TERRORISM EXPERT SAYS MILITANT ISLAMISTS "PREPARING CADRES" IN SOUTH SERBIA
BBC Monitoring - August 1, 2004

Article published by Serbian newspaper Borba on 27 July 2004 - subheads as published

Serbian Interior Ministry and Gendarmerie members have arrested Bajram Arifi, 45, of the village of Turija. Arifi is a former member of the Liberation Army of Presevo, Bujanovac, and Medvedja (OVPBM - UCPMB in Albanian) and is known as the "commander for the village of Turija." The arrest was made as part of the steps taken to solve a series of criminal acts of banditry and terrorism committed on the territory of Bujanovac municipality.

Arifi is suspected of committing armed robbery against the Sacipi (Shaqipi) family together with two as yet unidentified accomplices on 15 July.

Police (Interior) Minister Dragan Jocic recently said that the security situation on the territory of Bujanovac municipality had deteriorated over the past month. He gave as one of the main reasons attacks on cars and homes carried out by masked persons, mostly led by local OVPBM commanders.

"Judging by the available information a (further) deterioration of the security situation can be expected on the territories of Bujanovac and Presevo municipalities in the coming period," Jocic said.

Prof Dr Milan Mijalkovski told Borba that the recent acts of banditry in the area of Konculj have shown that organized crime and Albanian terrorists are strongly linked, with a view to undermining Serbia's territorial integrity.

"I think that Minister Jocic's statement that the situation could deteriorate is unfounded because the NATO secretary-general clearly said during his recent visit to Belgrade that he was ashamed of what he had seen in Kosovo - the torched Serb homes - and that that would not be permitted to happen again. NATO member states have full control of the Albanian extremists so that I do not believe that the latter would dare provoke some larger-scale conflicts," Mijalkovski, who heads the Security Department of the VSCG (Serbia-Montenegro Army) Military Academy, said. He did not rule out the possibility of terrorist-criminal groups staging similar operations with a view to keeping up tensions, that is, for the sake of the so-called protection of the Albanian population.

ANA linked to Al-Qa'idah

Prof Mijalkovski said that, although the usual typical criminal acts were involved, the terrorist Albanian National Army (ANA) (AKSh in Albanian) was behind it all.

"We must bear in mind that ANA is directly linked with the Al-Qa'idah terrorist network. The head of the Security-Information Agency (BIA) centre in Vranje confirmed this in late April when he submitted to the Serbian Assembly security committee data showing that militant Islamist organizations, which do not advocate terrorism for the time being but give financial assistance, especially to poverty-stricken Albanians, and provide education for them, that is, select them and send them to schools in Arab countries in the Middle East, are active in the areas of Bujanovac and Presevo," Mijalkovski, a well-known terrorism expert, told Borba.

According to Mijalkovski, that is a typical method employed by Wahhabis, who are in the Raska-Lim region (of southwest Serbia). He said that it was characteristic of the Wahhabis that state borders were of secondary importance to them and that they propagated jihad.

"They are no threat for the time being. However, for the time being it is a phase of indoctrination, that is, forming cadres for terrorist activities. Once they have those cadres it is only a step away from switching from acts of extremism to acts of armed terrorism," Mijalkovski said.

First signal

Dr Mijalkovski recalled that several members of the terrorist ANA have been arrested in Kosovo, Albania, (and) Switzerland in the past two to three months.

"The leaders of the Albanian terrorists are fully aware that Western European countries no longer approve of their method of struggle, because they know that neither the human nor the collective rights of Albanians are threatened in the Balkans in general. Therefore, there is no reason whatsoever for them to put themselves at the head of the violence that they had given as a reason for them to react in the past. It is important that the investigation conducted after the 17 March terrorist campaign in Kosovo has led to the arrest of about 300 Albanians and that criminal charges have been brought against 50 or so of them. That is a signal that police measures have been taken for the first time against a large number of terrorists for that kind of violence. All that is a signal that the situation is changing and that Europe no longer wants conflicts and violence. Once they have no backing, the only possibility left open to them is to make their presence felt in a way typical of bandits," Prof Mijalkovski said.

He said that the presence of our strong security forces in southern Serbia - members of the Gendarmerie, the multi-ethnic police and the (army's) Pristina Corps - and their joint work with the BIA and the Military Security Agency, was a basis for not allowing those groups to act over a longer period.
 

Source: Borba, Belgrade, in Serbian 27 Jul 04 p 4

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