Another One Bites the Dust

AKI reports:

Deputy chief of the United Nations administration in Serbia’s breakaway Kosovo province, Steven Shuck [sic] who is being probed for corruption and 'unprofessional behaviour' has stepped down from his post...

Shuck, a retired American general, is being investigated by the UN internal commission over his alleged ties with some Kosovo businessmen, politicians and sexual relations with UN staff as well as two ethnic Albanian popstars, the reports said.

Further citing local (i.e. Albanian) media, AKI claims that Shuck [edit: the name is spelled "Shook"] was close to KLA commander Ramush Haradinaj (one of the rare KLA leaders indicted by the Hague Inquisition), and had "suspicious dealings with Kosovo energy minister Ethem Ceku in connection with a multimillion dollar project to build electric power plants."

As Lord Acton famously wrote, absolute power corrupts absolutely. As occupiers of the southern Serbian province, UNMIK officials had as close to absolute power as one gets in this day and age (except, perhaps, the viceroy of Bosnia). Their lavish wages and connections with the Albanian mafia and separatist leaders (or am I repeating myself?) ensured unlimited access to pleasures of the flesh. No wonder UNMIK officials have become the very paragon of corruption.

It's unclear whether Shook's departure will halt the UN investigation. Allegations of his wrongdoing (and knowing UNMIK's modus operandi, this is probably just the tip of the proverbial iceberg) are too serious to just be dropped. No matter what the punishment, it will not fit the crime of occupation, with all the ills it has brought. Even a morsel of justice, however, is better than nothing.

Kosovo Returns Pathetic

From beograd.com, Friday, 13 May 2005, 1500 hrs:

Between 2000 and December 2004, 12,218 people have returned to Kosovo-Metohija, according to the UNHCR office in Priština. As related by the chairman of the Kosovo-Metohija Coordination Center Nebojsa Čović at the regular weekly press conference, the UNHCR made a summary of "accomplished returns based on information from the field."

UNHCR has information about the municipalities of Dragaš, Prizren, Orahovac, Suva Reka, Gnjilane, Novo Brdo, Vitina, Kosovska Kamenica, Štrpce, Uroševac, Gnjilane, Leposavić, Vučitrn, Kosovska Mitrovica, Srbica, Dečani, Đakovica, Peć, Istok, Klina, Obilić, Lipljan, Podujevo, Priština and Kosovo Polje.

The spreadsheets provided indicate that the bulk of the returns - 9,916 - occurred between 2000 and 2003, while only 2,500 returns took place last year.

Let me get this straight: UNHCR has documented only 12,000 or so returns in four years, out of 200-something thousand who were forced out during and after the war? If we take 250,000 as the displaced total, than this is somewhat less than 5%. And that is assuming these people actually returned - that is, actually live in their homes, and haven't been either:

• burned out of them during the 2004 pogrom
• killed, or
• coerced into selling them to Albanians and leaving again.

In short, UNHCR's numbers - no doubt intended to show "progress" and provide another paper-thin excuse for the sham "standards" review about to take place - make it obvious that the expelled non-Albanians are not returning to the occupied territories. And why would they? To live in fear, risk injury and death, and - since they would be denied the right to self-defense - exist solely at the mercy of the KLA and the NATO occupiers? Please!

Serbs may be naive, gullible and even masochistic, but not that much.

UNMIKistan

Chris Deliso over on Balkanalysis likes the new Balkan Express and points out a few more things:

"there are still other problems that emerge from the UN's failure to perform adequate passport checking from the start. Under UNMIK, Kosovo is where the war on terror went to die. [...] you have a situation whereby Osama himself could merrily motor into Kosovo without any problems. Sorry to say, this sort of thing has and does happen, if not with the big chief himself, at least with others of his ilk."

Deliso further argues that:

The UN in Kosovo has been playing 'I'm OK, you're OK' for far too long. It failed in the beginning to show a firm hand, and its cowardice has been noted and abused ever since. There's little chance that this belated attempt to bravely impose law and order will do anything of the sort. There may still be a golden future for UNMIKistan yet.

Could be because I'm a bit more cynical, but I've been skeptical of UNMIK and KFOR's bona fides from the start. They came into existence as a result of an illegla war of aggression and as agents of an illegal occupation. KFOR's job has been to "protect" Kosovo from Serbia, not anyone in Kosovo from the KLA and other terrorists. Similarly, UNMIK's job has never been to get the war-interrupted (Serbian) government up and running, but to build a new, Albanian government as a replacement. That in the midst of those perverted priorities they have paid as much attention to controlling the borders as to the KLA terror should not be surprising.