“Why is there a war in Kosovo?
Last summer, Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic launched a brutal attack on Kosovo’s ethnic Albanians, who formed 90 percent of the area’s population. The attack was a response to the Kosovo Liberation Army’s efforts to gain independence from Serbia. Although Milosevic signed a ceasefire in October, deaths still occurred and diplomatic efforts could not re-establish peace. NATO, which would like to force a compromise in which Kosovo is an autonomous state of Serbia, began bombing in March.
Serbians regard Kosovo as the cradle of their civilization. Kosovo was once the place where their religious headquarters were located and many important Serbian churches are still in the region.
Key points of history:
The Turkish Ottoman Empire ruled most of the Balkan region starting in the 1400s. In the First Balkan War of 1912, Serbia, Montenegro, Greece and Bulgaria defeated the Ottoman Turks, ending more than 500 years of Turkish domination. Serbia regained Kosovo, which had been lost to the Turks in 1389.
The assassination of Archduke Francis Ferndinand in 1914 in Sarajevo (a city in Bosnia) sparked World War I by causing Austria to declare war on Serbia. Russia, France and Great Britain then entered the war against Austria-Hungary, Germany and the Ottoman Empire.
During World War II, the Balkan region was occupied by German troops. When the war ended in 1946, Marshal Josip Tito and his communist-led Partisans took control of the region, forming the nation of Yugoslavia. In 1974, Tito gave Kosovo autonomy and its own vote in the Yugoslav federal council. Tito remained in power until his death in 1980.
After Tito’s death, Yugoslavia experienced much unrest. In 1989, Slobodan Milosevic, who was Serbia’s president, took away Kosovo’s autonomous status and declared military rule. By 1992, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia and Slovenia had declared independence, and there has been terrible conflict as warring ethnic groups fought for power.
Who are the different ethnic groups?
The principal groups in the region are the Serbians who are Eastern Orthodox Christians, the Croats who are Catholic and the Muslims.
What is NATO?
The North Atlantic Treaty, formed between 12 nations during World War II, now is an alliance between 19 countries. The members are Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. NATO’s goal is to guarantee the security of its member nations. It undertakes peace-keeping and crisis management tasks in cooperation with other countries and organizations.
Sources: Encyclopedia Brittanica; Time Magazine’s website at www.time.com; Cable News Network (CNN)’s website at www.cnn.com; NATO’s website at www.nato.int.”