The world is now undergoing a “deconstruction of power” that thought itself supreme 23 years ago, the famous Serbian director tells RT
The current conflict over Ukraine is basically the sequel to the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, the celebrated Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica told RT on Tuesday, pointing out the continuity of Russophobia and the West’s disdain for international law.
On March 24, 1999, NATO launched its air war against what was then the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The bombing continued for 78 days and ended with a negotiated armistice, allowing UN peacekeepers into the rebel province of Kosovo.
Because Russia was weak and ruled by the “Western oligarchy” propping up President Boris Yeltsin, Serbia was “absolutely alone” in fighting for its freedom, borders and survival, Kusturica told RT from his home in Mecavnik.
This was “when international law was changed to what I call ‘humanitarian’ law,” the filmmaker said, alluding to NATO’s official reasoning that it was trying to stop a humanitarian disaster in Kosovo, and the subsequent doctrine of “responsibility to protect” created to justify the war.
“This war did not just come out of nowhere. This is a continuation of something seeded much earlier,” the director said, referring to the current conflict over Ukraine. Kusturica sees a continuity of Russophobia in the West, which rejected Russia’s offer of partnership after the Cold War.
NATO claimed the bombing brought peace, but the only thing it achieved was to enable the October 2000 color revolution, Kusturica noted. Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was overthrown in what would become a template for two such revolts in Ukraine, first in 2004 and then in 2014.
Bombing of Serbia was just the first act, now we’re witnessing the second act of the same story.
