Wednesday, April 14, 1999
Journalist: Milosevic will survive
Visiting Serb blasts NATO
BY ANDREA TORTORA
The Cincinnati Enquirer
St. PETERSBURG, Fla. — With residents trying to recover from the NATO air strikes on Serbian Yugoslavia and Kosovo, Slobodan Milosevic is counting on the nation's state of shock to help him regain control and influence, a Serbian journalist said.
Aleksandra Ajdanic, editor of the Independent BETA News Agence in Belgrade, thinks Mr. Milosevic will prey on the tensions and fears in his own country and in neighboring Montenegro to remain in power once the NATO air strikes end.
“He is unfortunately a very, very smart guy,” Ms. Ajdanic said. “I mean a very smart guy. He will talk diplomacy issues but he's already working on his next step.”
Ms. Ajdanic, 39, a reporter and editor in Belgrade for 20 years, is a Serb who identifies as a Yugoslavian. She spoke to a group of 40 print, radio and television journalists last week at The Poynter Institute for Media Studies in St. Petersburg, Fla.
Ms. Ajdanic does not think the air strikes weakened Mr. Milosevic's will and is convinced he is very well hidden. “He won't be bombed, but people will be bombed,” she said.
Milosevic's rise
Ms. Ajdanic came to the U.S. to attend a media workshop. Two weeks before the bombing started, Ms. Ajdanic received a visa to travel to the states.
In Belgrade, Ms. Ajdanic watched Mr. Milosevic's power rise during the war in Bosnia. He used the independent ethnic and state-owned media to polarize the country.
“Journalists did huge damage,” Ms. Ajdanic said. “Before Bosnia and Croatia, there were those who talked with a language of hate.”
A divided people
Every ethnic group had its own newspapers and radio stations; each making the other ethnic groups out to be the devil, Ms. Ajdanic said. The Serbian press called Albanians terrorists; the Albanian press called Serbs aggressors. The worst thing was that many reporters identified governments with the people, assuming the people supported the governments in power.
Yet, as the war in Bosnia ended, the Serbian people tried to remove Mr. Milosevic from power, protesting his reign for three months. “The U.S. did not help,” Ms. Ajdanic said.
Even now, Mr. Milosevic is not loved by the Serbian people, Ms. Ajdanic said. “It's not exactly that people don't support him but they don't oppose him” because they are afraid.
Ms. Ajdanic was in Serbia during the first two and a half weeks of bombing. During that time, the government took control of all independent media and closed down some papers and radio stations. As ethnic Albanians were forced or asked to leave the country, many Serbs left too, fearful of the bombs.
“Bombs are really awful things for sure, but I'm also afraid of what will happen after that in the country,” Ms. Ajdanic said.
Ms. Ajdanic predicts that Kosovo will be divided: The northern half going to Serbia, the southern half going to Albania. “Kosovo will be empty,” she said. “Will the international community convince Albanians to come back? I don't know.”
Ms. Ajdanic said she thinks the NATO air attacks made the situation in the Balkans worse.
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