Najbolje se putuje...

We are off today for a holiday visit to our friends in lovely Baltimore, most likely back late Saturday night. There may or may not be time for a post or two in between cooking and socializing. If not, everybody enjoy a fine rest. The next couple of weeks will be intensive -- end of the semester, and then immediately off for a winter sojourn in Niš.

Uncertain future of nobody's favorite soap opera

Between frequent rest breaks, Slobodan Milošević has used up three quarters of the time which was allowed him to conduct his defence, and has concentrated most of this time on the first (and original) set of charges against him, in connection with violations of international law in Kosovo in 1999. He has shown that he is not an especially capable lawyer, that he does not have the physical or intellectual capacity to do the work of a legal defence, and that he is not willing to withdraw in favor of a legal defence which might be capable. This might be because he plans to appeal his eventual conviction on the ground that he did not receive an adequate defence, it might be because he is using the trial as a regular television broadcast, or it might simply be because he is conducting his defence with the same monomaniacal ineptitude with which he committed the violations that led him to be charged in the first place. As the trial has dragged on and on, it has become less the revealing and cathartic event which was intended -- even the live broadcasts draw an audience only on those days when a colorful witness is called.

Now it looks like there is a possibility that the show might be cancelled. When it comes back into session on 29 November, the Tribunal will consider a proposal to retroactively separate the indictments against Milošević. This would mean that they could deliver a verdict on the Kosovo indictment and hear the defence on the Croatia and Bosnia-Hercegovina indictments sometime in the future, if at all. Leaving aside the procedural decisions which led the trial to this state, that sort of half-finish without resolution would offer one more example of why the job of establishing historical truth and of contributing to peace and reconciliation is not one that should be put in the hands of lawyers. The tendency is to offer process rather than substance.

HRT and Nova TV do not sikiriki

Courtesy of Index.hr, here is the full text of the song "Mater vam jebem" by Edo Maajka, for which HRT and Nova TV have decided that they would not broadcast the video spot. It is true that the song contains some of what the linguists among us call by the technical term "naughty words," but this may not necessarily be the thing that bothers the TV producers.

Mater vam jebem
Kod nas se od Dejtona godine broje, ljudi se ljudi boje i svako glasa za svoje. Brđani postaju građani, do jučer svjetla gasili sjekirama, a sad su u odjelima.

Mirnese, sredi ih Mirnese, jebi im mater, ako se ti počneš prodvat i tebi ću mater jebavat da znaš, nije bitna ideologija, bitna je biologija, bitna je genetika balije, ustaše i četnika!

Svaka ovca svome krdu. Krave uz telad, u šarena vrata gledat, jedni drugima mater jebat. Znam ko je počeo rat, znam šta je glad! Znam kad su šešeljevci došli u moj grad!

Pričamo ono kako je sad, slabo se mičemo s mjesta, puni smo rupa ko naša cesta. Često vučemo ručnu - vidiš svaki biser, išli bi naprijed ali volimo taj rikverc.

Postalo nam navika da ne radi ni jedna fabrika, malverzacije prešutimo da šefove ne ljutimo, navikli smo, na gebiru i u miru. Mladi iz zemlje bježe, izbjeglice se vratit neće ne moraju, nek zarađuju, nek nam šalju para mi ćemo živit u mraku i jedni drugima jebavat majku...

Cijela država plaća reket, po kućama oružja od rata čuje se zveket, imamo mina ko jagoda - pune oranice, ali neće brati gurodovi sto su pravili sadnice!

Bole nas kite, imamo resursa više, pogotovo metala, govana, metana, to je naš zrak i hrana, s tim nas vođe hrane. Ne znam za vas ja sam sit, u mene više ne stane. Svako kurac u državi puši, zatvara uši.

Pred nepoznatim ljudima držim jezik za zubima. Dal selam, zdravo, bog? Kako je pravo? Ne znam više šta da kažem, u sranju da se ne nađem.

Pas je ujeo bubu, sviraju ratnu trubu, ljude drukčijeg pogleda imaju na zubu, a da im isprave pogled poslaće im jedan odred da im zapaljenu kuću gledaju kroz dvogled.

Al nema ratne nevjere što može uništit temelje, onaj korijen kuće u kojem su naše duše, onu burmu i lanac što u temelj baci Bosanac. Kad kuću pravi u temelj dio sebe stavi! Srušit do temelja ne ide! Temelj, on će ostat vječan ko Sava...

Mater vam jebeeeeeem!
Mater vam jebeeeeeem!
Mater vam jebeeeeeem!
Mater vam jebeeeeeem!

Just to clarify

The excellent news and commentary source that I have linked in the "Broadly international" section of the links here is the radio program (also available as a podcast) Open Source, which is hosted by the wonderful interviewer Chris Lydon together with several collaborators. It is a coproduction of WGBH and the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, and it is distributed through Public Radio International. Lovers of good radio will certainly remember Chris Lydon as the extraordinarily insightful and well-prepared host of The Connection, which is now hosted by Dick Gordon. The new project grew out of Lydon's inspiration to integrate the formats of radio and bloggery, and the result is a tremendously innovative program with far more interactivity than the broadcast product that most people are used to.

This project has nothing to do with a new, well-financed, and to all appearances thoroughly mediocre project which is going under the name Open Source Media, which would appear to be a promotional outlet for a group of right-wing personalities from blogs and media. Their frequently-revised claims to the contrary, they would appear to be using the name of an existing organisation unethically, and perhaps trying to muscle the name away from its originators. Does anybody remember when the forgotten sycophant Dragutin Brčin attempted to do the same thing?

Update: It looks as though they have listened to the objections and no longer claiming the name. Instead they will be going as "Pajamas Media," possibly because after you have used them it is time for a shower.

In time for holiday shopping

The brilliant Florian Bieber has a new book out from Palgrave, yclept Post-War Bosnia: Ethnicity, Inequality and Public Sector Governance. Says the promotional blurb:

"Ten years after the end of the war, Bosnian ethnicity continues to matter and the country remains dependent on international intervention. The Dayton Peace Accord signed in 1995 successfully ended the war, but froze the ethnic conflict in one of the most complex systems of government in the world. The book provides an in-depth analysis of governance in this divided post-war country, providing important lessons for international intervention elsewhere around the world, from Afghanistan to Iraq."

Wake up early to get in line, there will be crowds for these 200 pages of pure Balkanological reading pleasure.

Back online tomorrow

This week is a little bit of a breather before the final exam crunch begins in early December. I have not posted since Thursday because I had to scramble to finish an article (about which more soon), and also because my sister has been visiting from Seattle. We had to give her the opportunity to taste all of those things she cannot get at home, so we took her to Azra's favorite Chinese restaurant (my advice: try the crispy duck in addition to your other favorite dishes), to Roslindale's legendary site of Albanian cuisine pilgrimages and to Cambridge's always reliable Portuguese standby. All that and several good dog walks, a breakfast brought to our cousins on their first day in their new apartment, and even a bit of good home cooking. Plus the article got finished!

So I hope to have some new items to post tomorrow, then we head off to Baltimore for a short holiday visit. We are tired of turkey, so your goose recipes, if you have them, will be received with a welcoming smile. Our destination is the home of our former neighbors, and whenever we go there I seem to get inspired to make a dish that takes two days, is delightful, and will probably never get made again.

Israeli media on Tadić's visit

Thanks to friend of East Ethnia O.F. for bringing this to attention. Yossi Melman interviewed Boris Tadić for Haaretz and found out:

*He could not go swimming because he had a flu and was too busy

*The murder of Zoran Djindjić was like the murder of Yitzhak Rabin because "both were motivated by a desire to put an end to historical processes."

*He wants to commemmorate Serbian and Jewish victims in "a memorial center for the common tragedy of our two peoples, which will be built in Belgrade, where two concentration camps were located during the Nazi occupation."

*He sees a parallel between the sense of threat in both states, as (the reporter's words) "many Serbs feel close to and identify with Israel; they feel a common sense of victimization, justified or not. Israel is fighting Palestinian terrorism, and Serbia feels threatened by Albanian terrorism in the fight over Kosovo, most of whose residents are Muslims who want independence from Serbia."

All said, the interview is typical Tadić: a little bit of moderation, a little bit of opportunism, a little bit of playing to the extremes. It makes for an interesting set-piece on hybridity and the uses of victimisation.

Do animals harass people with lawsuits?

So it seems that the philosopher Milan Kangrga has won the case brought against him by the unusual person Tomislav Dragun on charges of "libelling Croatianity," noted earlier this month on this blog. Dragun had claimed that Kangrga had done him damage by claiming that animals were smarter than Croats. Kangrga denied having made any such claim (the conflict seems to have been over a satirical remark the philosopher had made on the question of whether people know what their interests are), and allowed that Dragun was smarter than an animal. There was no effort to specify what animal it was under discussion.

Moral foreign policy?

The Times reports that the Uzbek interior minister, who is accused of directing the massacre of potesters in Andijon in May, is currently in Germany for cancer treatment. Colonel General Almatov is one of twelve Uzbeks affected by an EU travel ban announced Monday. EU officials explained that "medical emergencies" were exempt from the travel ban. There goes your leverage.

The Bush administration's contribution to the progress of civilisation, in five words

Torture. Secret prisons. Chemical warfare.

Blog Against Racism Day, 1 December

This is the sort of blog action it is easy to support, and it could produce some useful results. Chris Clarke is asking people to make 1 December "Blog Against Racism Day." There is plenty going on worthy of comment and critique. On that day, put up whatever thoughts you have on the topic, and a good discussion ought to follow.

What's in a name?

The village of Smrdići (little stinkies) near Žitorađe (native town of Ceca Ražnatović), apparently got its name after a lot of horses died there. Now it has changed its name to Izvor (source), for some reason.

Treatment for blogophobia

There was some concern this past summer when a pseudonymous "Ivan Tribble" published a couple of essays in the Chronicle of Higher Education on the perils of blogging. Considering that he chose a pseudonym for a column in a print publication too, he might as well have been warning about the perils of saying anything at all, anywhere. This week Rebecca Goetz has a response based on her own experience (and a small-scale survey), highlighting the positive contributions of blogging to many parts of the academic job. I would go further: to the extent that professors and other academics have anything valuable to say, they are not doing their job if they do not communicate it.

Prediction: Something might happen, maybe

The interior ministry of RS is negotiating with somebody regarding a surrender to the ICTY, reports Nezavisne novine. It might be Ratko Mladić, but then again it might not be.

Confronting and understanding the extreme right

Today's papers have several reactions to the very public display of neo-Nazi groups in Serbia. Dnevnik's article cites a number of social scientists, including historian Zoran Janjetović who points out that the country does not have authentic fascist traditions and points to the appearance of extreme right groups as a sign of social crisis. The article also cites social psychologist Žarko Trebješanin who concurs that extreme movements appear as a result of social crisis, and also ties the appearance of these groups to the destruction of social values over the past several years. Sociologist Zagorka Golubović places the development in a global context, pointing out that similar developments are apparent elsewhere in the world, as a consequence of "great turbulence and confusion, and the impossibility of showing that there exists some different, new and more acceptable alternative to the dominant neoliberalism." Sociologist Neven Cvetićanin argues that people who see no future for themselves will tend to find solace in extremism.

A similar but more detailed perspective is outlined in sociologist Isidora Jarić's interview in Politika, where she details the results of a series of surveys on questions of hopelessness, inclination toward extreme perspectives, and the possibility of violence. B92's article concludes with a brief discussion of whether purely punitive approaches can address the problem.

Carnival of the Balkans #4!!!!

The fourth Carnival of the Balkans is up over at Science and Politics! This is the most exhaustive and diverse Balkan carnival ever, featuring Balkan blogs in many languages from around the world. Have a look and see what people are writing about, and what sorts of communications they are getting from their neighbors. Previous editions are archived at the Balkan carnival site.

Study in Eastern Europe!

Apparently the degree will come much more cheaply than in other places, and the Bologna process is just as tasty.

A reunion in question

A group of veterans of the Honvéd, the Hungarian occupying forces in World War II in Yugoslavia, held a reunion in Subotica, which seems to have inspired differing reactions. The organisers of the meeting, a nongovernmental organisation called "Open perspectives," insist that in the context of the move to claim equivalency for Četnici and Partisans, the meeting should be taken as an effort to promote understanding rather than as a provocation. The meeting organiser Gabor Kudlik denies that most Honvédek were fascists, and that rather these were people who were forcibly mobilised, and that many of them could be considered victims themselves, particularly as many were sent to the Eastern front. Others, including most of those who have so far commented on the news item, see the event a revisionist provocation.

(For my part, I am not certain that "Honvéd" is a very specific term. It would seem to be more or less an equivalent of "domobran," and it appears in the names of many military institutions, as well as providing the name for a popular football club. Perhaps this is a bit of vojvođanski shorthand for something else?)

Update: A brief summary of what J. Tomasevich (War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945, pp. 168-174) has to say on the matter -- the Hungarian occupation concentrated most of its nastiness, especially the dispossession and deportation of civilians, to 1941. Otherwise, the German minority exercised far more real power. By late 1943, Germany had substituted its own power for that of the Horthy regime in every sense but the most formal, and did so in the formal sense by installing Ferenc Szálasi in October 1944. Germany evacuated many Volksdeutsche from Vojvodina when it was clear that territory would be lost, but not many people who were not Volksdeutsche.

Little fascists

One group cut short a concert in Belgrade by the archival left-punkers The Exploited, by tossing tear gas into the audience of 1000 or so at the Student Cultural Center (SKC). Another group came in to verbally threaten participants in a discussion panel on the "fascist threat" in Novi Sad. Police reacted uselessly in both instances.

Odd as it may seem, appearing publicly as "fascists" is probably as far as these marginal and confused young people can get in terms of associating their behavior with something that people recognize. The tolerance of decent folks is probably the best treatment they will ever receive as well. If real fascists were ever to come to power thanks to their efforts, their "shock troops" would probably be among their earliest victims, as in the Night of the Long Knives.

Update: See the comments for the full text of the statement from the Independent Association of Journalists of Vojvodina (NDNV).

Update 2, 11 November: It looks like the police in Novi Sad are beginning to arrest members of the neo-Nazi group "Nacionalni stroj" after all. But they also want to file charges against the organisers of the meeting that was attacked for failing to file notice of a public meeting. Balance or something, what? But then the balance is upset again -- somebody is smashing the windows on shops owned by Chinese businesspeople in Valjevo.

Islamist Terror Strikes Again!

No, I'm not talking about the very real terror in Amman last night. I'm talking about the increasingly fantastic -- fantastically thin, that is -- case of the teenagers recently arrested in Denmark and Bosnia. The Copenhagen Post Online (whatever that may be) reported yesterday that they were linked to three suspects arrested in the UK:

Police fear that terror suspects arrested in Denmark are linked to a British plot to attack the US White House

A British police dragnet has raised suspicion that nine terrorist suspects arrested in Denmark and Bosnia are linked to a plan to attack the White House and other strategic targets in the United States. British police became interested in one of the suspects after they arrested three men in London and found they had had email correspondence with a man living in Bosnia. The man living in Bosnia had been suspected of running a network that sought to draw alienated youths to the rebellion in Iraq. Seven 16-20-year-olds are currently under arrest in Denmark along with two 18-year-old men in Sarajevo, one of Danish-Turkish heritage and the other from Sweden, in connection with the find of cache of weapons and explosives in Sarajevo. Two days after the two were arrested in Sarajevo, British police arrested three people in Great Britain on suspicion of planning a terror attack on The White House. The three men had apparently been in email correspondence with someone in Sarajevo who used the codename 'Maximus'.

I don't know where to start with this thing. First, it's totally unsourced. It says, "A British police dragnet has raised suspicion..." but doesn't tell us who is holding that suspicion. It says (in the hed, which probably wasn't written by the reporter) "Police fear..." but never tells us who told the reporter. But let's check the substance.

Police in Denmark and Bosnia arrest a bunch of people. Then the Brits arrest three more folks, apparently in an investigation that was at first unrelated. They find that the three new arrests had e-mail corrspondence with someone in Bosnia. That someone is "suspected" (but we don't know by whom) of running a network that "sought to draw alienated youths to the rebellion in Iraq." We are not told whether the network ever succeeded -- the term "seek" seems to indicate it didn't, and I wouldn't know what it means to "draw" someone "to the rebellion in Iraq" anyway.

The sole connection between the UK arrests and those in Denmark and Bosnia seems to be this 'Maximus' guy -- but the article doesn't even tell us whether those arrested in Denmark and Bosnia were ever in touch with him!

I'm not denying the very real danger of radicalism in Bosnia, or the potential for terrorism there. But the fact is that all of it is so far just speculation -- and I hope it'll remain that way.