From: MSN NicknameEagle_wng  (Original Message)    Sent: 1/2/2008 12:25 AM
"The Russian Phenomenon of Disposable People"
 
The International Institute for Middle-East and Balkan Studies (IFIMES), Ljubljana, Slovenia, regularly analyzes events occurring in the Middle East and the Balkans. The former President of the Democratic Party of Albanians (PDSH) in Macedonia and member of the Macedonian Parliament, Arbën Xhaferi, presents his view on the Russian phenomenon of disposable people. His article, entitled «The Russian Phenomenon of Disposable People», is here published in its entirety.

Arbën Xhaferi
The former President the Democratic Party of Albanians (PDSH) in Macedonia and a member of parliament of the Republic of Macedonia
 
THE RUSSIAN PHENOMENON OF 'DISPOSABLE' PEOPLE

“I am not a simple peasant, not of the working class, but the son of a deacon, and when I was free I lived at Kursk; I used to wear a frockcoat, and now I have brought myself to such a pass that I can sleep naked on the ground and eat grass. And I wish no one a better life. I want nothing and I am afraid of nobody, and the way I look at it is that there is nobody richer and freer than I am. When they sent me here from Russia from the first day I stuck it out; I want nothing! The devil was at me about my wife and about my home and about freedom, but I told him: 'I want nothing.' I stuck to it, and here you see I live well, and I don't complain, and if anyone gives way to the devil and listens to him, if but once, he is lost, there is no salvation for him: he is sunk in the bog to the crown of his head and will never get out.”

So spoke old Semyon, nicknamed Canny, the protagonist of Chekhov's short story «In Exile». The great Russian writer, with an exceptional style, painted a picture of the worries and depression of people without hope, without ideals, of people who are 'disposable', of people who have lived the greyness of life in the Siberian plains and had lost all desire for anything.
 
It was precisely this short story that I was reminded of while analyzing Russia's arrogant diplomacy, determined to provoke a global crisis at any cost and so threaten peace and international order for, essentially, nothing. Where do they get this courage from? Where does all the arrogance in Russia's diplomacy and their establishment stem from, this arrogance that so easily threatens peace and the new world order, based on the principles of liberal democracy and standards that ensure the protection of human rights and freedoms – and they do this with the smaller issue of Kosovo as well. Can they not see that the arguments they throw around, whilst defending Serb expansionism, are anachronistic and
belong to the period of pan-Slavism? How can they not realize that a global role can only be played through implementing universal values, human rights, and in particular the inalienable right of nations to freedom and self-determination?

Why are they not aware that their cynic arguments are unendurable for anyone that knows at least a little about Kosovo? How can they dare to speak so easily and cynically about a compromise, when it is clear to everyone that one cannot compromise with those who have tried for centuries to exterminate a nation they consider to be parasitic weed, and who still, today, do not hide their wishes to try to use old methods once more to reduce Albanians into an unimportant factor? Why do they give the status of Kosovo such a diabolic meaning – it would allegedly initiate a tidal wave of secession all over the world? If that is the case, how is it that the collapse of former Yugoslavia did not have such an effect on countries close and far? Why do new countries emerge all the time and are accepted into the United Nations, whilst at the same time this, according to the magical formula of the domino effect, does not spark of anarchy? How serious can they be, those that claim Kosovo's independence would set a dangerous precedent, when we all know that the number of United Nations members increased fourfold since the year 1945? If Kosovo would be a negative precedent, then what would be a positive example – perhaps Chechnya? Let us compare the two. In the case of Kosovo, Christianity and Islam are in harmony, because humanism prevails: the Christian civilization intervenes and does not permit genocide against one predominantly Muslim nation from the side of the other, let us say Christian nation. Furthermore, Kosovo sends a message about successful democratic elections, elections that have proceeded better than those in almost all transition countries. In Kosovo, the rights of ethnic and religious minorities are protected, so that today, the Serbs in Kosovo have more rights than they did in the period of Milošević. And what message is sent by the other, by the opposite example? A vast rift between religions, successful genocide, failed democratization, and the dismantling of human dignity. What precedent, then, is there at the heart of Russian diplomacy? When speaking of precedents, these must be analyzed from a normative perspective, not simply formally. We cannot forget that there are negative and positive precedents, just because of the amount of noise made regarding this issue. The latter is always connected to the inalienable right of a nation for freedom and self-determination.

Finally, on the topic of precedents, we must remember that, when browsing Russian archives in the post-October revolution period, particularly those from 1924, around the emergence of the Kosovo issue, that the then-Soviet authorities viewed the first Yugoslavia as a manufactured entity and worked towards its dissolution; furthermore, as far as the Albanian question is concerned, it contacted the Kosovo Committee (lead by the well-known Kosovo patriot Bajram Curri) prior to Albania's international recognition in order to establish diplomatic relations with the new Albanian government under Fan Noli. At that time, the precursors of Putin's contemporary diplomacy, such as G.V. Cicerini, wrote to the Politbureau of the Russian Communist Party (on the 22nd of July 1924) that Serbia, regarding the Bucharest agreement of 1913, annexed «Kosovo and Metohija» and absorbed them into the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes in 1918.

There are many such paradoxes, inconsistencies and questions, as well as answers. What is interesting is the analysis of the socio-cultural substrate that forms evaluations, the level of seriousness, responsibility, judgments and positions, both individual as well as collective, that leads to prejudices, resistance to hypocrisy, and the teaching of methods for unlimited manipulations of the public.

The answer to all this can be found in the dominant pattern of thought of the Russian establishment, which always, in a systematic manner, tolerated the creation of the social category of 'disposable' people, people towards whom state and society hold no obligation or responsibility; for they are disposable and even God turned his back on them.

THE RUSSIAN 'DISPOSABLE' AND KOSOVO

Russia's intensive colonial expansionism, particularly mastering territories with extreme climates, demanded people without hope, without alternatives, without goals and perspectives, criminals, proletarians, people without home and property who were promised a splendid future in a time of merciless industrialization. Masses of adventurers, criminals, prisoners and people opposed to the government thus headed for the vast plains of Siberia. They did this convinced that they would be fortunate and that their hope would be restored, but ended up with the painful revelation that they are abandoned, 'redundant', cheated; in short, accepted by no one. No one took these people into consideration. They were left without an alternative in the dirty mud of Siberia, and became the secret power of Russian imperialism – a force that managed not only to achieve territorial gains but was also able to resist numerous armies that attacked the Eurasian dinosaur, itself always provocative and hungry for new territory.

Aside from colonialism, the formation of the social category of disposable people was also affected by accelerating industrialization, collectivization, and an ever-increasing impoverishment of wide sectors of society. These people, with all hope lost forever, were coldly exploited as expendable material for territorial expansion, for the colonization of foreign countries, for accelerated economic development and to strengthen Russia's global role – and this is precisely what Russia is now doing with Kosovo. The difference between colonialism of the Russian variety and that of other nations lies in the fact that Russia expanded onto neighboring countries, so that today, the distinction between colony and own state is completely blurred, something which was, for example, never true for France.

To be fair, many other nations all over the globe have behaved in precisely the same way, from the creation of their states up until today, that is, from slave-owning up until democratic system. However, we cannot look at every nation and culture from a relativistic point of view. Some nations and cultures have developed a system of fixing mistakes, whilst others have not been as successful in doing so and, instead of fixing their mistakes, have been engaged in an arrogant and scandalous attempt to use rhetoric to cover up the bitter truth.

Today, we are witnessing a similar strategy, which attempts to, by way of creating and exploiting 'disposable people', use suicidal tactics to make up for the economic, scientific, and social inequality between so-called Western and Islamic countries. There exists a difference between Russian methods and these anarchic political groups that hide behind the veil of religious convictions as they abuse Islam. Whilst the category of Russia's 'disposable people' is a product of accelerated industrialization and colonialism, the category of 'holy warriors – kamikazes' is a product of extreme indoctrination and ruthless political manipulation.

STATES THAT (DON'T) FIX MISTAKES

Slavery existed in the United States alongside racism and legalized discrimination. Yet the history of states that belong to the circle of Western civilization has shown that these states are more than capable of engaging in attempts to fix their mistakes, whilst states with an authoritarian pattern of thought have never been able to free themselves of their prejudices. The former U.S. President Bill Clinton, in his book 'My Life', gave his thanks to nine black students that protested racial segregation in schools in 1957. «At the end of the summer of 1957, nine students gave their contribution to the ideal that everybody, white and black alike, could free themselves of the chains of racial prejudices,» is written not by just anybody, but by the former President of the U.S. Bill Clinton. Thanks to the value of correcting past mistakes, «enemies on the inside» became among the most appreciated human beings in American civilization, such as Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks, Muhammad Ali, and many others.
 
The pattern of thought that tolerates the existence of 'disposable people' as a social category has created a military doctrine, according to which victory is achieved with unlimited sacrifice of soldiers, who are treated as expendable material. Stalin's saying that the dead are counted only when the war is over is a sad testament to this. Such a degrading and humiliating view on human life was shared by former Czars and Communist leaders, and is shared with today’s false democrats. More than 20 million 'disposable people' died in the October revolution due to starvation. Lenin, the charismatic leader of the revolution, coldly viewed this tragedy as favorable for the revolution, as the masses would blame the previous regime for it, and so those affected would have no will to resist the Red Army. During the second World War, the disposable layers of Russian society sacrificed more than 20 million people, only to allow the dictator Stalin to enjoy global importance and the influence to make geostrategic decisions. Today, Russia's President Putin would, without a second thought, sacrifice the crew of the sunken submarine Kursk, rather than ask for Western help; by this, he decided for the continuation of immoral military secrecy above the lives of those unfortunate sailors, marked as 'disposable'.

The Beslan hostage tragedy, where 313 victims, mostly children, were killed alongside the terrorists, exposed a cultural and political tradition where human life matters little. Today's Russian democrats are quick to criticize the authoritarian leaders of the USSR-period, which creates the illusion that the leaders today respect democratic tradition and ideals. Yet the fate that faces Chechnya today is more tragic than the fate which befell the Tatar nation, the Baltic states, or the Germans that were expelled into Kazakhstan or other former Soviet Republics in the time of the previous regime. The Tatars, Germans, Lithuanians and others were persecuted in order to change the demographic structure so that it would be more in favor of Slavs; today, in a period of flourishing democracy, the Chechens, as a 'disposable' national group, face classical genocide.

Following the pattern of thought that, without a second thought, holds global influence and strength to be of more importance than the lives, destinies, and fortunes of millions of people, we must ask ourselves the following question: what kind of values do states that aspire global power proclaim? Russian politicians, unfortunately, are unable to hide that they are intoxicated by brutal extortion, that they defend racist ideas, and that they selfishly, in every issue in the world, defend Russian and Slavic interests. Speaking of immobile borders whilst being aware that borders are constantly changing, frightening the world with the apocalyptic promise of the domino effect, all this is simply rhetoric to divert attention. Of course, other states pursue their own interests when dealing on a global agenda, but they do this with the spread of human rights in mind. The difference between democratic liberal and non-liberal social structures lies in the fact that the latter always breed dictators who are ready to use unproportional violence as a method of punishing even the smallest of infractions.

The category of disposable people enables the quick spread of conflict, helps forming massive armies of soldiers who are worthless, creates masses of prostitutes and criminals, all who infiltrate every institution, from sport to religion, and poison them with criminal logic.

DO ALBANIANS HAVE 'DISPOSABLES' AS WELL?

Do Albanians produce people of this category too? There might exist indicators that this does happen, but the proportion remains small. Reasons for that could be found in the lack of industrialization, a process that is programmed to create expropriated sectors of society. It could also be due to tribal structures, healthy families, and a corresponding high level of solidarity among members of these structures. Having this explanation in mind, we can look at the fact that in Albanian speech, there is no term that would be the equivalent of 'ghetto'. This has resulted in the respect that Albanians have for one another – which at the same time weakened their military capabilities and throughout history has caused loss of territory.

Although the category of 'disposable' people does not exist in internal relations between Albanians, it does not hold true for relations between Albanians and others. Throughout history, others have treated Albanians, as well as Bosniaks, as disposable, and this is occurring to this day, where attempts at peace in the Balkans are directed to be at the expense of Albanians, whose economic opportunities and territory are being infringed upon. To prevent the aim of categorizing Albanians as a 'disposable nation', Albanian society must be organized on the basis of values and ideals. The further a society moves from ideals, the higher the possibility that it will become 'disposable', and thereby change to barter with. No functional state today can be stable without the sacrifices made for it by ideals and without the aims of a legitimate state. Nepotism, corruption, crime, authoritarianism, and theocracy are all factors that eat away at the foundations of a society that is meant to be for the good of all citizens and ethnicities.

Ljubljana, November 28, 2007

International Institute for Middle-East
and Balkan Studies (IFIMES) - Ljubljana

Directors: Bakhtyar Aljaf
Zijad Bećirović, M.Sc.

http://www.eurasianhome.org/File/IFIMES_.pdf