We are especially
dismayed with the unnecessary and dangerous succumbing of a pro-European government to the
anti-European hysteria and strategy that log barricades at two border crossings in
northern Kosovo can become the barrier to granting the status of candidate and the date
for the beginning of negotiations for Serbia's accession to the European Union.
In a country where time means nothing, losing the status of candidate or
being a candidate without a date for negotiations, will only mean yet another loss of
opportunity for a normal future, yet another decline of all that has managed to survive in
Serbia, yet more isolation on the margins of Europe of all those who have not already
escaped from Serbia.
The responsibility for the confusion in which we find ourselves lies in
the policy of the current government. It's calculating and hesitation has seriously
endangered the pro-European orientation of society and the country's vital interests which
depend upon it. No one should therefore expect of us to be silent on-lookers in the battle
that is being waged against a European Serbia. Today we cannot do the work which only the
government can do. The present leaders of Serbia must assume the responsibility for its
European future. If they choose to see the truth, they will see us, who can wait no
longer, clearing the minefields for the European path of Serbia of which they are in
charge.
It is a sad country which perpetually condemns itself to the suffering
that stems from its resistance to its own European future. Terrible is the price of lies
by all who belittle the weight of December 9. Serbia does not understand the significance
of that date, just as it failed to understand the significance of the fall of the Berlin
Wall or the consequences of its acquiescence to the policy of war and crime of the 1990s.
Therefore it should be known that we will all - unless we respond with truth and
democratic mobilization - be devastated in a way worse than during the 1990s by the
ruthless idea that Serbia can do without Europe.
In Serbia that December day is felt both as a threat and an opportunity.
It reflects our past and our future, the positive and negative energy of Serbia. The
successes and failures, the happiness and disappointments, the joys and fears of our
generation. Therefore, by taking a clear stand about the future of our country we must
stand up against the political hypnosis which belittles the real significance of Europe
for Serbia. We will disappear in the self-isolation which is being offered to us as an
honorable response to the alleged dishonor of Europe.
We must not withdraw before the lies which hide the black statistics of
Serbia. We are the poorest of European societies, with the lowest wages and pensions, the
largest unemployment rate, the smallest investments, the largest growth of debt, the most
dysfunctional education system and the largest brain-drain in Europe. This is not a
picture of our abilities and aptitudes, but the price of a misguided and erroneous policy.
That price will keep increasing until we abandon this policy.
It is frightening that a part of our political, religious, economic and
cultural elite recognizes its interest in that deepest of historical holes in which we
will find ourselves if we lose our European future. We have a government, but not a state.
In a country which is an onlooker in European integrations there is no employment unless
provided by the "government", there is no sport unless the
"government" presides over it, there is no culture without the stamp of
"government", nor media which has been spared of "government"
editorial policy.
The good thing is that we are aware of this reality, and that we are
prepared through a struggle for a European Serbia to clearly state in what kind of world
we wish to live in. We see meaning only in a Serbia with changed priorities, a country of
free citizens that has finally found peace with itself and its neighbors, a society ruled
by law and efficient institutions, a community which values and incites knowledge, work
and success, develops competition and strives towards an open economy, modernizing all
that is backward. Only this idea can be confirmed by time as a positive vision of a
society which knows what to do with itself in the 21st century.
Today, as a mature society, capable of rational judgment regarding its
own interests, we should rally around the idea of a turnabout which would lead Serbia into
Europe. We must force official Serbian policy to take the necessary decisions, change the
course of its Kosovo policy, and seize the opportunity to fulfill the greatest obligation
of this generation.
Our response to the threat of destruction by the united anti-European
front must be clear, decisive and strong. This is why we seek to unite all those who are
in favor of Serbia in Europe as the only ideology that today can represent the choice of
this country. We should subordinate all our differences, all our disappointments to the
struggle of Serbia joining the European Union. Now is the time to mobilize all our
strength against poverty and backwardness.
We refuse to withdraw or make compromises with the anti-European
usurpers of our future. We must not, nor do we have the right, to withdraw before the same
ideas which during the 1990s pushed us into a bloody adventure, ending in the historically
greatest defeat of Serbia and the Serbian nation. We ended up in columns of refugees,
waiting in cues before embassies of countries to which our dearest family members fled,
while Serbia was left disgraced by the crimes committed in its name towards other nations
and towards itself. These forces have now united around a common goal, to raise barricades
on all roads leading to Europe. Hiding behind the slogans of the Kosovo tragedy, which
they perpetrated, they proclaim Europe the enemy of Serbia and all Serbs worldwide,
evoking yet another tragedy in Kosovo and Serbia, fanning the flames of hatred towards our
neighbors and threatening that we will be the leaders of a new chaos.
Europe is our primary national interest, among other things because
hundreds of thousands of Serbian citizens live and work in Europe, and because 80 percent
of all Serbian exports end up on that great market, and because of the investments and the
funds, and because Europe is also a system of values to which we aspire. The European
Union is in our anti-fascist history, in our politics, our economy and technology, culture
and education, in our sports, in everything.
Ignoring the truth and reality of Kosovo does not change that truth or
that reality. Kosovo has not been under Serbian sovereignty since the war of 1999 and the
Kumanovo capitulation, after which Serbia withdrew from Kosovo. Hence the strategy
"both EU and Kosovo" really means "neither EU nor Kosovo". Between
European states there are no borders or customs barriers, while our government, claiming
it is leading Serbia into Europe, is risking that that very same Europe closes its doors
to Serbia because of four customs officers at two border crossings. No one can comprehend
this. Just as no reasonable person in Serbia can understand Serbs who fill Kosovo Serbs
with hatred against their Albanian neighbors, inciting them, over and over, to draw blood
in Kosovo yet again.
Serbia must change its policy if it wants to join Europe. Instead of old
Kosovo slogans, we need new political courage. Society is moved by valuable ideas, just as
it is destroyed by forgeries - which are what the current government's Kosovo policy has
turned into. We need a vision of Serbia that will hold-up, not fail, the test of time. An
idea that should make clear the horizon that is in front of us. We cannot reach such a
vision or idea if we are left outside of Europe, in perpetual conflict and
misunderstanding with the leading, democratic countries of the world.
This is why we believe that the struggle for Serbia in Europe and Europe
in Serbia is the only correct and honest policy.
This is why Serbia needs a turnabout! |
