The ripple effects of Tunisia, Egypt and Libya continue to spread

in addition to what's happening in northern africa, the near east and the u.s., we're starting to see tremors in the balkans (croatia and albania, specifically) and southern africa (zimbabwe)... having just been in zimbabwe last week and had a member of mugabe's secret police join the second day of our conference to make sure we weren't plotting against the government, i'm not surprised to see things being stirred up against yet another corrupt dictator...

croatia...

Croatian police clashed with about 15,000 anti-government protesters who rallied in Zagreb on Saturday, with 33 people injured and 58 protesters taken into custody, according to reports of the Croatian news agency HINA. The protesters, among whom were masked members of the Bad Blue Boys group of football supporters, demanded protection of war veterans from prosecution. They clashed with the police in an attempt to reach St. Mark's Square, where the government is located. The police were forced to use force as some protesters acted violently and tried to break police cordons, Zagreb police chief Tomislav Buterin was quoted as saying at a news conference, adding that 33 people were injured in the process, including journalists. A great number of policemen were guarding the downtown area and helicopters were seen flying over the city. The situation calmed down around 4 p.m. local time (1500 GMT). At another Zagreb square Bana Jelacica, thousands protested peacefully against the government and in support of a Croat war veteran awaiting extradition to Serbia in a Bosnian prison. A similar protest was also organized in the eastern Croatian city of Osijek. Croatian police clashed with about 15,000 anti-government protesters who rallied in Zagreb on Saturday, with 33 people injured and 58 protesters taken into custody, according to reports of the Croatian news agency HINA.

The protesters, among whom were masked members of the Bad Blue Boys group of football supporters, demanded protection of war veterans from prosecution. They clashed with the police in an attempt to reach St. Mark's Square, where the government is located.

The police were forced to use force as some protesters acted violently and tried to break police cordons, Zagreb police chief Tomislav Buterin was quoted as saying at a news conference, adding that 33 people were injured in the process, including journalists.

A great number of policemen were guarding the downtown area and helicopters were seen flying over the city. The situation calmed down around 4 p.m. local time (1500 GMT).

At another Zagreb square Bana Jelacica, thousands protested peacefully against the government and in support of a Croat war veteran awaiting extradition to Serbia in a Bosnian prison.

A similar protest was also organized in the eastern Croatian city of Osijek.

croatia isn't the only balkan country ripe for political upheaval... only a month ago, i was in kosovo and i can tell you, the corruption there is on a par with the worst of them... in fact, there has already been uprising and unrest in albania, kosovo's close neighbor, as recently as late january...

zimbabwe's mugabe is still managing to keep his heel on the throat of his people but, once the ball gets rolling, that might change quickly...

Zimbabwe's capital, Harare, remained tense Tuesday as military and police maintained a show of force though protests against President Robert Mugabe called for by a group on the Internet social media site Facebook failed to materialize.

A Facebook page called "Zimbabwe Million Citizen March" called for protests in Harare, Bulawayo and other major cities to “demand the end of the 31-year rule of the iron-fisted and corrupt dictator Robert Mugabe."

Zimbabwean authorities for weeks have warned against any attempt to emulate the mass protests seen across North Africa and the Middle East, and recently arrested 45 people on charges of treason alleging they were conspiring to topple the government.

Those arrests and a general crackdown has been condemned by the United Nations and other human rights groups. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay condemned the arrest and alleged torture of activists and said the arrests “appear to be part of a growing crackdown on civil society and members of the political opposition."

we're only seeing the tip of the iceberg... i predict when we hit june, we might not recognize a lot of the world we thought we knew - and that will be a very good thing...

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The real story of Kosovo

Kosovo in relation to Serbia

from ihc...

Following the NATO invasion of Kosovo in June of 1999, the US and its allies stood by as the Albanian mafia and gangs of criminals and paramilitaries spread out across the province and systematically cleansed Kosovo of hundreds of thousands of Serbs, Romas and other ethnic minorities. They burned down houses, businesses and churches and implemented a shocking campaign to forcibly expel non-Albanians from the province. Meanwhile, the US worked closely with the Kosovo Liberation Army and backed the rise of war criminals to the highest levels of power in Kosovo. Today, Kosovo has become a hub for human trafficking, organized crime and narcosmuggling. In short, it is a mafia state. Is this the "democracy" Hillary Clinton speaks of "promoting" in "the heart" of Europe?

It didn't take long for the US to begin construction of a massive US military base, Camp Bondsteel, which conveniently is located in an area of tremendous geopolitical interest to Washington. (Among its most bizarre facilities, Bondsteel now offers classes at the Laura Bush education center, as well as massages from Thai women and all the multinational junk food you could (n)ever wish for). In November 2005, Alvaro Gil-Robles, the human rights envoy of the Council of Europe, described Bondsteel as a "smaller version of Guantanamo." Oh, and Bondsteel was constructed by former Halliburton subsidiary KBR.

i always wondered why serbs, macedonians, and the people of the former yugoslavia hated clinton with such a passion... an american visiting belgrade for the first time, as happened with me in 2005, before even being dropped at the hotel, is driven past the still shattered nato bombing sites which are quietly pointed out without comment... go read this article in full and weep for the seemingly never-ending horrors inflicted on the world by my country...

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Serbia, Kosovo and the sacking of the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade

Kosovo in relation to Serbia

what's puzzling to me, having seen numbers of u.s. embassies in other countries, is how such fortresses could possibly be breached... the embassies i've seen are armed camps with concertina wire, omnipresent security forces (both u.s. and private contractors), concrete barriers and bullet and impact-proof glass aplenty, and formidable layers of access points from street to interior offices... as with most news stories these days, something seems askew...

Angry Serbs broke into the U.S. Embassy and set fire to an office Thursday night as rioters rampaged through Belgrade's streets, putting an exclamation point of violence to a day of mass protest against Western support for an independent Kosovo.

At least 150,000 people rallied in Belgrade, waving Serbian flags and signs proclaiming "Stop USA terror," to denounce the bid by Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority to create their own state out of what Serbs consider the ancient heartland of their culture.

The United States strongly criticized the violence and the Serb response. White House spokesman Dana Perino said the embassy "was attacked by thugs" and Serb police didn't do enough to stop it. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the U.S. warned Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica and Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic that it would hold them personally responsible for further damage.

Protesters burned American flags and the mob that attacked the embassy tore down the U.S. flag there. Crowds also ransacked a McDonald's, looted stores and fought with police in front of other diplomatic compounds in a display of the resentment seething in Serbia over the secession of what has been its southernmost province.

A charred body was found in the U.S. Embassy after the fire was put out, but all staff were accounted for, embassy spokeswoman Rian Harris said. Belgrade's Pink TV said the body appeared to be that of a rioter.

also, like virtually every other news story these days, this one is a textbook example of context-free journalism... nowhere is it mentioned that serbia, as the core of the former yugoslavia, has watched as its economic base, geography, culture, and pride have been whittled down to almost nothing, the most recent examples being kosovo and, in 2006, montenegro... can you imagine the uproar in the u.s. if the northern parts of new hampshire and maine were ceded to quebec or if new mexico and the part of colorado south of the arkansas river were ceded to mexico...? in fact, just such a scenario has already happened in the u.s. with the lakota nation, but, given the official u.s. policy to treat anything to do with native americans as either a joke or to ignore it altogether, few americans are even aware that it took place last december...



(see my previous posts on serbia and kosovo here...)

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Bush's watch snatched off his wrist in Albania

as a frequent traveler to the balkans and other areas of the world where i always tend to pay closer attention to what's going on around me, i find this just too funny...

George W Bush was visibly cheered when he received a hero's welcome in Albania at the weekend, with Albanians draped in the Stars and Stripes reaching out to hug him and shake his hand.

But perhaps the leader of the Western world should have exercised a little more caution and followed the standard advice to travellers in the Balkans to keep an eye on their belongings.

watch it and judge for yourself...



forever in denial and stonewall mode, the white house responds...

A White House spokeswoman denied today that that the President had been robbed. She also denied other Albanian reports that Mr Bush's watch did fall off during the vigorous walkabout but that it was returned to a bodyguard. Instead the spokeswoman said that Mr Bush had removed it himself. "He took it off," she said.

yep, they love him all right...

(note: this is not and should not be a reflection on either albania or the balkans... most everybody knows you should take the same precautions in big cites and crowds everywhere...)

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A tough day's work for George but, tomorrow, ALBANIA!

the day didn't start off too well and it just got worse...

first, bush was apparently distracted when he was briefed on the protocol for meeting the pope, and that he had forgotten what he had been told before previous meetings didn't help...

Meeting the pope, Bush said: "Good to be with you, sir." Italian journalists noted the breach in protocol: the pope is formally addressed as "Your Holiness."

then there was a car problem...

The president's stretch - armour-plated - limo stalled while he returned from the Vatican to the US embassy. A statement on American engineering?

and, after all that, there were those annoying demonstrators...

After the talks [with the Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi], riot police used tear gas against anti-Bush demonstrators.

ah, but everything will be SO much better when he gets to albania tomorrow...

The city [Tirana] and the country have been in a state of almost permanent excitement for weeks for the first-ever visit by a US president to this small, Western Balkan country.

Travelling in from the airport on the newly constructed road you are immediately confronted with billboard after billboard proclaiming the visit.

"Albania welcomes President Bush" and "President Bush in Albania, making history" the signs read.

A picture of Mr Bush beams down from giant posters.

i'm sure he'll forget all about italy in no time at all...

"Albania is for sure the most pro-American country in Europe, maybe even in the world," [Tirana] Mayor Edi Rama told the newspaper. "Nowhere else can you find such respect and hospitality for the president of the United States. Even in Michigan, he wouldn't be as welcome."

nope, for sure, i don't think he'd be as welcome in michigan...

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