[PEN-L:4677] Mines in Kosovo

["Charles Brown" <CharlesB@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Workers World July 30, 1998: The war is about the mines of Kosovo

Workers World newspaper
from the July 30, 1998 issue By Sara Flounders

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Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the July 30, 1998
issue of Workers World newspaper
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Kosovo: 'The war is about the mines'
By Sara Flounders
Wars are at root about economics, and the rapidly expanding war in Kosovo is
no different. So why have millions of dollars in high-tech weapons suddenly
become available to the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army by way of the U.S.
and Germany?

A July 11 report by New York Times Balkans bureau chief Chris Hedges
describes the KLA*s new arsenal*the latest anti-tank rocket-propelled
grenades and anti-aircraft weapons. These weapons are shifting the balance
of power toward the KLA, which is funded fully by outside sources, mostly
from the U.S. and Germany.

The KLA is "fed by recruits, money and arms from outside Serbia," Hedges
confirms.

It has an "inexhaustible supply line," he reports.

"Rebel soldiers, in full uniform with the red and black patch of the Kosovo
Liberation Army, pull thick wads of German marks from their pockets. There
are also signs that the arrival of dozens of former professional soldiers as
well as some mercenaries are turning the ragtag band into a viable military
force of several thousand fighters."

In fact, the KLA is primarily a mercenary army funded by the kind of shadowy
sources that have long been associated with U.S. and German intelligence
services. It is a contra army.

Kosovo is often portrayed in the media as an isolated mountainous region
that*s poor and without resources. It might seem, from these accounts, to be
an area of interest only to those who live there.

The New York Times, for example, has carried dozens of such articles by
Chris Hedges in the last six months. Only once, on July 8, did Hedges write
about the real wealth of Kosovo*the Stari Trg mining complex. It was a
tip-off that something more was at stake in this war.

Hedges* visit to the Stari Trg mining complex is an eye opener. He describes
the glittering veins of lead, zinc, cadmium, gold and silver in Stari Trg.

According to Hedges, "The sprawling state-owned Trepca mining complex, the
most valuable piece of real estate in the Balkans, is worth at least $5
billion."

According to the mine*s director, Novak Bjelic, "The war in Kosovo is about
the mines, nothing else. This is Serbia*s Kuwait*the heart of Kosovo. ... In
addition to all this, Kosovo has 17 billion tons of coal reserves."

The whole world knows and observed firsthand in the war against Iraq to what
horrendous extent the Pentagon was willing to go in order to guarantee
control of the oil wealth of Kuwait.

But the enormous mineral wealth of Kosovo is never publicly discussed by
U.S. United Nations Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, President Bill Clinton or
the Pentagon generals. They speak only of "self-determination" of the
Albanian population of Kosovo. Of course, they never mention what
U.S.-imposed "self-determination" means. It means colonization under the
guise of "liberation," like what the U.S. did to Puerto Rico, Cuba and the
Philippines a hundred years ago.

An Internet search for reports on the mines of Kosovo*the Trepca mining
complex or Stari Trg*turned up only the one article by Hedges and a small
piece in the June 22 Wall Street Journal. All other mentions are in
metallurgical journals.

How could this vital fact be omitted from all discussion of what is at stake
in Kosovo? It is comparable to describing Kuwait and the oil-rich Gulf
states as barren deserts.

The wealth of Kosovo is greater than the rich veins of ore in the mines.
Hedges describes the mining complex: "The Stari Trg mine, with its
warehouses, is ringed with smelting plants, 17 metal treatment sites,
freight yards, railroad lines, a power plant and the country*s largest
battery plant."

The labor power of millions of workers throughout socialist Yugoslavia built
this mining complex into the powerhouse it is today. It was their wealth
that was invested in developing the complex. It belongs not just to those
who live in Kosovo, but to the workers of all Yugoslavia.

The Yugoslav web site www.yugo slavia.com describes Trepca as the "richest
lead and zinc mines in Europe."

Lignite deposits in the Kosovo mines are, according to experts, sufficient
for the next 13 centuries. The capacity of the lead and zinc refineries
ranks third in the world.

Miners work round the clock, day and night, in six-hour shifts.

According to the mine director, "In the last three years we have mined
2,538,124 tons of lead and zinc crude ore and produced 286,502 tons of lead
and zinc and 139,789 tons of pure lead, zinc, cadmium, silver and gold."

Although the average person watching the news in the evening has never heard
of Stari Trg, it has been a prize changing hands for two thousand years.

The wealth of Stari Trg is legendary. Precious metals were mined there more
than 2,000 years ago, first by the Greeks, then by the Romans.

These mines were the grand prize in the Nazi occupation of the Balkans after
Germany grabbed control from the British. The mines have great industrial
and military importance. The Nazis used batteries produced there to power
their U-boats. Today submarine batteries are still made there.

Profits from these mines are helping to keep the Yugoslav Federation afloat.
U.S. and UN sanctions imposed on Serbia and Montenegro, the two remaining
republics of Yugoslavia, have taken an enormous toll.

Without investment credits, loans for financing industry, imports and
exports, the economy has been stifled. Inflation has weakened the currency.
The mines, which once were the largest employer in the province, have also
been affected.

The most important words in Hedges* article are the description of the
complex as "state owned." Throughout this decade, as the capitalist market
has swept over the former socialist countries of Eastern Europe and the
Soviet Union, socialist Yugoslavia has attempted to resist privatization of
its industry and natural resources.

To break this resistance, the Western imperialist countries played a major
role in the breakup of socialist Yugoslavia.

This huge complex of mines, refining, power and transportation in Kosovo may
well be the largest uncontested piece of wealth not yet in the hands of the
big capitalists of the U.S. or Europe.

The industry, natural resources and transportation of all the former Soviet
republics, the socialist countries of Eastern Europe, and the secessionist
republics of Yugoslavia are now being rapidly privatized. No one within the
region has the wealth or connections to finance capital to buy controlling
shares of these vast state-owned industries. The major Western corporations
are gobbling these industries up.

While the fate of some industries is still in negotiation, the lending and
credit conditions of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank
require the breakup of all state-owned industries. This is true for the oil
and natural gas wealth in the Caucasus and the Caspian Sea as well as the
diamond mines of Siberia.

The decision on who will own or have controlling interest in the 22 mines
and the many processing plants of the Trepca complex will be made by whoever
wins the armed struggle raging in Kosovo. NATO domination on the ground
would put U.S. corporations in the best ownership position. Nationalist
strife advances their position.

Although being forced to privatize in order to survive in today*s global
market, Yugoslavia has tried to control the process and to propose Balkan
regional development.

According to the June 22 Wall Street Journal, the Yugoslav Federation is in
negotiations to sell shares in the Trepca mining complex. Forced by the
economic crisis, they have been negotiating with a Greek investor*Mytilineos
Holdings SA*for partial ownership.

The former manager of the mines, Byrhan Kavaja*who is now allied with the
opposition to the Yugoslav government*has written to all corporations
dealing in soft metals to tell them not to make agreements with the Yugoslav
government. Kavaja says that once a new government is in power, all past
decisions on ownership will be invalidated. The opposition will make "new
agreements." Who is likely to be the beneficiary of these agreements?

The progressive movement in the U.S. and throughout Western Europe must be
at the forefront in explaining that the billions of dollars spent on the
U.S./NATO occupation of the region is not in the interests of any of the
people of the Balkans. Nor is it in the interests of poor and working people
in the U.S. or Europe. The war is destroying all that was built through
collective ownership and collaboration in the Balkans.

This war will mean higher taxes and even more cuts in social programs in the
U.S and Europe. But the billions of dollars in profit will go to a few
wealthy stockholders in the U.S. or in Western Europe.

- END -

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