ECONOMIC TERRORISM
by Michel Chossudovsky [8 May 2001]
Professor of Economics, University of
Ottawa
* In Yugoslavia, the IMF has become
the steadfast financial bureaucracy of
the Western military alliance, working
hand in glove with NATO and the US State
Department. *
The
International Monetary Fund (IMF) is
known to bully developing countries,
imposing strong doses of "deadly
economic medicine" while saddling
governments with spiraling external
debts. In complicity with Washington, the
IMF often meddles in cabinet appointments
in debtor countries. In Korea in the
turmoil of the 1997 Asian crisis, the
Finance Minister --sacked for allegedly
"hindering negotiations" with
the IMF-- was replaced by a former IMF
official.1 In Turkey, also in the wake of
an IMF-style financial meltdown (March
2001), the Minister of Economy was
substituted by a Vice-President of the
World Bank. 2
But what has occurred in Yugoslavia sets
a new record in the abusive practices of
the Washington-based international
financial bureaucracy: the arrest of a
head of State of a debtor nation
--demanded by its main creditors-- has
become "a pre-condition" for
the holding of loan negotiations. While
the 31st of March 2001 was Washington's
deadline date for the arrest of President
Slobodan Milosevic by the DOS government,
another ultimatum was set for
transferring the former head of State to
the jurisdiction of the NATO-sponsored
Hague Tribunal (ICTY). In the words of
Secretary of State Colin Powell:
"the US administration's support for
an international donors' conference where
Yugoslavia is hoping for up to $1 billion
to help rebuild would depend on continued
progress in full cooperation with the
[Hague] tribunal."3
A State Department spokesman further
clarified "that the United States
has the power to stop the conference from
going ahead in the early summer if
Washington is not satisfied."4
Meanwhile, the Hague Tribunal has
threatened to take the matter before the
UN Security Council, if President
Milosevic is not rapidly transferred to
its jurisdiction. 5
WITHHOLDING
FINANCIAL "AID"
Very timely... At the height of the
Yugoslav presidential elections
(September 2000), "enabling
legislation" was rushed through the
US House of Representatives. Washington
had forewarned Kostunica --pursuant to an
Act of Congress (HR 1064)-- that unless
his government fully complied to US
diktats, financial "aid" would
be withheld. The IMF and the World Bank
had also been duly notified by their
largest shareholder, namely the US
government, that:
"the US Secretary of the Treasury
[would] withhold from payment of the
United States share of any increase in
the paid-in capital of [the IMF and World
Bank] an amount equal to the amount of
the loan or other assistance [to
Yugoslavia].6
Meanwhile, Washington had demanded the
setting up of an office of the Hague
Tribunal (ICTY) in Belgrade as well as
modifications to the legal statutes of
Yugoslavia. The latter --to be
rubber-stamped by the Parliament-- would
place the ICTY Tribunal above the
jurisdiction of Yugoslavia's national
legal system. It would also allow the
ICTY to order on NATO's behest, the
arrest of thousands of people on trumped
up charges.
RELEASING
KLA TERRORISTS
US officials had also intimated that the
prompt release of KLA "freedom
fighters" serving jail terms in
Serbia was to be regarded as an
"additional pre-condition" for
the granting of financial assistance:
"State Department officials later
told UPI that among other steps the
United States was looking for, were
Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica to
begin returning Albanians captured during
the 1999 Kosovo conflict to Kosovo and
for an acceptance of the war crimes
tribunal's jurisdiction inside Serbia
where numerous indicted suspects still
enjoy immunity."7
An "Amnesty Law" was rushed
through the Yugoslav parliament barely a
month before Washington's March 31st
deadline.8 While the victims of the war
are persecuted and indicted as war
criminals, the Kostunica regime --on
Washington's instructions-- has released
Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) criminals
(linked to the drug mafias) who committed
atrocities in Kosovo.
Meanwhile, these criminals have rejoined
the ranks of the KLA, now involved in a
new wave of terrorist assaults in
southern Serbia and in neighboring
Macedonia. The evidence amply confirms
that these terrorist attacks are
supported and financed by Washington.9
"ECONOMIC
NORMALIZATION"
Without further scrutiny, the Western
media touts the holding of a donors'
conference as "a necessary
step" towards "economic
normalization" and the
"reintegration" of Yugoslavia
into the "family of nations".
Public opinion is led to believe that the
"donors" will "help"
Yugoslavia rebuild. The term
"donor" is a misnomer. In fact
the donors' conference is a meeting of
bankers and creditors mainly from the
countries which bombed Yugoslavia. Their
intent is to not only to collect money
from Yugoslavia, but also to gain full
control and ownership of the Yugoslav
economy.
Meanwhile, national laws have been
revised to facilitate sweeping
privatization. Serbia's large industrial
complexes and public utilities are to be
restructured and auctioned off to foreign
capital. In other words, rather than
"helping Yugoslavia", the donor
conference --organized in close
consultation with Washington and NATO
headquarters in Brussels-- would set the
stage for the transformation of
Yugoslavia into a colony of the Western
military alliance.
Yugoslavia's external debt is in excess
of $14 billion of which $5 billion are
owed to the Paris Club (i.e. largely to
the governments of NATO countries) and $3
billion to the London Club. The latter is
a syndicate of private banks, which in
the case of Yugoslavia includes some 400
creditor institutions. The largest part
of Yugoslavia's commercial debt, however,
is held by some 16 (mainly) American and
European banks which are members of an
"International Coordinating
Committee" (ICC) headed by America's
Citigroup and Germany's giant
WestDeutsche Landesbank. Other big
players in the ICC include J. P.
Morgan-Chase and Merrill Lynch.
The ICC --which operates discretely
behind the scenes-- ultimately call the
shots regarding debt negotiations,
privatization and macro-economic therapy.
In turn, the IMF bureaucracy acting on
behalf of both the commercial and
official creditors has called for "a
restructuring of FRY's external debt on
appropriate terms" underscoring the
fact that fresh money can only be
approved "following the
regularization of arrears." 10 What
this means is that Belgrade would be
obliged to recognize these debts in full
as a condition for the negotiation of
fresh loans as well as settle pending
succession issues regarding the division
of the external debt of the FRY with the
"successor republics."
FICTICIOUS
MONEY
While token
"reconstruction" loans are
envisaged, vast amounts of money and
resources will be taken out of
Yugoslavia. In fact, most of the promised
"reconstruction" money is
totally fictitious.
A $208 million 'bridge loan" granted
by Switzerland and Norway (January 2001
was used to reimburse the IMF. In turn,
the IMF had granted $151 million to
Belgrade in the form of a so-called
"post-conflict assistance"
loan. But this "aid" was tagged
to reimburse Switzerland and Norway,
which had coughed up the money to settle
IMF arrears in the first place:
"The [IMF] Board approved a loan
[of] ...US$151 million under the IMF's
policy on emergency post-conflict
assistance in support of a program to
stabilize the FRY's economy and help
rebuild administrative capacities. Of
this amount, the [Belgrade] authorities
will draw... US$130 million to repay the
bridge loans they received [from
Switzerland and Norway] to eliminate
arrears with the IMF."11
The illusion is conveyed that "money
is coming in" and that "the IMF
is helping Yugoslavia." In fact,
what remains after the IMF "has
reimbursed itself" is a meager
influx of 21 million dollars. And broadly
the same fictitious money arrangement has
been put in place by the World Bank,
which has ordered that $1.7 billion in
arrears "be cleared" before the
granting of fresh loans.
In this regard, Belgrade will be granted
a so-called "loan of
consolidation" from the World Bank
to reimburse the $1,7 billion debt it
owes to the World Bank. Little or no
money will actually enter the country. In
the words of Central Bank governor Mladan
Dinkic:
"[this] will pave the way for
Yugoslavia's return to the World Bank.
`In the first three years, we will
receive the so-called AIDA status, which
the World Bank gives to the poorest
countries... [this] is the most favorable
arrangement possible, with a longer
grace-period and minimum interest, which
will allow our economy to pay off the
[$1.7 billion] debt and create conditions
for receiving new loans".12
More generally, the
"reconstruction" money will
line the pockets of international
creditors and multinational corporations
(with trinkets for DOS cronies) while
putting the entire Yugoslav economy on
the auction block. Assets will be sold at
rock-bottom prices under IMF-World Bank
supervision. The meager proceeds of
forced privatization --in which only
foreign "investors" will be
allowed to bid-- will then be used to pay
back the creditors, who happen to be the
same people who are buying up
Yugoslavia's assets.
And who will appraise the "book
value" of Yugoslavia's industrial
assets and supervise the auction of State
property? The large European and US
merchant banks and accounting firms,
which also happen to be acting on behalf
of their corporate clients involved in
bidding.
DEADLY
ECONOMIC MEDICINE
Fictitious reconstruction money,
however, is only granted on condition
Yugoslavia implements economic
"shock therapy." The
donor-sponsored program is predicated on
"destruction" rather than
"reconstruction". Under the
disguise of "economic
normalization", the IMF, the World
Bank and the London-based European Bank
for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)
have been given the mandate to dismantle
through bankruptcy and forced
privatization what has not yet been
destroyed by the bombers.
In this process, political terror and
"economic terror" go hand in
hand. The evidence amply confirms that
the IMF-World Bank's lethal economic
reforms imposed in more than 150
developing countries have led to the
impoverishment of millions of people. In
a cruel irony, bitter economic medicine
and token financial assistance are
presented as "the rewards" for
transferring President Milosevic to the
jurisdiction of the Hague Tribunal.
While the present IMF program is a
"continuation" of the deadly
economic reforms first imposed on federal
Yugoslavia in the 1980s (and then on its
"successor republics"), it
promises to be far more devastating.13
The Group of 17 economists (G-17) --which
controls the Ministry of Finance and
Yugoslavia's Central Bank (NBJ)-- are in
permanent liaison with the IMF, the World
Bank and the US Treasury. A "letter
of Intent" outlining in detail the
economic therapy to be imposed on
Yugoslavia by the DOS government had in
fact been drawn up in secret negotiations
with the creditors before the September
2000 presidential elections. Mladjan
Dinkic --who now holds the position of
Governor of the National Bank of
Yugoslavia (NBJ) (Central Bank)-- had
stated that one of the first things they
would do under a Kostunica presidency
would be to implement economic
"shock therapy":
"Immediately after taking the
office, the new government shall abolish
all types of subsidies... This measure
must be implemented without regrets or
hesitation, since it will be difficult if
not impossible to apply later, in view of
the fact that in the meantime strong
lobbies may appear and do their best to
block such measures... This initial step
in economic liberalization must be
undertaken as a "shock therapy"
as its radical nature does not leave
space for gradualism of any kind."14
The G-17 does not hide the fact that one
of its main objectives consists in
breaking social resistance to the
economic restructuring program:
"Any future democratic regime is
likely to face substantial public
resistance to privatization and the
socio-economic reforms that will
accompany it. In the short term, the
insolvency and restructuring of Serbian
enterprises is likely to generate
unemployment or wage cuts for many
employees... The servicing of debts and
fiscal adjustments are likely to require
cuts in public expenditure and the
introduction of potentially unpopular new
taxes and levies. The purchase of Serbian
firms by wealthy domestic and foreign
investors may also generate resentment,
especially as it will represent a radical
break with the former Yugoslav tradition
of workers' or "social"
ownership. Nationalist and anti-reformist
groups are likely to mobilize popular
resistance by exploiting these problems.
This form of political opposition would
limit the scope for introducing effective
economic reform and
privatization."15.
FREEZING
WAGES
The IMF program --put into full swing
in the wake of the September 2000
elections-- calls for the adoption of
"prudent macroeconomic policies and
bold structural reforms", In IMF
lingo, "bold" invariably means
the application of "shock
treatment" while "prudent"
means carefully designed and
uncompromising austerity measures.16.
Upon assuming office, the Kostunica
government --under IMF instructions-- has
deregulated the prices of basic consumer
goods and frozen the wages of working
people.17 A new Labor Law setting the
minimum wage at 35 percent of the average
wage was rubber-stamped by the Yugoslav
parliament. In other words, with rising
prices coupled with the deindexation of
wages ordered by the IMF, the new
legislation allows the real minimum wage
to slide to abysmally low levels.18
Credit has been frozen to local
businesses and farmers. Interest rates
have already skyrocketed. With the end of
the economic sanctions, the IMF has also
demanded that import barriers be removed
to facilitate the dumping of surplus
commodities on the domestic market
leading to the bankruptcy of domestic
producers. In turn, energy prices are to
be totally deregulated prior to the
privatization of public utilities, State
oil refineries, coal mining and
electricity.
In turn, drastic cuts in the social
security and pension funds of the
Republic of Serbia are envisaged, which
would virtually lead to their collapse
(See IMF Program, op cit). The
restructuring of social programs is a
carbon copy of that imposed in
neighboring Bulgaria, where pensions paid
out to senior citizens plummeted in 1997
to $3 as month.19
ENGINEERING
THE COLLAPSE OF THE DINAR
The most lethal component of the IMF
program, however, is the so-called
"managed float" of the exchange
rate which --according to IMF Deputy
Managing Director Stanley Fischer-- is
implemented "to better reflect
market conditions". 20
Yugoslavia's central bank foreign
exchange reserves are of the order of
$500 million, the external debt is in
excess of $14 billion. Under agreement
with the IMF, money (in the form of
"precautionary loan") would be
granted to replenish the foreign exchange
reserves of the Central Bank with a view
to supporting the dinar. Moreover
following the Brazilian pattern, the
dinar would also be artificially propped
up by extensive government borrowing from
private banking institutions at
exorbitant interest rates thereby
fuelling the internal public debt. 21
In the absence of exchange controls
restricting capital flight, central bank
foreign exchange reserves would
eventually be depleted. In other words,
when the "borrowed reserves"
are no longer there to prop up the
currency, the dinar collapses. In the
logic of the "managed float",
the dollars borrowed under an IMF
precautionary fund arrangement, would be
reappropriated by international creditors
and speculators once the dinar slides,
leading to a further expansion of
Yugoslavia's external debt.
In fact, this policy is largely
instrumental in triggering
hyperinflation. The national currency
would become totally worthless. In other
words, prices would go sky high following
the collapse of the national currency. In
turn, wages would be frozen on IMF
instructions as part of an
"anti-inflationary program" and
the standard of living would plummet to
even lower levels. And Yugoslavs are
already impoverished with two thirds of
the population (according to UN sources
acknowledged in the IMF report) with per
capita incomes below 2 dollars a day.
It's the same financial scam that the IMF
applied in Korea, Indonesia, Russia,
Brazil and more recently Turkey.22 In
this process, various speculative
instruments (including "short
selling" of currencies) were applied
by international banks and financial
institutions to trigger the collapse of
national currencies. In Korea, debts
spiraled in the wake of the currency
crisis. As a result, the entire economy
was put on the auction block and several
of Korea's powerful conglomerates were
taken over by American capital at
ridiculously low prices.
In Russia, the ruble became totally
worthless following the implementation of
an IMF program. The float of the ruble
applied in 1992 under IMF advice was
conducive in less than a year to a one
hundred fold (9900%) increase in consumer
prices. Nominal earnings increased ten
fold (900%), the collapse in real wages
in 1992 was of the order of 86 percent.
In subsequent years, real earnings
continued to plummet precipitating the
descent of the Russian people into
extreme poverty.23
More generally, the IMF program creates a
framework for collecting as well as
enlarging the debt through the
manipulation of currency markets. It is
worth mentioning, in this regard, that
barely a few weeks before the arrest of
President Milosevic, Turkey was subjected
--following the destabilization of its
currency-- to the most brutal economic
reforms leading virtually over night to
the collapse of the standard of living.
Under IMF ministrations, interest rates
in Turkey had shot up to a modest 550%.
WAR DAMAGES
The IMF has acknowledged in its report
that the damage caused by NATO bombings
is of the order of 40 billion dollars.24
This figure does not take into account
the losses in Yugoslavia's GDP resulting
from years of economic sanctions, nor
does it account for the loss of human
life and limb, the human suffering
inflicted on an entire population, the
toxic radiation from depleted uranium and
the environmental devastation amply
documented by Yugoslav and international
sources. 25 Ironically, this study on war
damages was coordinated by G-17 Mladjan
Dinkic and Miroslav Labus who now hold
key positions in the DOS government.
Since his appointment to the position of
central bank governor, Dinkic has not
said a word about "war damages"
in his discussions with Western
creditors. 26
LUCRATIVE
RECONSTRUCTION CONTRACTS
No "compensation" for war
damages let alone debt relief has been
contemplated. In a cruel twist, a large
part of the fresh loans --which
Yugoslavia will eventually have to
reimburse-- will be used to rebuild what
was destroyed by the bombers. Moreover,
under the World Bank-EBRD system of
international tender, these loans are in
fact tagged to finance lucrative
contracts with construction companies
from NATO countries:
"the big winners [are the Western]
telecommunications companies,
construction firms, banks and shipping
concerns who can rebuild the Danube River
bridges, power plants and refineries
destroyed by NATO airstrikes. ... While
European companies, already busy with
Balkan projects, have a home-court
advantage, U.S. companies such as
infrastructure specialists Brown &
Root [a subsidiary of Vice President Dick
Cheney's company Halliburton Oil], AES
and General Electric could get a piece of
the action." 27
And what will these companies do? They
will sub-contract will local firms and/or
hire Yugoslav engineers and workers at
wages below one hundred dollars a month.
In other words, the borrowed money
promised to Belgrade for
"reconstruction" will go
straight back into the pockets of Western
banks and MNCs. In turn, the so-called
"prioritization of
expenditures" imposed by the IMF
means that the State (i.e. Yugoslavia's
own money) would be footing the bill for
clearing the Danube and rebuilding the
bridges, essentially
"subsidizing" the interests of
foreign capital. Moreover, IMF
"conditionalities" --which
require drastic cuts in social
expenditures-- would prevent the
government from allocating its budget to
rebuilding schools and hospitals hit
during the bombing campaign.
THE
COSTS OF THE AIR CAMPAIGN
Accusing the Serbian people and the
former head of State of the crimes
committed by the aggressor is intended to
instill a sense of fear and collective
guilt on an entire Nation.
But there is something else which has so
far not been mentioned: Washington's
design is to hold President Milosevic
responsible for the War not as an
individual but as the country's head of
State, with a view to eventually
collecting war reparations from
Yugoslavia.
In other words, if the former head of
State were to be indicted by the Hague
tribunal, the country could be held
"legally responsible" not only
for the costs of NATO's
"humanitarian bombs", but for
all the military and
"peacekeeping" expenses
incurred since 1992.
In fact, an army of accountants and
economists has already evaluated --on
NATO's behest-- the costs of the air
campaign and the various
"peacekeeping operations". In
this regard, the U.S. share of the costs
of the bombing, "peacekeeping"
and "refugee assistance" solely
in fiscal year 1999 was estimated at
$5.05 billion. The amounts allocated by
the Clinton Administration to pay for the
war and the refugees in FY 1999 were of
the order of $6.6 billion. So-called
"emergency funding"
appropriated by Congress for operations
in Kosovo and other defense spending in
FY 1999 totaled $12 billion. Moreover,
the Department of Defense estimates the
costs of deployment of American
occupation forces and civilian personnel
stationed in Bosnia and Kosovo since 1992
to be of the order of $21.2 billion.28
In other words, indicting President
Milosevic on trumped up charges raises a
fundamental question of legitimacy. It
sanctions the bombings as a humanitarian
operation. It not only absolves the real
war criminals, it also opens up the
avenue for the indictment of Yugoslavia
as a nation.
The former head of State is indicted; the
people are collectively indicted. What
this means is that NATO could at some
future date oblige Yugoslavia to pay for
the bombs used to destroy the country and
kill its people.
There is nothing fundamentally new in
this process. Under the British Empire,
it was common practice not only to
install puppet regimes but also to bill
the costs of gunboat operations to
countries, which refused to sign a
"free trade" agreement with Her
Majesty's government. In 1850, Britain
threatened to send in its "gun
boats" ---equivalent to today's
humanitarian air raids-- following the
refusal of the Kingdom of Siam (Thailand)
to sign a free trade treaty with Britain
(equivalent to today's "letter of
intent" to the IMF). While the
language and institutions of colonial
diplomacy have changed, the similarity
with contemporary practices is striking.
In the words of British envoy Sir James
Brooke (equivalent to today's Richard
Holbrooke):
"The Siamese Government is hostile--
its tone is arrogant-- its presumption
unbounded... Should these just [British]
demands firmly urged be refused, a force
should be present, immediately to enforce
them by a rapid destruction of the
defenses of the river... Siam may be
taught the lesson which it has long been
tempted, ... a better disposed king
placed on the throne, and an influence
acquired in the country which will make
it of immense commercial importance to
England... [Note the similarity in
relation to Yugoslavia] Above all, it
would be well to prepare for the change
and to place our own kind on the throne
... This prince [Mongkut] we ought to
place on the throne and through him, we
might, beyond doubt, gain all we
desire.... And the expense incurred [of
the military operation] would readily be
available from the royal treasury of
Siam."29
Replace the head of State, impose
"free" trade, bill the country
for the military operation!
PRECEDENTS
OF WAR REPARATIONS: VIETNAM AND NICARAGUA
In fact in the case of Vietnam
--which won the war against US
aggression-- Hanoi was nonetheless
obliged to pay war reparations to the
United States, as a condition for the
lifting of economic sanctions in 1994.
Although the historical circumstances
were quite different to those of
Yugoslavia, the pattern of IMF
intervention in Vietnam was in many
regards similar. The decision to lift the
sanctions on Vietnam was also taken in
the context of a donors' conference.
"Some two billion dollars of loans
and "aid" money had been
pledged in support of Vietnam's IMF
sponsored reforms, yet immediately after
the Conference another separate meeting
was held, this time "behind closed
doors" in which Hanoi was obliged to
fully reimburse ... the debts incurred by
the US installed Saigon military
government."30 By fully recognising
the legitimacy of these debts, Hanoi had
in effect accepted to repay loans that
had been utilised to support the US War
effort.
Moreover, Hanoi's acceptance had also
totally absolved Washington from paying
war reparations to Vietnam totalling $4.2
billion as agreed at the Paris Peace
Conference in 1973.31
NICARAGUA:
"FREEDOM FIGHTERS" AND IMF
ECONOMIC MEDICINE
Similarly the 12 billion dollars
"reparations" that the US had
been ordered to pay to Nicaragua by the
Hague International Court of Justice
(ICJ) were never paid. In 1990, following
the installation of a pro-US
"democratic" government, these
reparations --ordered by the ICJ-- were
erased in exchange for
"normalization" and the lifting
of sanctions. In return, Washington
approved a token $60 million in
"emergency aid" which was of
course conditional upon the payment of
all debts and the adoption of the most
deadly IMF economic shock therapy:
"The United States ... provides
severance pay to government workers fired
under the U.S.-mandated [IMF structural
adjustment] program to reduce the size of
Nicaragua's government. Among the
results: Nicaragua's social security
budget has been slashed from $ 18 million
to $ 4 million while unemployment has
risen to about 45 percent. Health
spending has dropped from $86 per person
[per annum] five years ago to $ 18 [in
1991 in the year following the
elections]. Pensions for disabled war
veterans have been frozen at $ 6.50 per
month while food prices have risen [1991]
to nearly U.S. levels... In the words of
a State Department official 'The US is
committed to rebuilding Nicaragua, but
there's only a limited amount you can do
with development aid.'"32
Yet the US did not hesitate in spending
billions of dollars to finance nine years
of economic embargo and war in which
Washington created and funded a
paramilitary army (the Contras) to fight
the Sandinista government. Heralded by
the Reagan administration and touted by
the media as "freedom
fighters", the Contras insurgency
was financed by drug money and covert
support from the CIA. And in fact the
same pattern of covert support using drug
money was applied to financing the Kosovo
Liberation Army (KLA) with a view to
destabilizing Yugoslavia. William Walker,
head of the OSCE mission to Kosovo in the
months preceding the 1999 war, was
responsible together with Coronal Oliver
North in channeling covert support to the
Contras which ultimately led to the
downfall of the Sandinista government and
its defeat in "democratic"
elections in 1990.
THE
ROLE OF THE UNITED NATIONS COMPENSATION
COMMISSION (UNCC)
Another case is that of Iraq which
--in the wake of the Gulf War-- was
obliged to pay extensive war reparations.
The United Nations Compensation
Commission (UNCC) was set up to process
"claims" against Iraq. Thirty
percent of Iraqi oil revenues in the
"oil for food program" are
impounded by the UNCC to pay war
reparations to governments, banks and
corporations. The UNCC "has awarded
more than $32 billion [in claims], and
more than $9.5 billion has been paid out
under the food-for-oil regime."33
These precedents are important in
understanding the war in Yugoslavia.
Although no official statement has been
made by NATO, the framework and
bureaucracy of the UNCC could at some
future date be extended to collecting war
reparations from Yugoslavia. The UNCC's
claim procedures are based on a 1991 UN
Security Council resolution which
establishes Iraq's liability for the Gulf
war under international law.
In the case of Yugoslavia, President
Milosevic is accused by the Hague
tribunal for "crimes against
humanity and violations of the laws or
customs of war", 34. Following the
Iraqi precedent, a decision of the Hague
Tribunal concerning President Milosevic
could constitute the basis for the
formulation of a similar UN Security
Council Resolution establishing the
liability of the government and people of
Yugoslavia for the "direct loss,
damage... to foreign governments,
nationals and corporations",
including "the costs of the air
campaign." 35
REWRITING
HISTORY
Recent events have shown how realties
can be turned upside down by the
aggressor and its propaganda machine.
NATO's intent is to blatantly distort the
course of events and manipulate the
writing of modern history. It is
therefore essential that the Yugoslav
people remain united in their resolve. It
should also be understood that the
"demonisation" of the Serbian
people and of President Slobodan
Milosevic alongside the triggering of
ethnic conflicts is intended to impose
the "free market" and enforce
the New World Order throughout the
Balkans.
Internationally, the various movements
against IMF-World Bank-WTO reforms must
understand that war and globalization are
inter-connected processes. Applied around
the World, the only promise of the
"free market" is a World of
landless farmers, shuttered factories,
jobless workers and gutted social
programs with "bitter economic
medicine" under IMF-WB-WTO custody
constituting the only prescription.
Moreover, militarization increasingly
constitutes the means for enforcing these
deadly macro-economic reforms.
Yugoslavia's struggle to preserve its
national sovereignty is --at this
particular juncture in its history-- a
part of the broader movement against the
New World Order and the imposition
throughout the World of a uniform
neo-liberal policy agenda under IMF-World
Bank-WTO supervision. Behind these
organizations --which routinely interface
with NATO-- are the powers of the US and
European financial establishments and the
Western military-industrial complex.
C Copyright by Michel Chossudovsky,
Ottawa, May 2001. All rights reserved.
Permission is granted to post this text
on non-commercial community internet
sites, provided the essay remains intact
and the copyright note is displayed. To
publish this text in printed and/or other
form, contact the author at
chossudovsky@videotron.ca, fax:
1-514-4256224.
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