Regular commentator of the Belgrade weekly "Vreme", Milos Vasic, looks at the political involvement of the Serbian police in former Yugoslavia and particularly in Kosovo from the aspect of the more and more frequent refusal of policemen to go to the province in the June 13, 1998 issue of this weekly.

Judging by all information, a certain number of policemen (the number has three figures) of the Serbian state police force has in some way rejected the orders to go to Kosovo and involve themselves in clashes with KLA. The report of Belgrade daily "Dnevni Telegraf" that only in Belgrade this number is over a hundred has not been denied.

Starting from 1990. the functional division line of military and police in Serbia is being lost. Firstly the professional Serbian state policemen have been infiltrated into Croatia and Bosnia to subvert the authorities there and to organize the armed rebellion of Serbs there; then the JNA has been compromised by the setup of then Presidency president Borisav Jovic on March 9, 1991, when it was forced to draw the tanks into Belgrade streets, since the police has been intentionally misused so to create the impression that the situation is out of its control. Later it came out that March 9 was a coup d'etat attempt, a game in which the highest officials of the Serbian police took part; the police has then been misused in the name of selfish interests of one party. In the meantime, the police officials have been already quite involved in the formation. Arming, equipping and control of the paramilitary formations infiltrated into Croatia.

The integrity of the police as a politically neutral state service has quite dissipated during the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Firstly, Milosevic brought to Belgrade in Spring 1992, a certain number of members of Martic's Krajina police, as a threat to the opposition and the population. It remained unclear whether these policemen were citizens of FRY and authorized operatives of the Ministry of internal affairs - or foreign citizens who had unauthorized possession of arms and falsely present themselves in official capacity. This stupidity fortunately ended without serious consequences. But, mutual symbiosis of the police structures from FRY and "Western Serb lands" has continued and has lead to thoroughly unwanted consequences. If it wasn't for this, there would be no tragedies in Sandzak (Strpci, Sjeverin, etc.), deportation of refugees from Montenegro to Bosnian Serbs, unlawful mobilization of refugees in Serbia and their sending off to Bosnia and Croatia.

As the Serbian side was losing the wars in Croatia and Bosnia more and more, the number of Serbian MUP /police/ sent there grew to help and patch things up. First they went off discreetly, under false names, under full operative security and good rewards: near the end, in Summer 1995, they already went in larger groups and without much discretion, as if they were going to Kosovo. So, willingly or unwillingly, the Serb policemen had a good taste of war under Bihac, Trnovo, Glina, Srebrenica and other war fronts of the former country, shoulder to shoulder with various paramilitary forces comprised of criminals which they were formerly arresting. On those war fronts, and in cooperation with brotherly services, the Serbian police lost its political innocence completely.

While all this was happening abroad, Kosovo was a peaceful oasis for the police. Since the Spring of 1981, after which the famous Joint Police Unit was formed, there was real action only on two or three occasions in 1989. and 1990. Besides these exceptions, the life of the police in Kosovo was monotonous: they patrolled or waited for somebody to throw a stone a pamphlet on them, they did not speak Albanian, while the daily allowances, and additional ones for separate life were good.

The policemen do not speak eagerly with civilians about the occurrences when the service is departed due to the war in Kosovo, but they say, that there is talk among colleagues about it, which is normal. Worry is visible: one can hear questions about what is really happening, war or terrorism - and, depending on the answer - who is responsible and whose job that is.

During these eight months of the guerilla war in Kosovo, it turned out that this regime is using the police as a specialized military formation. With all due respect to the system of police schooling and training, it does not seem that the Serbian police is capable of doing this. First of all, majority of uniformed police has only gone through courses, and not through middle or higher school of internal affairs. A good part of them has combat experience from previous wars, but it is a big question is this worth to them in this situation. That is, in Kosovo they are operating in their uniforms and as an organ of the Serbian state; that is not "glorious combat" from Krajina and Bosnia, where things were done the way they were done, and we know what that was like.

Even if the information that three hundred policemen who have refused to go to Kosovo is correct, that is just a fraction of the whole personnel of MUP. What is in question is an indicator which should not be discarded lightly: the policemen were the last group which was expected to begin to reexamine the policies of the regime; the regime thinks that it has corrupted them enough and tied them to themselves so that - after all - they are ready to do anything.


Source: Belgrade weekly "Vreme," June 13, 1998