed concerned over the efforts of Kosovo police to seize the vehicle transporting Serbian dinars which are then distributed for “social benefit payments from Serbia.”

    A statement from the EU said the closure of those offices would “have negative effects on the daily lives and living conditions of Kosovo Serb communities, as it will restrict their access to basic social services given the apparent absence of alternatives at this moment.”

    Starting Feb. 1, Kosovo required ethnic Serbian-dominated areas to adopt the euro currency, which is used in the rest of the country, and abolished the use of the Serbian dinar.

    “The EU urges Kosovo to avoid unilateral actions that could raise tensions, and to address these issues through the EU-facilitated dialogue,” the EU statement said.

    “These actions are unnecessarily raising ethnic tensions and as a consequence limit the options of the United States to serve as an effective advocate for Kosovo in the international arena,” said Hovenier.

    Kosovo has ensured “the new rules do not have a negative impact or penalize the citizens,” according to Deputy Prime Minister Besnik Bislimi.

    The European Union and the United States are pressing both countries to implement agreements that Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti reached in February and March last year.

    The EU-facilitated normalization talks have failed to make progress, especially following a shootout last September between masked Serb gunmen and Kosovo police that left four people dead and ratcheted up tensions.

    Serbia and Kosovo have both said they want to join the EU, but the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, has warned that their refusal to compromise is jeopardizing their chances.

    Serbian forces fought a 1998-99 war with ethnic Albanian separatists in what was then the province of Kosovo. About 13,000 people, mostly ethnic Albanians, died until a 78-day NATO bombing campaign pushed Serbian forces away. Kosovo eventually declared independence in 2008, but the government in Belgrade doesn’t recognize its neighbor as a separate country.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Israeli arms quietly helped Azerbaijan retake Nagorno-Karabakh, to the dismay of region’s Armenians

    Israeli arms quietly helped Azerbaijan retake Nagorno-Karabakh, to the dismay of region’s Armenians

    [ad_1]

    TEL AVIV, Israel — Israel has quietly helped fuel Azerbaijan’s campaign to recapture Nagorno-Karabakh, supplying powerful weapons to Azerbaijan ahead of its lightening offensive last month that brought the ethnic Armenian enclave back under its control, officials and experts say.

    Just weeks before Azerbaijan launched its 24-hour assault on Sept. 19, Azerbaijani military cargo planes repeatedly flew between a southern Israeli airbase and an airfield near Nagorno-Karabakh, according to flight tracking data and Armenian diplomats, even as Western governments were urging peace talks.

    The flights rattled Armenian officials in Yerevan, long wary of the strategic alliance between Israel and Azerbaijan, and shined a light on Israel’s national interests in the restive region south of the Caucasus Mountains.

    “For us, it is a major concern that Israeli weapons have been firing at our people,” Arman Akopian, Armenia’s ambassador to Israel, told The Associated Press. In a flurry of diplomatic exchanges, Akopian said he expressed alarm to Israeli politicians and lawmakers in recent weeks over Israeli weapons shipments.

    “I don’t see why Israel should not be in the position to express at least some concern about the fate of people being expelled from their homeland,” he told AP.

    Azerbaijan’s September blitz involving heavy artillery, rocket launchers and drones — largely supplied by Israel and Turkey, according to experts — forced Armenian separatist authorities to lay down their weapons and sit down for talks on the future of the separatist region.

    The Azerbaijani offensive killed over 200 Armenians in the enclave, the vast majority of them fighters, and some 200 Azerbaijani troops, according to officials.

    There are ramifications beyond the volatile enclave of 4,400 square kilometers (1,700 square miles). The fighting prompted over 100,000 people — more than 80% of the enclave’s ethnic Armenian residents — to flee in the last two weeks. Azerbaijan has pledged to respect the rights of ethnic Armenians. Armenia calls the exodus a form of ethnic cleansing.

    Israel’s foreign and defense ministries declined to comment on the use of Israeli weapons in Nagorno-Karabakh or on Armenian concerns about its military partnership with Azerbaijan. In July, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant visited Baku, the Azerbaijan capital, where he praised the countries’ military cooperation and joint “fight against terrorism.”

    Israel has a big stake in Azerbaijan, which serves as a critical source of oil and is a staunch ally against Israel’s archenemy Iran. It is also a lucrative customer of sophisticated arms.

    “There’s no doubt about our position in support of Azerbaijan’s defense,” said Israel’s former ambassador to Azerbaijan, Arkady Milman. “We have a strategic partnership to contain Iran.”

    Although once resource-poor Israel now has plenty of natural gas off its Mediterranean coast, Azerbaijan still supplies at least 40% of Israel’s oil needs, keeping cars and trucks on its roads. Israel turned to Baku’s offshore deposits in the late 1990s, creating an oil pipeline through the Turkish transport hub of Ceyan that isolated Iran, which at the time capitalized on oil flowing through its pipelines from Kazakhstan to world markets.

    Azerbaijan has long been suspicious of Iran, its fellow Shiite Muslim neighbor on the Caspian Sea, and chafed at its support for Armenia, which is Orthodox Christian. Iran has accused Azerbaijan of hosting a base for Israeli intelligence operations against it — a claim that Azerbaijan and Israel deny.

    “It’s clear to us that Israel has an interest in keeping a military presence in Azerbaijan, using its territory to observe Iran,” Armenian diplomat Tigran Balayan said.

    Few have benefited more from the two countries’ close relations than Israeli military contractors. Experts estimate Israel supplied Azerbaijan with nearly 70% of its arsenal between 2016 and 2020 — giving Azerbaijan an edge against Armenia and boosting Israel’s large defense industry.

    “Israeli arms have played a very significant role in allowing the Azerbaijani army to reach its objectives,” said Pieter Wezeman, senior researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks arms sales.

    Israeli long-range missiles and exploding drones known as loitering munitions have made up for Azerbaijan’s small air force, Wezeman said, even at times striking deep within Armenia itself. Meanwhile, Israeli Barak-8 surface-to-air missiles have protected Azerbaijan’s airspace in shooting down missiles and drones, he added.

    Just ahead of last month’s offensive, the Azerbaijani defense ministry announced the army conducted a missile test of Barak-8. Its developer, Israel Aerospace Industries, declined to comment on Azerbaijan’s use of its air defense system and combat drones.

    But Azerbaijan has raved about the success of Israeli drones in slicing through the Armenian defenses and tipping the balance in the bloody six-week war in 2020.

    Its defense minister in 2016 called a combat drone manufactured by Israel’s Aeronautics Group “a nightmare for the Armenian army,” which backed the region’s separatists during Azerbaijan’s conflict with Nagorno-Karabakh that year.

    President Ilham Aliyev in 2021 — a year of deadly Azerbaijan-Armenian border clashes — was captured on camera smiling as he stroked the small Israeli suicide drone “Harop” during an arms showcase.

    Israel has deployed similar suicide drones during deadly army raids against Palestinian militants in the occupied West Bank.

    “We’re glad for this cooperation, it was quite supportive and quite beneficial for defense,” Azerbaijani’s ambassador to Israel, Mukhtar Mammadov told the AP, speaking generally about Israel’s support for the Azerbaijani military. “We’re not hiding it.”

    At a crucial moment in early September — as diplomats scrambled to avert an escalation — flight tracking data shows that Azerbaijani cargo planes began to stream into Ovda, a military base in southern Israel with a 3,000-meter-long airstrip, known as the only airport in Israel that handles the export of explosives.

    The AP identified at least six flights operated by Azerbaijan’s Silk Way Airlines landing at Ovda airport between Sept. 1 and Sept. 17 from Baku, according to aviation-tracking website FlightRadar24.com. Azerbaijan launched its offensive two days later.

    During those six days, the Russian-made Ilyushin Il-76 military transport lingered on Ovda’s tarmac for several hours before departing for either Baku or Ganja, the country’s second-largest city, just north of Nagorno-Karabakh.

    In March, an investigation by the Haaretz newspaper said it had counted 92 Azerbaijani military cargo flights to Ovda airport from 2016-2020. Sudden surges of flights coincided with upticks of fighting in Nagorno-Karabkh, it found.

    “During the 2020 war, we saw flights every other day and now, again, we see this intensity of flights leading up to the current conflict,” said Akopian, the Armenian ambassador. “It is clear to us what’s happening.”

    Israel’s defense ministry declined to comment on the flights. The Azerbaijani ambassador, Mammadov, said he was aware of the reports but declined to comment.

    The decision to support an autocratic government against an ethnic and religious minority has fueled a debate in Israel about the country’s permissive arms export policies. Of the top 10 arms manufactures globally, only Israel and Russia lack legal restrictions on weapons exports based on human rights concerns.

    “If anyone can identify with (Nagorno-Karabakh) Armenians’ continuing fear of ethnic cleansing it is the Jewish people,” said Avidan Freedman, founder of the Israeli advocacy group Yanshoof, which seeks to stop Israeli arm sales to human rights violators. “We’re not interested in becoming accomplices.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Serbia’s president denies troop buildup near Kosovo, alleges ‘campaign of lies’ in wake of clashes

    Serbia’s president denies troop buildup near Kosovo, alleges ‘campaign of lies’ in wake of clashes

    [ad_1]

    BELGRADE, Serbia — Serbia’s president on Sunday denied U.S. and other reports of a military buildup along the border with Kosovo, complaining of a “campaign of lies” against his country in the wake of a shootout a week earlier that killed four people and fueled tensions in the volatile Balkan region.

    Both the United States and the European Union expressed concern earlier this week about what they said was an increased military deployment by Serbia’s border with its former province, and they urged Belgrade to scale down its troop presence there.

    Kosovo’s government said Saturday it was monitoring the movements of the Serbian military from “three different directions.” It urged Serbia to immediately pull back its troops and demilitarize the border area.

    “A campaign of lies … has been launched against our Serbia,” President Aleksandar Vucic responded in a video post on Instagram. “They have lied a lot about the presence of our military forces …. In fact, they are bothered that Serbia has what they describe as sophisticated weapons.”

    Associated Press reporters traveling in the border region Sunday saw several Serbian army transport vehicles driving away toward central Serbia, a sign that the military might be scaling down its presence in the region following calls from U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and others.

    Tensions have soared following the violence in northern Kosovo last Sunday involving heavily armed Serb gunmen and Kosovo police officers. The clash was one of the worst since Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 and prompted NATO to announce it would beef up a peacekeeping force stationed in the country.

    Serbia has denied Kosovo’s allegations that it trained the group of some 30 men who opened fire on police officers, leaving one dead, and then barricaded themselves in an Orthodox Christian monastery in northern Kosovo. Three insurgents died in the hours-long shootout that ensued.

    Kosovo has also said it was investigating possible Russian involvement in the violence. Serbia is Russia’s main ally in Europe, and there are fears in the West that Moscow could try to stir trouble in the Balkans to avert attention from the war in Ukraine.

    John Kirby, spokesman for the White House National Security Council, said Friday that U.S. officials were monitoring a large deployment of Serbian troops along the border with Kosovo, describing it as an “unprecedented staging of advanced Serbian artillery, tanks and mechanized infantry units.”

    Vucic has several times over the past months raised the combat readiness level of Serbian troops on the border with Kosovo. Serbia also has been reinforcing its troops with weapons and other equipment mainly purchased from Russia and China.

    “We will continue to invest in the defense of our country but Serbia wants peace,” the president said Sunday. “Everything they said they made up and lied, and they knew they were making up and lying.”

    Last weekend’s shootout near the village of Banjska followed months of tensions in Kosovo’s north, where ethnic Serbs are a majority of the population and have demanded self-rule. Dozens of soldiers from the NATO-led peacekeeping force known as KFOR were injured in May in a clash with ethnic Serbs protesting the Kosovo police presence in the area.

    Fearing wider instability as the war rages in Ukraine, Washington and Brussels have sought to negotiate a normalization of relations between Serbia and Kosovo, but the two sides have failed to implement a tentative agreement that was recently reached as part of an EU-mediated dialogue.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Chinese government sentences a famed Uyghur scholar to life in prison, foundation says

    Chinese government sentences a famed Uyghur scholar to life in prison, foundation says

    [ad_1]

    BEIJING — A prominent Uyghur scholar specializing in the study of her people’s folklore and traditions has been sentenced to life in prison, according to a U.S.-based foundation that works on human rights cases in China.

    Rahile Dawut was convicted on charges of endangering state security in December 2018 in a secret trial, the San Francisco-based Dui Hua Foundation said in a statement Thursday. Dawut appealed but her conviction was upheld, the foundation said.

    “The sentencing of Professor Rahile Dawut to life in prison is a cruel tragedy, a great loss for the Uyghur people, and for all who treasure academic freedom,” John Kamm, executive director of the Dui Hua Foundation, said in a statement.

    Dawut was a professor at Xinjiang University and founder of the school’s Ethnic Minorities Folklore Research Center. She disappeared in late 2017 amid a brutal government crackdown aimed at the Uyghurs, a Turkic, predominately Muslim ethnicity native to China’s northwest Xinjiang region.

    For years, her exact status was unknown, as Chinese authorities didn’t disclose her whereabouts or the nature of the charges against her. That changed this month when the Dui Hua Foundation saw a Chinese government document disclosing that Dawut was sentenced to life in prison.

    Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Mao Ning said she had “no information” on Dawut’s case at a regular press briefing Friday, but added that China would “handle cases in accordance with the law.”

    Dawut was internationally renowned for her work studying sacred Islamic sites and Uyghur cultural practices in Xinjiang and across Central Asia, authoring many articles and books and lecturing as a visiting scholar abroad, including at Cambridge and the University of Pennsylvania.

    She is one of over 400 prominent academics, writers, performers and artists detained in Xinjiang, advocacy groups say. Critics say the government has targeted intellectuals as a way to dilute, or even erase, Uyghur culture, language and identity.

    “Most prominent Uyghur intellectuals have been arrested. They’ve been indiscriminate,” said Joshua Freeman, an Academia Sinica researcher who used to work as a translator for Dawut. “I don’t think it is anything about her work that got her in trouble. I think what got her in trouble was that she was born a Uyghur.”

    News of her life sentence shocked Freeman and other academics in Uyghur studies, as Dawut didn’t engage in activities opposing the Chinese government. Dawut was a member of the Chinese Communist Party and received grants and awards from the Chinese Ministry of Culture before her arrest.

    Dawut’s daughter, Akeda Pulati, said she was stunned by the news and called on the Chinese authorities to release her mother.

    “I know the Chinese government is torturing and persecuting the Uyghurs. But I didn’t expect them to be that cruel, to give my innocent mother a life sentence,” Pulati said. “Their cruelty is beyond my imagination.”

    Pulati called Dawut “the hardest working person I’ve ever met,” saying that since she was a child, she had been inspired by her mother’s dedication to her career.

    “She’s a very simple person — all she wants in her life is just to find enjoyment in her work and her career and do something good for society, for the people around her,” Pulati said.

    Mukaddas Mijit, a Uyghur ethnomusicologist based in Brussels, said Dawut had been an important advisor to her and many other scholars early in their careers. Dawut was a critical bridge between global academia and Uyghur culture, Mijit said, mentoring a generation of prominent Uyghur scholars across the world.

    “She was a guardian of Uyghur identity, and that’s something the Chinese government is after,” Mijit said. “They want to erase everything, and they want Uyghurs to forget how beautiful and colorful a culture they had.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Serbia and Kosovo leaders hold long-awaited face-to-face talks as the EU seeks to dial down tensions

    Serbia and Kosovo leaders hold long-awaited face-to-face talks as the EU seeks to dial down tensions

    [ad_1]

    BRUSSELS — The leaders of Serbia and Kosovo held a long-awaited face-to-face meeting on Thursday in talks aimed aimed at improving their strained relations as calls mount for a change in the Western diplomatic approach toward them amid concern that their tensions could spiral out of control.

    Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti are in Brussels for talks under the so-called Belgrade-Pristina dialogue process, supervised by European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.

    The last round of the dialogue in June ended without producing any obvious results. Vučić and Kurti refused to meet in person, and Borrell, who held talks separately with both men, conceded that they have “different interpretations of the causes and also the facts, consequences and solutions.”

    In a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, Borrell wrote that it was time to begin applying the agreement on the path toward normalization “in earnest. Today, we will see if they are ready to take responsibility.” He also posted a picture of the two men in the same room with him.

    Serbia and its former province of Kosovo have been at odds for decades. Their 1998-99 war left more than 10,000 people dead, mostly Kosovo Albanians. Kosovo unilaterally declared independence in 2008 but Belgrade has refused to recognize the move.

    In May, in a dispute over the validity of local elections in the Serbian part of northern Kosovo, Serbs clashed with security forces, including NATO-led KFOR peacekeepers working there, injuring 93 troops.

    Last week, KFOR commander Maj. Gen. Angelo Michele Ristuccia warned that his forces “are living a time frame of constant crisis management.” He said that tensions between Belgrade and Pristina are so high that even “the most insignificant event can create a situation.”

    In August, senior lawmakers from the United States — the other diplomatic power in the process — warned that negotiators aren’t putting enough pressure on Vučić. They said that the West’s current approach shows a “lack of evenhandedness.”

    Vučić, a former ultranationalist who now claims to want to take Serbia into the EU, has maintained close ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin and has refused to impose sanctions on Russia over its war on Ukraine.

    There are widespread fears in the West that Moscow could use Belgrade to reignite ethnic conflicts in the Balkans, which experienced a series of bloody conflicts in the 1990s during the breakup of Yugoslavia, to draw world attention away from the war.

    But at the same time, Kurti — a long-time Kosovo independence activist who spent time in prisons in both Serbia and Kosovo — has frustrated the Europeans and proven difficult for negotiators to work with since he became prime minister in 2021.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Armenia says 3 soldiers killed by Azerbaijan attacks at the border

    Armenia says 3 soldiers killed by Azerbaijan attacks at the border

    [ad_1]

    Armenia’s defense ministry says three soldiers have been killed in firing from Azerbaijan as tensions between the two countries persist

    ByThe Associated Press

    September 1, 2023, 4:14 PM

    YEREVAN, Armenia — Armenia’s defense ministry said three soldiers were killed Friday in firing from Azerbaijan as tensions between the two countries persist.

    The ministry initially reported four soldiers were killed and one wounded, but later said one of those believed to have died was resuscitated.

    The ministry said Armenian positions were hit near the settlements of Sotk and Norbak, which are about 8 kilometers (5 miles) from the border.

    Azerbaijan’s defense ministry in turn said Armenian forces in the area had been firing on positions in Azerbaijan and that Armenia was bringing more troops to the area.

    Azerbaijan and Armenia fought a six-week fullscale war in 2020 that ended with Azerbaijan regaining many areas that had been under the control of ethnic Armenians backed by Armenian forces since 1994.

    However, the agreement that ended the fighting did not include Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian region within Azerbaijan.

    Azerbaijan has blocked traffic on the road that connects Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia since last year, and Armenia charges that the resultant food shortages show Azerbaijan wants to starve out the ethnic Armenians.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • The leaders of the Netherlands and Luxembourg tell Kosovo and Serbia to normalize ties for EU hopes

    The leaders of the Netherlands and Luxembourg tell Kosovo and Serbia to normalize ties for EU hopes

    [ad_1]

    PRISTINA, Kosovo — The leaders of the Netherlands and Luxembourg on Tuesday said that normalizing ties between Kosovo and Serbia would serve not only regional peace and stability but also their prospects of future integration into the European Union.

    Prime Ministers Mark Rutte of the Netherlands and Xavier Bettel of Luxembourg were on a trip to Pristina after a visit to Belgrade on Monday.

    They both called on Kosovo and Serbia to de-escalate recent tensions that have threatened to push the Balkan region into instability as Europe faces Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.

    “We are here to listen. And we are here to try to build these bridges which are sometimes, between neighbors, not that easy to build,” said Bettel, adding “so we have to avoid every new crisis.”

    “I believe this is necessary not only for peace and stability in the region, but also for the prospects of further EU integration,” Rutte said.

    Tensions between the two countries flared anew in May after Kosovo police seized local municipal buildings in Serb-majority northern Kosovo to install ethnic Albanian mayors who were elected in an April election that Serbs overwhelmingly boycotted.

    Violent clashes injured 30 international peacekeepers and more than 50 ethnic Serbs, stirring fears of a renewal of the 1998-99 conflict that left more than 10,000 people dead, mostly Kosovar Albanians.

    The U.S. and the EU have pressed Serbia and Kosovo to take steps to lower tensions. Normalization of relations is the key condition for the two countries to move forward in their efforts to join the 27-nation bloc.

    Just four months ago, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti gave their tacit approval to a EU-sponsored plan to end animosity and help improve their ties in the longer term.

    But the agreement unraveled almost immediately as both leaders appeared to renege on their commitments.

    When EU envoy Miroslav Lajcak visited Pristina on Tuesday, Kosovar leaders gave a positive reception to the three requests from Brussels to lower tensions with Serbia. They include de-escalation efforts, fresh election in the four Serb-majority municipalities and return to the EU-facilitated dialogue on normalization of their ties.

    After a long meeting with Kurti, Lajcak said they agreed to continue talks on the concrete steps toward de-escalation.

    Belgrade and Kosovo’s Serbs want special police forces to leave the northern area, while Pristina says the number will be gradually reduced.

    Belgrade also wants the release of Serbs detained for alleged violence against Kosovar police, journalists and international peacekeepers. The Kosovo government says a normal legal process will be held for them, inviting the EU to monitor.

    On Wednesday Lajcak goes to Belgrade.

    “I’m optimistic that good minds will prevail,” said Rutte, adding that de-escalating the latest tension was the first step to take and immediately “try to get back to a process, a step-by-step process to make it again.”

    Serbia and its former province Kosovo have been at odds for decades, with Belgrade refusing to recognize Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence.

    “We as politicians, we take the decisions, but the populations are the ones who will take benefits or suffer if we take the wrong decisions,” Bettel said.

    Washington and most EU nations have recognized Kosovo’s independence, while Russia and China have backed Serbia’s claim on the territory.

    The 1998-99 war erupted when separatist ethnic Albanians rebelled against Serbia’s rule and Belgrade responded with a brutal crackdown. NATO’s bombing campaign in 1999 forced Serbia to relinquish control, but the government in Belgrade has maintained that Kosovo remains part of Serbia.

    ——-

    Llazar Semini reported from Tirana, Albania.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Kosovo Serbs trying to take over municipality building in the north clash with police

    Kosovo Serbs trying to take over municipality building in the north clash with police

    [ad_1]

    ZVECAN, Kosovo — Ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo clashed with police at a municipal building on Monday as they tried to take over one of the local communes where ethnic Albanian mayors entered last week with the help of authorities.

    The violence was the latest incident as tensions soared over the past week, with Serbia putting the country’s military on high alert and sending more troops to the border with Kosovo, which declared independence in 2008.

    Kosovo and Serbia have been foes for decades, with Belgrade refusing to recognize Kosovo’s sovereignty. The United States and the European Union have stepped up efforts to help solve the Kosovo-Serbia dispute, fearing further instability in Europe as Russia’s war rages in Ukraine. The EU has made it clear to both Serbia and Kosovo they must normalize relations to advance in their intentions to join the bloc.

    On Monday, Kosovar police and the NATO-led Kosovo Force, or KFOR, were seen protecting the municipality buildings in Zvecan, Leposavic, Zubin Potok and Mitrovica, four communes that held early elections last month. They were largely boycotted by ethnic Serbs, who form the majority in those areas. Only ethnic Albanian or other smaller minority representatives were elected in the mayoral posts and assemblies.

    Police said that Serbs gathered early in the morning at the three communes in the north — Zvecan, Leposavic and Zubin Potok — and in Zvecan they tried to enter violently using tear gas in their efforts to get into the public buildings. Police responded with tear gas spray, a statement said.

    Serbs say they want both the new mayors, whom they called “illegal and illegitimate sheriffs,” to resign and leave offices, and special police to leave northern Kosovo, according to Goran Rakic, a Serb politician from northern Kosovo, adding that the demands were also sent to KFOR and international embassies.

    Dragisa Milovic, another Serb politician in northern Kosovo, said “people have gathered to peacefully and democratically convey that we are worried about the situation and our future,” describing the situation as “pure occupation.”

    KFOR said it has increased its presence in the four municipalities, including Mitrovica, “to ensure a safe and secure environment and freedom of movement for all communities in Kosovo.” It called on all sides “to refrain from actions that could inflame tensions or cause escalation” and urged both “Belgrade and Pristina to engage in the EU-led dialogue to reduce tensions and as the only way to peace and normalization.”

    More than a dozen Serbs and five Kosovar police officers were injured in clashes last Friday, and Serbian troops on the border with Kosovo were put on high alert the same day.

    Ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo, who are a majority in that part of the country, tried to block recently-elected ethnic Albanian officials from entering municipal buildings. Kosovo police fired tear gas to disperse the crowd and let the new officials into the offices.

    The U.S. and the EU condemned Kosovo’s government for using police to forcibly enter the municipal buildings.

    On Sunday evening, France, Germany, Italy, the U.K., the U.S. and EU again issued a statement saying they strongly caution “all parties against other threats or actions which could impact on a safe and secure environment, including freedom of movement, and that could inflame tensions or promote conflict.”

    At a rally Friday evening in Belgrade with his supporters, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said “Serbia won’t sit idle the moment Serbs in northern Kosovo are attacked.”

    However, any attempt by Serbia to send its troops over the border would mean a clash with NATO troops stationed there.

    A 2013 Pristina-Belgrade agreement on forming the Serb association was later declared unconstitutional by Kosovo’s Constitutional Court, which said the plan wasn’t inclusive of other ethnicities and could entail the use of executive powers to impose laws.

    The two sides have tentatively agreed to back a EU plan on how to proceed, but tensions still simmer.

    The conflict in Kosovo erupted in 1998 when separatist ethnic Albanians rebelled against Serbia’s rule, and Serbia responded with a brutal crackdown. About 13,000 people, mostly ethnic Albanians, died. NATO’s military intervention in 1999 eventually forced Serbia to pull out of the territory. Washington and most EU countries have recognized Kosovo as an independent state, but Serbia, Russia and China haven’t.

    ___

    Llazar Semini reported from Tirana, Albania. Jovana Gec contributed to this report from Belgrade, Serbia.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • No breakthrough in Armenia, Azerbaijan peace talks in Russia

    No breakthrough in Armenia, Azerbaijan peace talks in Russia

    [ad_1]

    MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan on Monday to try to broker a settlement to a longstanding conflict between the two ex-Soviet neighbors, but announced no breakthrough.

    The peace talks took place as Putin’s military delivered a new missile barrage targeting Ukraine’s critical infrastructure in the conflict that has entered its ninth month.

    After meetings with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi, Putin said they had to remove continuing points of disagreement from a prepared statement that was to have formed the basis of a peace deal. He called the meetings “very useful” but declined to answer a reporter’s question about the remaining sticking points, saying they were too delicate to discuss publicly.

    Before the meeting with Pashinyan, Putin had said the goals would be to ensure peace and stability, and unblock transportation infrastructure to help Armenia’s economic and social development.

    A joint statement released after the talks said the two sides pledged to refrain from the use of force, to negotiate issues based on respect for each other’s sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability of borders. It said Armenia and Azerbaijan would work to normalize relations, foster peace and stability, as well as the security and economic development of their region.

    Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked in a decades-old conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, which is part of Azerbaijan but has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since a separatist war there ended in 1994.

    “We see the approaches of our colleagues to what is happening on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and around Karabakh,” Putin said Monday. “This conflict has been going on for a decade, so we still need to end it.”

    The meetings concern implementation of a 2020 peace deal that Russia brokered. During a six-week war in 2020, Azerbaijan reclaimed broad swaths of Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent territories that Armenian forces held for decades. More than 6,700 people died in the fighting. Moscow deployed about 2,000 troops to the region to serve as peacekeepers.

    Pashinyan said Monday that he would press for Azerbaijan to withdraw its troops from the Russian peacekeeping zone in Nagorno-Karabakh, and seek freedom for Armenian prisoners of war. An extension of the Russian peacekeeping mandate was also under discussion, Russian state news agencies reported. Putin told reporters afterward that extension of Russia’s peacekeeping mission would depend on resolution of other issues.

    A new round of hostilities erupted in September, when more than 200 troops were killed on both sides. Armenia and Azerbaijan traded blame for triggering the fighting.

    Russia is Armenia’s top ally and sponsor. In a delicate balancing act, it maintains a military base in Armenia but also has developed warm ties with Azerbaijan.

    In an apparent reflection of tensions with Armenia’s leadership, Putin noted last Thursday that the Kremlin had advised Pashinyan’s government before the 2020 hostilities to agree to a compromise in which Armenian forces would give up Azerbaijani lands outside Nagorno-Karabakh that they seized in the early 1990s. Putin lamented that “the Armenian leadership has taken a different path.”

    During the 2020 fighting, Azerbaijan reclaimed not only those territories but significant chunks of Nagorno-Karabakh proper.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Putin to host leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan for talks

    Putin to host leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan for talks

    [ad_1]

    MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin will host the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan to help broker a settlement to a longstanding conflict between the two ex-Soviet neighbors, the Kremlin said Friday.

    Putin’s talks with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev will be held at the Russian leader’s Black Sea residence in Sochi on Monday.

    The Kremlin said the leaders will discuss the implementation of a 2020 peace deal brokered by Russia and “further steps to enhance stability and security in the Caucasus,” adding that “the issues related to the restoration and development of trade and economic and transport links will also be discussed.”

    The ex-Soviet neighbors have been locked in a decades-old conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, which is part of Azerbaijan but has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since a separatist war there ended in 1994.

    During a six-week war in 2020, Azerbaijan reclaimed broad swaths of Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent territories held by Armenian forces. More than 6,700 people died in the fighting, which ended with a Russian-brokered peace agreement. Moscow deployed about 2,000 troops to the region to serve as peacekeepers.

    A new round of hostilities erupted in September, when more than 200 troops were killed on both sides in two days of heavy fighting. Armenia and Azerbaijan traded blame for triggering the fighting.

    [ad_2]

    Source link