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TO SECRATRY OF STATE COLIN POWELL
R.K.Kent
Historioan
Dear And Esteemed Mr. Secretary
I bring to your personal attention the recent message to Serbia by two of our Senators. They are demanding delivery to the Hague Tribunal for Yugoslavia (now Serbia and Montenegro) of several prominent Serbs in and out of office as a minimal price tag for some $40,000,000 in promised aid. They are also implying that no other consideration can outweigh this particular demand. The State Department is to certify by 31st March that Serbia “qualifies” for the release of these funds.
May I point out that this is in serious conflict with the policy just announced by President Bush to the effect that economic and social misery in other countries provide the breeding grounds for hate directed at us at home. A very substantial increase in foreign aid to combat this condition is in the making. I respectfully urge you to advise our President to disregard what is nothing less than a misguided, shallow and morally indefensible blackmail that demeans our national dignity.
We have punished the Serbs (our allies in two World Wars) enough with eleven years of brutal economic sanctions plus eleven weeks of bombing their civilian infrastructure without even a declaration of war. Estimates of damage range between $40 BILLION and twice that amount. As a consequence, the economic and social misery in Serbia is acute even if the demanding Senators cannot bring themselves to admit it. Just over 50% of the labor force is begging for a job. Everything else is in a state of penury. The hardest hit is the Serb middle class which holds the greatest promise for democratic changes.
If President Bush is right in His assessment as He surely is, we should not merely release the outstanding $40,000,000 but get together with other members of NATO to resurrect the Serb economy and reduce the social misery. We must NOT INSIST on further punishments at a Tribunal which is blatantly political and which has no respect for the premise of Anglo-Saxon Common Law (and our Law as well) that a person is innocent until PROVEN guilty.
History Department, University of
California
Respectfully,
Berkeley, CA. 94720
(510/642-1971
Raymond K. Kent, Emeritus
22.03.2002
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