Canadian Peace Alliance Statement on the War in Yugoslavia

The Canadian Peace Alliance (CPA) opposes NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia and the Government of Canada’s complicity in this violation of international law. Our position is based on legal, ethical, humanitarian and pragmatic considerations.

The bombing of Yugoslavia is an attack on a sovereign nation state. International law prohibits such attacks. The existence of regimes that grossly abuse the rights of their citizens does not alter this fact. The Charter of the United Nations is part of an evolving body of international law. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a statement of principles to which we all aspire. When these two documents are incompatible, the scales should be tipped in favour of international law. If we subscribe to the rule of law at home, then we should respect international law abroad.

Stability in the Balkans has been deteriorating for several years. This deterioration has led to violent conflict which is escalating. The human costs of this violence are horrendous.

Violence begets violence, resulting in unforeseen and uncontrollable consequences. Military means are inappropriate and inadequate to the solution of political problems.

NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia has given Slobodan Milosevic an excuse to intensify his oppression of Kosovar Albanians, making a bad humanitarian situation worse.

What can we do?

1. Address the complexities

The problem should not be defined solely in terms of Slobodan Milosevic. He is a key player in the current crisis, but he is not the entire problem. The main problem is the long-standing clash between ethnic groups in the Balkan Peninsula.

2. Stop the bombing

Bombing won’t solve the problem. Bombing typically produces two important reactions: 1) it strengthens the resolve of the people being bombed, and 2) it rallies support around their leaders. NATO sees the bombing as an attack on Slobodan Milosevic; Serbs see it as an attack on themselves.

3. Give negotiations a chance

We do not have enough information to assess the present situation adequately or propose political solutions to it. What we can propose, however, is a process for dealing with it.

That process should be one of genuine negotiation

• - that does not weigh in on one side or the other, and
• - that aims to find a workable compromise which meets the minimum requirements of all sides.

Anyone failing to negotiate in good faith should have all possible peaceful pressure brought to bear on them, such as:

• - denying landing rights to aircraft
• - freezing assets
• - ending arms deliveries
• - selective boycotting

Such a process has yet to be tried. Real negotiations have not been given a chance. NATO’s efforts to find a peaceful solution failed partly because NATO is not an impartial negotiator. The Rambouillet plan was a non-starter because its terms, which were not negotiable, included the intervention of NATO rather than the UN -- something no sovereign government could have accepted. Slobodan Milosevic was made an offer he had to refuse. Rambouillet was not the product of impartial negotiation.

Conclusion

For these reasons, the Canadian Peace Alliance calls on the Government of Canada

• to withdraw its support for NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia and advocate that the bombing stop at once
• to use its influence within the UN and the OSCE to establish a process of genuine negotiations intended to seek a fair and balanced solution to the crisis in Kosovo
• to undertake an extensive, open, public debate on the issues raised in this document

April 12, 1999