KOSOVO "FREEDOM FIGHTERS"   FINANCED BY ORGANIZED CRIME  
 

   The narcotics trade enabled Washington and Bonn to finance  
   the "Kosovo conflict", with the  ultimate objective of destabilizing  
   the  Belgrade government and fully  recolonizing the Balkans    

Heralded by the global media as a humanitarian peacekeeping mission,  
NATO's ruthless bombing of Belgrade and Pristina goes far beyond the 
breach of international law.  While Slobodan Milosevic is demonized,  
portrayed as a remorseless dictator, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)  is upheld as a self-respecting nationalist movement struggling for  
the rights of ethnic Albanian. The truth of the matter is that the  
KLA is sustained by organized crime with the tacit approval of the  
United States and its allies.  

Following a pattern set during the War in Bosnia, public opinion has  
been carefully misled. The multi-billion dollar Balkans narcotics  
trade has played a crucial role in financing "the conflict" in Kosovo  
in accordance with Western economic, strategic, and military  
objectives.  Amply documented by European police files, acknowledged  
by numerous studies, the links of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) to riminal syndicates in Albania, Turkey, and the European Union have  
been known to western governments and intelligence agencies since the 
mid-1990s.  

The financing of the Kosovo guerrilla poses critical questions and it  
sorely tests, claims of an "ethical" foreign policy. Should the West  
back a guerrilla army that appears to be partly financed by organized  
crime?  

While KLA leaders were shaking hands with secretary of State  
Madeleine Albright at Rambouillet, Europol (the European Police  
Organization based in The Hague) was "preparing a report for European interior and justice ministers on a connection between the KLA and  
Albanian drug gangs." In the meantime, the rebel army had been  
skillfully heralded by the global media as broadly representative of  
the interests of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo.  

Ironically, until recently, Washington has not denied the links of  
the Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosoves (UCK) to organized crime.  
Christopher Hill, America's chief negotiator and architect of the  
Rambouillet agreement, "has ... been a strong critic of the KLA for  
its alleged dealings in drugs." In the words of Robert Gelbard,  
America's special envoy to Bosnia: "We condemn very, strongly  
terrorist actions in Kosovo The UCK [KLA] is, without any question, a  
terrorist group."  

Moreover, barely a few months before Rambouillet, the State  
Department had acknowledged (based on reports from the U.S.  
Observer Mission) the role of the KLA in terrorizing and uprooting 
ethnic Albanians:  

[According to a police informant ... the KLA harass or kidnap anyone  
who comes to the police, ...KLA representatives had threatened to  
kill villagers and burn their homes if they did not join the KLA [a  
process which has continued since the NATO bombings] .... [The KLA  
harassment has reached such intensity those residents of six villages  
in the Stimlje region are "ready to flee".  

From "TERRORISTS" to "POLITICAL PARTNERS"  

With KLA leader Hashim Thaci (a 29-year-old "freedom fighter")  
appointed as chief negotiator at Rambouillet, the KLA had become the  
de facto helmsman of the peace process on behalf of the ethnic  
Albanian majority, and this despite its links to the drug trade.  The  
West was relying on its KLA puppets to rubberstamp an agreement,  
which would have transformed Kosovo into an occupied territory under  
Western military rule.  With Thaci as Prime Minister designate, the  
KLA had already been promised a central role in the formation of a  
government under the Rambouillet treaty.  

In order to get the Albanians' "...acceptance [of the peace plan],  
Ms. Albright offered incentives intended to show that Washington is a  
friend of Kosovo.... Officers in the Kosovo Liberation Army would ...  
be sent to the United States for training in transforming themselves  
from a guerrilla group into a police force or a political entity"   

BYPASSING THE KOSOVO DEMOCRATIC LEAGUE   

While backing a "freedom movement" with links to the drug trade, the  
West was also intent in bypassing the civilian Kosovo Democratic  
League and its leader Ibrahim Rugova, who has called for an end to  
the bombings and expressed his desire to negotiate a peaceful  
settlement with the Yugoslav authorities.  It is worth recalling that  
a few days before his March 31 press conference, Rugova had been  
reported by the KLA (along with three other leaders including Fehmi  
Agani) to have been killed by the Serbs.  

Rugova had openly criticized both Belgrade and NATO: "The bombing  
should stop.  I recommend to Belgrade to cooperate with the  
international community, and to NATO to understand the other side,  
and not to kill people, but to help find a solution."  

Both NATO and Western governments have cursorily disregarded  
these statements.  The KLA has accused Rugova of being a traitor.  

COVERT FINANCING OF "FREEDOM FIGHTERS"  

Remember Oliver North and the Contras?  The pattern in Kosovo is  
similar to other CIA covert operations in Central America, Haiti, and  
Afghanistan, where "freedom fighters" were financed through the  
laundering of drug money Since the onslaught of the Cold War, Western  intelligence agencies have developed a complex relationship to the  
illegal narcotics trade.  In case after case, drug money laundered in  
the international banking system has financed covert operations.  

According to author Alfred McCoy, the pattern of covert financing  
was established in the Indochina war. In the 1960s, the CIA-backed  
Hmong army in Laos was funded by the narcotics trade as part of  
Washington's military strategy against the combined forces of the  
neutralist government of Prince Souvanna Phouma and the Pathet Lao.  

The pattern of drug politics set in Indochina has since been  
replicated in Central America and the Caribbean.  "The rising curve  
of cocaine imports to the U.S.," wrote journalist John Dinges  
"followed almost exactly the flow of U.S. arms and military, advisers  
to Central America."  

The military in both Guatemala and Haiti, to which the CIA provided  
covert support, were known to be involved in the trade of narcotics  
into southern Florida. And as revealed in the Iran-Contra and Bank of  
Commerce and Credit International (BCCI) scandals, there was strong  
evidence that covert operations were funded through the laundering of  
drug money "Dirty money" recycled through the banking system-often  
through an anonymous shell company-became "covert money", used to 
finance various rebel groups and guerrilla movements, including the  
Nicaraguan Contras and the Afghan mujahedin. According to a 1991 Time magazine report:  

 "Because the US wanted to supply the mujahedin rebels in Afghanistan 
with Stinger missiles and other military hardware, it needed the full  
cooperation of Pakistan.  By the mid-1980s, the CIA operation in  
Islamabad was one of the largest US intelligence stations in the  
World. 'If BCCI is such an embarrassment to the US that forthright  
investigations are not being pursued, it has a lot to do with the  
blind eye the US turned to the heroin trafficking in Pakistan,' said  
a US intelligence officer."  

AMERICA AND GERMANY JOIN HANDS   

Since the early 1990s, Bonn and Washington have joined hands in  
establishing the respective spheres of influence in the Balkans.  
Their intelligence agencies have collaborated in covert activities.  
According to intelligence analyst John Whitley, undercover support to  
the Kosovo rebel army was established as a joint endeavor between  
the CIA and Germany's Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) (which previously played a key role in installing a right-wing nationalist governmen in Croatia under Franjo Tudjman). The task to create and finance the KLA was initially given to Germany: "They used German uniforms, East German weapons, and were financed, in part, with drug money." According to Whitley, the CIA subsequently instrumental in training and equipping the KLA in Albania.  

The covert activities of Germany's BND were consistent with Bonn's  
intent to expand its Lebensraum into the Balkans. Prior to the onset  
of the civil war in Bosnia, Germany and its foreign Minister, Hans  
Dietrich Genscher had actively supported secession; it had "forced  
the pace of international diplomacy" and pressured it Western allies  
to recognize Slovenia and Croatia. According to the Geopolitical Drug  
Watch, both Germany and the US favored (although not officially) the  
formation of a "Greater Albania" encompassing Albania, Kosovo, and  
parts of Macedonia. According to the late Balkans scholar, Sean  
Gervasi, Germany was seeking a free hand among its allies "to pursue  
economic dominance in the whole of Mitteleuropa."  

ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM IN SUPPORT OF THE KLA   

The CIA had used Islamic fundamentalist organizations in Afghanistan  
to finance its covert operations.  The pattern was replicated in the  
Balkans; Bonn and Washington's "hidden agenda" consisted of  
triggering ethnic strife and nationalist liberation movements in  
Bosnia and Kosovo, with the ultimate purpose of destabilizing  
Yugoslavia. This objective was implemented by turning a blind eye to  
the influx of money and mercenaries from Islamic organizations,  
including direct support provided by Osama Bin Laden's Al Qa'ida,  
accused of masterminding the African embassy bombings in August 1998.  

"Bin Laden had visited Albania himself.  His was one of  
several fundamentalist groups that had sent units to fight in Kosovo  
... Bin Laden is believed to have established an operation in Albania  
in 1994.... Albanian sources say Sali Berisha, who was then  
president, had links with some groups that later proved to be extreme  
fundamentalists."  

This infiltration by, Islamic fundamentalist organizations was not  
only known and accepted by the US State Department; it was an  
integral part of CIA covert activities.  

FOREIGN MERCENARIES   

Mercenaries financed by, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait had been fighting  
in Bosnia.  And the Bosnian pattern was replicated in Kosovo:  
Mujahedin mercenaries from various Islamic countries are reported to  
be fighting alongside the KLA in Kosovo. German, Turkish, and Afghan 
instructors were reported to be training the KLA in guerrilla and  
diversion tactics. According to Deutsche Press-Agentur, financial  
support from Islamic countries to the KLA had also been channeled  
through the former Albanian chief of the National Information Service  
(NIS), Bashkim Gazidede. "Gazidede, reportedly, a devout Moslem who fled Albania in March of last year [1997], is presently [1998] being  
investigated for his contacts with Islamic terrorist organizations.  

"By early December 1997, Iranian intelligence had already delivered  
the first shipments of hand grenades, machine guns, assault rifles,  
night vision equipment, and communications gear… Moreover, the  
Iranians began sending promising Albanian and KLA commanders for  
advanced military training in al-Quds [special] forces and IRGC camps  
in Iran…"   

THE LAUNDERING OF DRUG MONEY   

The supply routes for arming KLA "freedom fighters" are the  
rugged mountainous borders of Albania with Kosovo and Macedonia.  
Albania is also the hub of the Balkans drug route, which supplies  
Western Europe with grade four heroin.  Seventy-five percent of the  
heroin entering Western Europe is from Turkey. And a large part of  
drug shipments originating in Turkey, transits through the Balkans.  
According to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), "it is  
estimated that 4-6 metric tons of heroin leave each month from Turkey  
[through the Balkans] having as [their] destination Western Europe."  
A recent intelligence report by, Germany's Federal Criminal Agency  
suggests that: "Ethnic Albanians are now the most prominent group  
in the distribution of heroin in western consumer countries."  

In order to thrive, the criminal syndicates involved in the  
Balkans narcotics trade needs friends in high places.  Smuggling  
rings with alleged links to the Turkish state are said to control the  
trafficking of heroin through the Balkans "cooperating closely with  
other groups with which they have political or religious ties,"  
including criminal groups in Albania and Kosovo. In this new global  
financial environment, powerful undercover political lobbies  
connected to organized crime cultivate links to prominent political  
figures and officials of the military and intelligence establishment.  

The narcotics trade nonetheless rises respectable banks to launder  
large amounts of dirty money.  While comfortably removed from the  
smuggling operations per se, powerful banking interests in Turkey but  
mainly those in financial centers in Western Europe discretely  
collect multi-billion dollar money laundering operation. These  
interests have high stakes in ensuring a safe passage of drug  
shipments into Western European markets.   

THE BALKANIAN CONNECTION   

Arms smuggling from Albania into Kosovo and Macedonia started at  
the beginning of 1992, when the Democratic Party came to power in  
Albania, headed by President Sali Berisha.  An expansive underground  
economy and cross-border trade had unfolded.  A triangular trade in  
oil, arms, and narcotics had flourished as a result of the embargo  
imposed by the international community on Serbia and Montenegro and 
the blockade enforced by Greece against Macedonia.  

Industry and agriculture in Kosovo were spearheaded into  
bankruptcy following the IMF's lethal "economic medicine" imposed on 
Yugoslavia through an embargo in 1990.  Ethnic Albanians and Serbs  
were driven into abysmal poverty.  Economic collapse created an  
environment, which fostered the progress of illicit trade.  In  
Kosovo, the rate of unemployment increased to a staggering 70 percent 
(according to Western sources).  

Poverty and economic collapse served to exacerbate simmering  
ethnic tensions.  Thousands of unemployed youths (including young  
girls) "barely out of their teens" from an impoverished population  
were drafted (often by force Final intimidation) into the ranks of  
the KLA. KLA intimidation (according to an Agence France-Presse  
report) consists of threatening to burn the houses of those who  
refuse to join the KLA: "Either you are with us or we will burn down  
your houses. Join your brothers." It was signed: "Ushtria Clirimtare  
e Kosoves," the words for Kosovo Liberation Army".  

 In neighboring Albania, the free market reforms adopted since 1992  
had created conditions, which favored the criminalization of  
state institutions.  Drug money was also laundered in the Albanian  
pyramids (Ponzi schemes) which mushroomed during the government of 
former President Sali Berisha (1992-97). These shady funds were an  
integral part of the economic reforms inflicted by Western creditors  
on Albania.  

Drug barons in Kosovo, Albania and Macedonia (with links to the  
Italian Mafia) had become the new economic elites, often associated  
with Western business interests.  In turn the financial proceeds of  
the trade in drugs and arms were recycled toward other illicit  
activities (and vice versa), including a vast prostitution racket  
between Albania and Italy.  Albanian criminal groups operating in  
Milan, "have become so powerful running prostitution rackets that  
they have even taken over the Calabrians in strength and influence."  

The application of "strong economic medicine" under the guidance of  
the Washington-based Bretton Woods institutions had contributed to  
wrecking Albania's banking system and precipitating the collapse of  
the Albanian economy. The resulting chaos enabled American and  
European transnationals to carefully position themselves. Several  
Western oil companies, including Occidental, Shell, and British  
Petroleum, had their eyes riveted on Albania's abundant and  
unexplored oil deposits.  Western investors were also gawking at  
Albania's extensive reserves of chrome, copper, gold, nickel,  
and platinum.  The Adenauer Foundation had been lobbying in the  
background on behalf of German mining interests.  

Berisha's Minister of Defence, Safet Zoulali (alleged to have been  
involved in the illegal oil and narcotics trade), was the architect  
of the agreement with Germany's Preussag (handing over control of  
Albania's chrome mines) against the competing bid of the US-led  
consortium of Macalloy Inc., in association with Rio Tinto Zimbabwe  
(RTZ).  

Large amounts of narco-dollars had also been recycled into the  
privatization programs leading to the acquisition of state assets by  
the mafias. In Albania, the privatization program had led virtually  
overnight to the development of a property-owning class firmly  
committed to the "free market." In northern Albania, this class was  
associated with the Guegue "families," linked to Albania's Democratic  
Party.  

Controlled by the Democratic Party under the presidency of Sali  
Berisha, Albania's largest financial "pyramid," VEFA Holdings, had  
been set up by the Guegue families of northern Albania, with the  
support of Western banking interests.  VEFA was under investigation  
in Italy in 1997 for its ties to the Mafia, which allegedly used VEFA  
to launder large amounts of dirty money.  

According to one press report (based on intelligence sources),  
senior members of the Albanian government during the presidency of  
Sali Berisha, including cabinet members and members of the secret  
police, Shik, were alleged to be involved in drug trafficking and  
illegal arms trading into Kosovo:  

"The allegations are very serious.  Drugs, arms, contraband  
cigarettes, all are believed to have been handled by a company run  
openly by Albania's ruling Democratic Party, Shqiponja.... In the  
course of 1996, Defense Minister Safet Zhulali [was alleged] to have  
used his office to facilitate the transport of arms, oil, and  
contraband cigarettes.... Drug barons from Kosovo ... operate in  
Albania with impunity, and much of the transportation of heroin and  
other drugs across Albania, from Macedonia and Greece en route to  
Italy, is believed to be organized by Shik, the state security  
police.... Intelligence agents are convinced the chain of command in  
the rackets goes all the way to the top and have had no hesitation in  
naming ministers in their reports."  

The trade in narcotics and weapons was allowed to prosper despite  
the presence since 1993 of a large contingent of American troops at  
the Albanian-Macedonian border with a mandate to enforce the embargo. The West had turned a blind eye.  The revenues from oil and narcotics were used to finance the purchase of arms (often in terms of direct barter): "Deliveries of oil to Macedonia (skirting the Greek embargo [in 1993 - 94]) can be used to cover heroin, as do deliveries of  Kalashnikov rifles to Albanian 'brothers' in Kosovo."  

The northern tribal clans or "fares" had also developed links with  
Italy's crime syndicates. In turn, the latter played a key role in  
smuggling arms across the Adriatic into the Albanian ports of Dures  
and Valona.  At the outset in 1992, the weapons channeled into  
Kosovo were largely small arms including Kalashnikov AK-47 rifles,  
RPK and PPK machine-guns, 12.7-calibre heavy machine-guns, etc.  

The proceeds of the narcotics trade had enabled the KLA to rapidly  
develop a force of some 30,000 men.  More recently, the KLA has  
acquired more sophisticated weaponry including anti-aircraft and  
anti-armour rockets. According to Belgrade, some of the funds have  
come directly from the CIA "funneled through a so-called 'Government 
of Kosovo' based in Geneva, Switzerland.  Its Washington office  
[employed] the large public relations firm Ruder Finn-notorious for  
its slanders of the Belgrade government "  

COORDINATING WITH NATO AIR HAIRS   

Since the onset of NATO's "humanitarian bombings," foreign  
mercenaries and volunteers (recruited in Western Europe, the US, and  
Canada) have joined the ranks of the KLA. In turn the US and its  
allies are now supplying the KLA directly with military hardware.  
According to Yugoslav sources, the KLA training camp in Albania is  
now "concentrating on heavy weapons training-rocket propelled  
grenades, medium caliber cannons, tanks and transporter use, as well  
as on communications, and command and control."  

The KLA has acquired electronic surveillance equipment, which enables  it to receive satellite information as well as relay to NATO command  
intelligence concerning bombing targets.  In turn, British and  
American Special Forces teams are "advising the rebels at their  
strongholds in northern Albania, where the KLA has launched a major  
recruitment and training operation. According to high-ranking KLA  
officials, the [British] SAS is using two camps near Tirana, the  
Albanian capital, and another on the Kosovo border to teach KLA  
officers how to conduct intelligence-gathering operations on Serbian  
positions. "  

The KLA is also negotiating "for a long-term training deal with  
Military, and Professional Resources International, a mercenary  
company run by former American officers who operate with Semi-  
official approval from the Pentagon and played a key role in  
building up Croatia's armed forces."  

THE POSTWAR AGENDA   

The fate of Kosovo had already been carefully laid out prior to the  
signing of the 1995 Dayton agreement.  Deliveries of weapons to the  
Kosovo rebel army since the mid-1990s were consistent with Western  
geo-political objectives. Not surprisingly, there has been a  
deafening silence from the international media regarding the Kosovo  
arms-drugs trade. In the words of a 1994 report of the Geopolitical  
Drug Watch, "the trafficking [of drugs and arms] is basically being  
judged on its geostrategic implications.... In Kosovo, drugs and  
weapons trafficking is fueling geopolitical hopes and fears.  "  

NATO had entered an unwholesome marriage of convenience with the  
Mafia. "Freedom fighters" were put in place, the narcotics trade  
enabled Washington and Bonn to finance the Kosovo conflict, with the  
ultimate objective of destabilizing the Belgrade government and fully  
recolonizing the Balkans.  

In turn, a terrorist movement with links to organized crime has  
become the sole political "voice" representing ethnic Albanians in  
Kosovo.  In the words of State Department spokesman James Foley:  

"We want to develop a good relationship with them as they  
transform themselves into a politically-oriented organisation....  
We believe that we have a lot of advice and a lot of help that we  
can provide to them if they become precisely the kind of political  
actor we would like to see them become."   

INSTALLING A "NARCO-DEMOCRACY"   

With the KLA poised to play a central role in the formation of a  
government, NATO's hidden agenda consists of installing in Kosovo a  
"Mafia state" with links to the drug trade. The State Department's  
position is that the KLA would "not be allowed to continue as a  
military force, but would have the chance to move forward in their  
quest for self-government under a 'different context,' meaning the  
inauguration of a 'narco-democracy' under NATO custody. 'If we can  
help them and they want us to help them in that effort of  
transformation. I think it's nothing that anybody can argue with."  

In turn, "free market reforms" are envisaged for the postwar Kosovar  
State under the supervision of the Bretton Woods institutions. The  
IMF's deadly economic therapy transforms countries into open  
territories while fostering the growth of illicit trade and the  
criminalisation of State Institutions. Post-war reconstruction,  
finance by the World Bank and the European Development Bank (EBRD), will largely benefit Western investors and construction companies while fuelling external debt well millennium.  

The destruction of an entire country is the outcome. Western  
governments which participated in the NATO operation bear a heavy  
burden of responsibility in the deaths of civilians, the  
impoverishment of both of ethnic Albanian and Serbian population and  
the plight of those who were brutally uprooted from towns and  
villages in Kosovo as a result of the bombings."