Albanian Civil Society Survives Amidst the Carnage

By Teresa Crawford

In March of 1998, six Americans traveled to Pristina, Kosova at the
invitation of the Independent Student Union of the University of Prishtina
(USUP). I was part of that group. Our mission was to work with the
students in their efforts to expand and extend their active nonviolent
campaign. In the course of our stay, we met with ethnic Albanians and
Serbs of Kosova, and began to develop a picture of their life in the
province. After almost two weeks, we were arrested by Serbian authorities
for failing to register with the police. We were tried, and then sentenced
to ten days in prison. We were pardoned by President Milan Milutinovic
after serving three days and were deported to Skopje, Macedonia.

For me, the worst part of the experience was not being able to say
goodbye. Upon our release, I was picked up from my prison in Lipjan, about
13 km outside Pristina. Lipjan is on the way to the Macedonian border. The
men had already been collected from their prison in Pristina. We were
driven to the border, given back our passports, with stamps inside
forbidding re-entry for three years, and told to walk across no man's land
to the Macedonian side. The people we met and the family we stayed with
had opened their hearts and their homes to us. I did not get to say
goodbye.

I have strong memories of our all-too-brief stay. I have never had that
much Turkish tea or coffee to drink in my entire life. We went from house
to house, hearing story after story of the parallel society that had been
created by ethnic Albanians. This involved ingenuity and creativity. The
methods they used to survive did not happen in a vacuum. Kosovar Serbs
employed many methods to survive in Kosova also. I remember a Kosovar
Serb restaurant owner -- a former Communist party official who had been
fired from his job for speaking out when Belgrade revoked KosovaŐs
authority in 1989. He opened a restaurant and employed people from all
ethnic groups and used this as a legitimate front to smuggle gasoline,
which he sold on the black market. Or the Kosovar Albanian professor in
the technical faculty at the "parallel university," who devised a
double-booking system of accounting which allowed Albanian businesses to
hide their true assets from the Belgrade authorities, and so avoid taxation.
Belgrade had levied steep taxes and fines on the Albanians when they
declared an "independent" government in Kosova, and the businesses were
also paying taxes to the LDK (Democratic League of Kosova) to sustain the
parallel institutions. So anything that kept their real assets hidden helped
to support their parallel state.

What they were able to accomplish individually was matched by what they
were able to achieve collectively. The parallel political, medical and
education systems were supposed to be temporary: an interim step to a
political solution. But for ten years they served the needs of approximately
2 million people. This figure does not include those Kosovar Serb and Roma
who received help from some of these parallel organizations. (for an
expanded article on some of these structures, see Prof. Julie Mertus,
Remembering Kosova,
http://www.law.onu.edu/organizations/international/Kosovo.htm)

These autonomous structures were developed by ordinary people, even if
they were funded, in large part, by the Diaspora community. It meant that
Kosovars began to see themselves in a democratic political environment.
This helped to change the demands for a restoration of autonomy into one
of independence. It was a crucial shift, although Ibrahim RugovaŐs passive
non-violence was receiving much more attention -- and praise --
internationally. The crackdown against the Kosova Liberation Army (KLA) in
Drenica in early March was another catalyst. It served up images of dead
women and children, and prompted many in the cities to affirm that they,
too. were KLA.

The province of Kosova has always been a contentious space within the
Yugoslav federation. Kosova was an autonomous province under the
Yugoslav Constitution of 1974, and it differed from the other provinces of
Yugoslavia in that it could not secede from the state. During the late
1970Ős, demographic changes continued a trend that began in the decade
following World War II. The ratio of Albanians to Serbs in Kosova has gone
from approximately 6 to 4 following World War II, to todayŐs ratio of 9 to
1. During the 1970Ős and 80Ős, Serbs submitted many concerns to the
federal government about their safety amidst a growing Albanian
population. In 1981, a series of large Albanian demonstrations against the
Yugoslav government encompassed the entire Albanian community and
made demands such as greater autonomy and better living conditions for
Kosova. The Yugoslav government reacted to these demonstrations with
violence and heightened security measures. Meanwhile, Serb grievances to
the federal government continued in the 1980Ős, until present-day
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic finally embraced their concerns in
1987. Milosevic was the first politician from Belgrade to acknowledge Serb
grievances since the 1960Ős. He addressed their concerns by revoking the
autonomy of Kosova, a move met by support from most politicians in
Belgrade. During and after the war in Bosnia he began to move in Serbian
refugees from the Krajina, many against their will, to Kosova in an attempt
to reverse the ethnic make-up of the region.

Of the six of us arrested last year in Kosova all have continued our work
on behalf of the Kosovars and somehow stayed connected to the region.
Peter Lippman is writing for The Advocacy Project in Bosnia. His series of
profiles on returning refugees will start going out to subscribers within the
next few days.

As for me, I have been moderating the Kosova Action Network distribution
list, KAN-L on the <www.alb-net.com> server. This has meant that I get
to see many emails about Kosova, and people have been sending me
fascinating notes about work they are doing or questions they need help
answering. Whether it is "Shani" in San Francisco telling me about a Roma
group in Skopje, or "Tova" telling me about a trip for Crabgrass, these
messages display a deep commitment to a free Kosova and an
understanding of what it will take to achieve that. They also demonstrate
that the spirit and courage which created that parallel society in Kosova is
still alive and well in the new Albanian Diaspora, and even the refugee
camps. It has not been destroyed, in spite of the brutal events of the last
month.

We are learning of women helping other women. There is the woman who
was blocked at the border for 24 hours before being able to leave Kosova.
Once in Macedonia, she contacted the local Macedonian Albanian Women's
Organization. Within days, they had a clinic open. There are the two
women from the United States, who rescued another woman's 84-year-old
mother-in-law from the camps and paid for the rent of a clinic with money
collected in the United States. There is the group of former women
journalists who are organizing to go out and interview refugees in private
homes in the south of Macedonia, and sell their stories to news services to
avoid becoming dependent.

There is the man in Tirana who is helping women organize within the
National Albanian Farmers Union. There is the 24-year-old
Albanian-American woman who (with her father) has started the "Kosova
Humanitarian Aid Organization" and is sending two teams to Macedonia and
Albania to distribute aid and register the names of refugees a database.
Then there is "Women 4 Women," an organization that originally started
working with women in Bosnia, and is now opening an office in Tirana.

The Advocacy Project has decided to start issuing excerpts of this email
traffic to our subscribers in the form of our Electronic newsletter
(E-letter), On the Record. The Advocacy Project was established last year
to help civil society with information. This, combined with the personal
involvement of two of our members in Kosova, makes this entirely
consistent with our work. We hope you agree. This first issue starts with
the disturbing news that Dr. Flora Brovina, a well known female activist in
Kosova, has been kidnapped from the apartment where she lived in Pristina
and Albin Kurti, former leader of UPSUP and former secretary of Adem
Demaci, was arrested in Pristina along with his father and two younger
brothers -- proof of the terror that has been wrought against civil society
in Kosova. But it also illustrates the dynamism and determination of
Albanian Kosova. One can only be both inspired and appalled by what is
taking place in the Balkans.

The first issues will focus on civil society in the regions most affected by
the influx of large numbers of refugees. The coverage will gradually be
extended to areas, which have received less coverage in the mainstream
media, such as Montenegro, Bosnia, Turkey, and other countries that have
accepted refugees over the last year. We have also received reports of
the work of civil society within Serbia and Montenegro itself. To the extent
possible, we will also feature their reports, although there is a risk that too
much publicity could make them more vulnerable to repression. They could
be in acute danger if Milosevic is still in power once this conflict ends.

Among the subjects to be covered: Albanian Civil Society; Macedonian
Civil Society; Kosovar Civil Society reconstructed; Refugee centers in
Montenegro, Bosnia, and Turkey; Serbian Civil Society; the response of
international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) (this will include
supporters like the Platform for Kosova, KHAO, Balkan Sunflowers, and the
nongovernmental aid agencies that are members of the International
Council of Voluntary Agencies (ICVA), a partner of The Advocacy Project);
the international community (UNHCR, other UN agencies, NATO, and the
OSCE); Women and children; the plight of the Roma; and possibilities for
using the new information Technology.

Teresa Crawford is a founding member of The Advocacy Project. She was
among a group of peaceworkers arrested in Kosova, by the Serbian
authorities in the spring of 1998. To subscribe send an email to:
majordomo@lists.advocacynet.org with the words (in the message body):
subscribe kosovo