BELGRADE, SERBIA
Provocative NATO summit draws angry protests
By
John Catalinotto
Published Jun 26, 2011 10:08 PM
Despite its recent failures in imposing stable colonial rule in
Afghanistan or subduing the legitimate government of Libya, NATO went ahead
with a high-level meeting in Belgrade, Serbia, in mid-June. This slap in the
face to the people of the Balkans drew angry opposition.
About 200 top military officers from 55 countries met June 13-15 in Belgrade at
NATO’s annual Strategic Military Partner Conference. This
organization’s goal is to bring the militaries of the former East
European and Balkan socialist states into a subservient role in the imperialist
military alliance.
Many people of the former Yugoslav capital were unable to erase the memory of
the brutal NATO aggression against their country 12 years earlier. On June 10,
the Movement for Serbia presented more than 3,000 signatures protesting the
NATO meeting at a news conference where the group said it would support all
public protests.
During the NATO meeting, the same alarm went off throughout the capital that
was used during the U.S.-led NATO bombing that went on for 78 days in 1999.
Observers said it brought back memories of the bombing that killed 3,500 people
and destroyed much of the industrial infrastructure of Serbia. Former
government buildings that were bombed then still remain ruins in the center of
the city.
Hundreds of people demonstrated in Pioneer Park at the call of the Serbian
Radical Party. Some of the signs they carried were “NATO = crime”
and “The killer returns to the scene of the crime.” Police attacked
this demonstration.
Another rally was jointly held by the Democratic Party of Serbia, the Center
for Strategic Alternatives, the Active Center civic organization and Slobodan
Jovanovic Foundation under the slogan, “This is not a NATO state.”
The DPS is Vojislav Kostunica’s party; that even this party would be
protesting shows how far the Serbian regime has submitted to Western rule since
1999.
Kostunica was the first Western-backed replacement for Slobodan Milosevic and
came to power in a coup following a contested election in the fall of 2000. At
the time, the Western media painted Kostunica and his party as democratic
saviors, but the NATO powers saw his government only as the first step toward
the re-colonization of the region. All talk of “democracy” was pure
imperialist demagogy.
Observers report that the demonstrators against the NATO meeting also protested
NATO’s current bombing campaign against Libya.
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