File spoon-archives/marxism-thaxis.archive/marxism-thaxis_1998/marxism-thaxis.9803, message 303


Date: Wed, 11 Mar 1998 20:45:01 +0100
From: Hugh Rodwell <m-14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se>
Subject: M-TH: Burying the dead -- still a live issue in Kosova


The arrogance and brutality of the Serb chauvinist thugs -- already
revealed in complete clarity in Bosnia, with systematic mass rape, torture
and murder of Muslims and other opponents -- is repeating itself in Kosova.

In the light of our discussions of Greek drama on the list we can link some
of the actions and implications thousands of years back to the conflict
between an arrogant state represented by Kleon and family rights
represented by Antigone.

This area of Europe has a fanatical attachment to family honour, vendetta,
blood feuds and so on. In neighbouring Macedonia there are still festivals
in honour of the dead where the family gathers on the grave and eats in
ritual nourishment of the dead. I know this very well because a friend I
made on a bus trip back from Belgrade to Stockholm -- a young, handsome,
well-built, curly-headed Swedish DJ -- told me about his adventures in
Bitola. Everyone went to the graveyard with picnic baskets, and there was
intense competition among the matrons to get him to join their group so
they could stuff him with goodies. Why? He was a proxy for the dead -- his
health and appetite were imparted to the shades.

So what do the Milosevic' butchers do? They throw the bodies of their
victims in plastic sacks into a shed -- men, women and children -- and tell
the villagers that if they don't claim the dead and bury them at once
they'll dump them in a mass grave. Now the living have two reasons to hate
the butchers for this. One is the risk of arrest on claiming the bodies, as
everyone is insolently inspected by the goons. The other is the wish for an
impartial post mortem to be performed on the bodies so that justice can be
wreaked on the perpetrators of the massacre.

Who gets to dispose of the bodies as they think fit??

Today's version of Antigone comes to us courtesy of Greater Serb
nationalism in the true master race tradition.

Stop the killing!
Serbian troops out!
No imperialist involvement -- No EU, No UN, No NATO!
Full national rights for Kosova!
For a constitutional assembly!



Hugh






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