For centuries the Albanian people have been suffering and fighting for freedom, especially in Former Yugoslavia, Kossovo, Montenegro and Macedonia.

They have been usually surrounded by bigger populations, and parted in the several neighbouring countries such as Former Yugoslavia, Greece, Turky, Italy and other parts of Europe and of the world, for almost a century. Today the Albanian people risk to be overwhelmed, downtrodden and strongly damaged in the gap between East and West. They risk to get involved in a war that may turn out to be the massacre of Albanians -a population that has never conquered someone else's territory, but that has just defended itself against invasors.

The "game" with the Albanian lands started already under the Turkish domination. In 1878 Russia, having won over the Turks, and moving in a panslavist direction, imposed the assignment of the vast Albanian lands to Montenegro and Serbia (today in Former Yugoslavia).

The Albanian reaction was immediate. In fact, on the 10th of June, 1878, the League of Prizen was founded. Through this League, all Albanians, Catholic, Ortodox and Muslim joined together to fight the Turkish domination, as well as against any foreign domination. The movement was a real political and military organization that asked for the acknowledgment of the Albanian Nation, as well as the garanty of its territorial integrality.

After several fights, on the 28th of November, 1912, in Valona, Albany, the independence was declared and the standard of the national hero, Gjergj Kastriota Skanderberg, was hoisted. This flag (a two-headed black eagle on a red background) is the symbol of Albany today still.

But, on the 22nd of March, 1913, in a general atmosphere of indifference, on the occasion of the London Conference, the Albanian borders were established: Kossovo definitively passed to the crown of the "old Yugoslavia" (that is the Serbian-Croatian-Slovenian kingdom) and Chamaria, south, passed to Greece. Some other parts of the region were included in the territories of the present Republics of Former Yugoslavia, Montenegro and Macedonia. In Kossovo there lived almost one third of the whole Albanian population, and Chamaria -the main Illyrian and Epirian region of historical interest- was mainly inhabited by the citizens of "the Country of Eagles"*.

In order to better understand the present situation in Former Yugoslavia it is necessary to say something on the origins of the present conflict and on Yugoslavia as a State.

Yugoslavia was artificially created by the great European powers in 1918, after the fall of the Ottoman empire and the destruction of the Austro-Hungarian kingdom. Different peoples, cultures, traditions, languages and religions were forcibly joined together under the label of "Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians", that actually was the kingdom of Serbia. The other peoples, as the Albanian, Macedonian and Montenegrin ones, not to talk of minorities, were not even acknowledged at a mere juridic level and underwent all kinds of limitations and injustices in different sectors of the political, economical, social religious and cultural life.

Then, the second world war bursted. The communists called it the "war of liberation", but it actually was a fratricidal fight, a balancing of old accounts dating back to the period of the monarchic Yugoslavia. Communism only changed the color of the dictatorship, appealing especially to the numerically strongest people, the Serbian one, thus creating the new federal Yugoslavia, where the Serbs dominated and had privileges on everything and everybody. The term "Yugoslavia" was just a common denomination that pointed out a sad and hard reality to the world. A reality that we have never accepted nor wanted, but that was imposed with violence.

With the ideological crisis -but especially with the economical one- of the communist system at an international level, the Yugoslavian "reality" exploded too.

As a result of the free elections of 1990, the national parties -no to say nationalist parties- had a great success and, at the same time, the many injustices that had been perpretated since 1918 and, afterwards, since 1945 to our days, were denounced.

Both first Yugoslavia, the monarchic one, and second Yugoslavia, the communist one, were wanted and created by the European great powers, who never respected the will and, in particular, the diversities of peoples. For this reason Yugoslavia has always been a forced and artificial reality, based on injustice and on the Serbian hegemony, and as such could not have lasted long in time and space.

At the beginning of 1981, the Albanian population of Kossovo (that counts roughly two million people, whereas the other million Albanians live in Macedonia and Montenegro) denounced openly and publically the above said injustices, at first with the pacific student rebellion in the capital Prishtina, then with the rebellion of workers. Such unrest soon became a Popular Movement for the democratization of life at all levels, for Albanians as well as for all other ethnic groups.

This was the first democratic movement in Europe, after the Polish one; even though at that time in our country little was known of Poland. It was a great intuition, that unfortunately was not understood nor accepted, not only by the Yugoslavian communist party, this was obvious, but not even by the free and democratic Europe. This Movement was interpreted and introduced to the world as a den of nationalism, separatism, irredentism, Islamic fundamentalism and was therefore heavily repressed, using against the Albanians the Yugoslavian military and police machinery.

Kossovo had to be the test stand also for the other peoples of Yugoslavia; a strenght test, the defence of "unity" at all costs, even with blood. Since then, the Serbian dictatorial communism and nationalism were reinforced again and took power: at first to the damage of Albanians; today, to the damage of all the other peoples of the former Yugoslavian federation.

Slobodan Milosevic has astutely exploited these circumstances, experiencing his policy first in Kossovo, then in Vojvodina (another autonomous region of Serbia with a strong presence of Hungarians, Croats and other minorities) and in Montenegro. In fact, he introduced himself as the only heir of communism, almost as a new prophet, who had the duty and the will to save Yugoslavia at all costs, even with war. Actually, his target was that of realizing the Serbs' secular dream: the creation of a big Serbia, even under the title or label of Yugoslavia. (This effort is still going on with the creation of the so-called "third Yugoslavia" with Serbia and Montenegro, in fact Kossovo and Vojvodina have already been oppressed, by the creation of the satellite Serbian States in Croatia and Bosnia).

On the 23rd of March 1989 Milosevic, with violence and with the support of police and of the Yugoslavian army, made an amendment to the federal Constitution of 1974, approved by Titus, practically taking away all real autonomy to the once autonomous region of Kossovo and giving to Serbia the total control of police and magistracy. He thus gave to Serbia the possibility of issuing new laws and new constitutions without the consent of the Albanian population. Unfortunately, the federal Yugoslavia did nothing to stop him; on the contrary, they helped him, beliving it dealt with an internal question that did not concern other peoples. The same can be said of the European and world public opinion.

In April 1989 many popular pacifist demonstrations took place, promoted by Albanians to defend the autonomy of Kossovo, but they were choked with blood. The balance was of almost 100 deaths, several wounded people, many imprisoned with heavy accusations, many dismissed...

On the 2nd of June 1990 the Albanian parliamentarians of Kossovo tried to remedy to these injustices proclaiming the Republic of Kossovo, that is to proclaim Kossovo as an integrant and constitutive part of Yugoslavia, yet indipendent from Serbia. This decision was fully confirmed also by an underground referendum, occurred in September of the same year, in which 98 percent of people approved the creation of the Republic of Kossovo. After the proclamation of the Republic of Kossovo, on the 2nd of July, the democratic Constitution was promulgated too, always by initiative of the Albanian parliamentarians, and partly also by the Turkish ones, and always underground. The reaction of Milosevic's Serbia was immediate and violent. On the 5th of July, free Kossovo was victim of a coup d'tat: the Parliament of Kossovo was abolished with liberty and violence; radio, television and the Albanian press head offices were occupied (and are unfortunately still occupied). In one word, all that was Albanian was mostly blocked, occupied or destroyed.

We cannot say that in Kossovo there have been free elections, because we are not free people and because we are forced to vote only for the Serbian parliament, and maybe later for the so-called Yugoslavian one, that is always Serbian. Nearly all Albanian political parties were not acknowledged by Serbia; therefore, they now work underground and with many difficulties. We cannot even talk of population census, because the Albanians who once worked in the Statistics Institute have all been dismissed; thus the census is only a formality at the service of the regime.

Since the 5th of July 1990, the Albanians of Kossovo have been being hindered a lot in various ways and forms. More than 100.000 Albanian workers -over 150,000- have been arbitrarily dismissed. The Public Health Service, from which Albanians have been completely excluded and discriminated, is in Serbian hands. The university of Prishtina, the only bilingual university (Albanian and Serbian), is practically forbidden to Albanians. Today the entire education system, from primary schools to university, has undergone the same destiny under the pretext that Albanians should accept only one education system, the Serbian one. The Serbian parliament has abolished even the Kossovo Academy of Sciences and Arts and many other cultural institutions.

It is an ethnic-group massacre and a genocide prepared to the damage of Albanians through hunger, any kind of persecutions and through a non-declared war, yet ruthless and unfair.

Numerically, Albanians are the third nation of Former Yugoslavia, after Serbs and Croats. From an historical point of view, together with the Greek, they represent the most ancient Balkanic people. Yet, they have been treated as an ethnic minority. Their only fault is to be Albanians, democrate, against all dictatorship and against socialist communism, and to defend the fundamental rights as well as the human dignity of each people.

It is no longer possible to create nationalistic States based on the conceptions of dominion, force and exploitment excluding and destroying other realities. The Albanian people of Former Yugoslavia will never accept any solution to the conflict that does not envisage the Albanian participation to it. The only possibility for everybody's future is still the unity in the diversity, without discriminations between winners and losers. In this way universal values as peace, justice, tolerance, the parity of rights and duties, the mutual respect, can guarantee freedom in democracy to all.

In no way can we, and must we, allow this absurd war to extend from Bosnia to Kossovo and Macedonia, (John Paul II calls it a war "unworthy of man and of the European civilization"). In fact, if that happened, it would immediately extend to the neighbouring peoples, degenerating in a Panbalkanic conflict, and consequently also an European and maybe world conflict. We cannot leave a people, my Albanian people of Kossovo and of Former Yugoslavia, die in silence; nor can we leave the other peoples die -today in particular the Croatian, Serbian and Muslim people of Bosnia and Erzegovina- just for the opportunism and indifference of the free and democratic Europe and of the United States of America.

If the others are not free, we cannot be free. The question of Former Yugoslavia is the test stand for the existence and the maturity of Europe and of the democratic world, as well as for their ability to stop war, destructions, massacres and any kind of violence.

The crisis in Former Yugoslavia should be faced and solved in its globality for the sake of all peoples.

In the hardest and most dangerous times, the Albanian people have started a process to search their roots, their Christian identity, that has characterized them for so many centuries. They responded to the challenges of our time with two national, cultural, spiritual and religious options: to hatred and blood spreading they responded with the unconditioned universal reconciliation with everybody; to tortures, repressions, all kinds of limitations, killings, imprisonments and the abolition of the autonomy of Kossovo, they responded with the strategy of nonviolence.

I have called such process: "the cultural baptism", that is to find oneself, one's own national, cultural and religious identity in the Catholic Church through our common 15-centuries Christian past. I think that it is an unique case all over the world, that so many Albanian muslims - especially the Youth and the highbrows- have somehow already become Catholic, trying to find themselves after the many deceptions of atheism and of the imposed Islam.

The islamized Albanians today, look at the Catholic Church and expect that it takes its role of leader, in these dramatic times .

Already in 1989 the auxiliary bishop Nike Prela, of the diocese of Shkup-Prizren (that includes Kossovo and Macedonia, and counts about 75,000 Catholics, mostly Albanians of Kossovo), made a public appeal to defend the life of the miners of Trepcia, who were asking that their pro-Serbian Communist Albanian Chiefs be dismissed. Then, he made several other public appeals to the provincial authorities of Serbia and of the Yugoslavian federation against segregation in schools, for the defence of the fundamental human rights at a personal, family, national and religious level, but with no results. Then, he addresses a public appeal to the Yugoslavian public opinion denouncing the killings of youth, the inprisonments and the poisoning of about 7,000 people, among whom many children and young people. Eventually, he addressed personally to the President of the Yugoslavian presidency, to the Holy See, to mother Teresa, to the Italian Government and, through this, to the EEC, to the Council of the European Episcopal Conferences, to the President of the United States, Mr. G. Bush and to that of the Soviet Union, Mr. M. Gorbaciov.., asking that any further violence be interrupted to avoid national conflicts.

All this was done before the war in Yugoslavia broke out, perceiving that danger was imminent and big, but it remained like a voice in the desert of indifference...

The position of the Catholic Church in Kossovo is the following: numerically we are few, just 3%, plunged in a pluralist world from both the national and cultural point of view and the religious and social one. We are brothers in faith to Serbia and to Montenegrin people, because they are Orthodox Christians and we therefore want and look for an ecumenical dialogue with them. We are brothers in blood, language, culture and tradition to Muslim Albanians. Thus, the Catholic Church wants to be a go-between within the Albanian people and create bridges of friendship, cooperation, mutual esteem within a global process of forgivness, justice, peace and love that are good and necessary values for everybody. This is important especially today that we hardly see rays of hope for a better future.

Today more than ever, we have to believe, act, witness with all our lives' strength. Evil can be won only through good, hatred through love, injustice through justice and forgiveness.

The Catholic Church of Kossovo, together with other Albanians, especially with young people and with the world of culture, have started, inspired and supported three great actions that have now grown up in popular movements.

* Albanians call their land Shqiperia (Land of Eagles) and themselves Shqipetari (people of the Land of Eagles). The term "Albanian" comes from the Illyrian tribe of Albanoi, of whom the geographer Ptolemy (II century after christ) has talked.

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