Hate Speech in the Balkans
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This publication was supported by the Austrian Federal Chancellery (BKA) from Funds for Cooperation with Central and Eastern European Countries. This project was made possible with grants from: PHARE Democracy Programme of the European Commission; European Commission Program to Support Democracy and the Peace Process in the Republics of the Former Yugoslavia. The Council of Europe contributed funding to this project in Albania and Croatia. The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) contributed to the project in Slovenia. The Open Society Institute (OSI) supported the participation of Greek Helsinki Monitor in this project. Copies available from: The International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights Rummelhardtgasse 2/18, 1090 Vienna, Austria Tel: (+43-1) 402-73-87 or 408-88-22; Fax: (+43-1) 408-74-44 E-mail: [email protected] -and- Greek Helsinki Monitor P.O.Box 51393, GR-14510 Kifisia, Greece Tel: (+30-1) 620-01-20; Fax: (+30-1) 807-57-67 E-mail: [email protected] This publication is also available in the web site http://www.greekhelsinki.gr ISBN: 960-86206-0-0 © 1998 by the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) All rights reserved a b mariana lenkova editor hate speech in the balkans The International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) ETEPE 1 2 table of contents Preface Aaron Rhodes ................................................................................................. 5 Part I : General Presentation ....................................................................................... 7 Introduction Panayote Elias Dimitras ........................................................................... 8 Hate Speech: (Re)Producing the Opposition Between the National Self and the Others Nafsika Papanikolatos ....................................................................... 10 Part II : Summaries of National Reports Mariana Lenkova ............................................ 29 Reporting on the Monitoring of Hate Speech in the Balkan Region ............................ 30 Albania ....................................................................................................................... 31 Bosnia ......................................................................................................................... 35 Bulgaria ...................................................................................................................... 36 Croatia ........................................................................................................................ 39 Greece ........................................................................................................................ 43 Special Section: The Imia/Kardak story ........................................................................ 65 ñ The Apotheosis of Hate Speech: The Near-Success of (Greek and Turkish) Media in Launching War Panayote Elias Dimitras ................................................... 65 ñ The Greek-Turkish Imia/Kardak Crisis in Dates Vasiliki Neofotistos ..................... 69 ñ The Greek Media on the Imia/Kardak Conflict Vasiliki Neofotistos .......................... 71 ñ The Turkish Media on the Imia/Kardak Conflict Ferhat Kentel ................................ 77 Kosovo ....................................................................................................................... 81 Macedonia .................................................................................................................. 84 Montenegro ................................................................................................................ 86 Romania ..................................................................................................................... 88 Serbia ......................................................................................................................... 96 Slovenia ...................................................................................................................... 108 Appendices ................................................................................................................. 109 Media Monitored ....................................................................................................... 110 The Media Scene in the Balkans in 1995 Mariana Lenkova ........................................... 116 Contributors to this Volume ....................................................................................... 124 Contributors to the Project Media Freedoms and Hate Speech in the Balkans 1995-6 ......................................... 125 3 4 preface The role of the media -a common concern of media in the West- is not yet well-explored although shamefully abused in post-totalitarian societies, some of which are still less post than totalitarian. But given especially the well-documented relationship between ethnically-motivated slaughter in the Former Yugoslavia and media propaganda, e.g. by Mark Thompson in Forging War (London: Article 19;1994), the topic has become an important one to human rights organizations like the IHF that seek not only to report on human rights violations but also to promote, at the local level, the political and moral values that support the respect for human rights. The notion of a transnational media-monitoring project based in the Balkan Helsinki Committees, focusing on the problem of hate speech, emerged in the IHF Secretariat in 1993, thanks largely to the efforts of Liselotte Leicht. It took considerable time to develop it fully and to put together a funding structure that would allow us to support this work in eleven different countries or provinces. The IHF is deeply grateful to those sponsors, which include the PHARE Democracy Programme of the European Commission; the EUs program to Support Democracy and the Peace Process in the Republics of the Former Yugoslavia; the Council of Europe; the Austrian Federal Chancellors Office (which made possible the publication of this volume); and the United States Institute of Peace. The Greek project partner was supported by a grant from the Open Society Institute (OSI). We are also grateful to the Helsinki Committees and other NGOs that took part, and especially to the colleagues in Greek Helsinki Monitor who took on the challenging task of distilling the national reports and analyzing their contents, and writing this report. I also wish to acknowledge with thanks the efforts of Therese Nelson, whose portfolio as Legal Counsel included management of the project; Dardan Gashi, who assisted as a Consultant, and Sylvia Hordosch. In the latter phases of the project, Brigitte Dufour, Legal Counsel; Jennifer Lincoln-Lewis, Researcher; and David Theil, Financial Officer have all worked hard to administer this complicated project. While our reason for organizing this project was to generate documentation by giving civil human rights organizations the means and a framework within which to monitor hate speech in the media, our ultimate goal is more ambitious. The result of our work is more than a record of hate speech. It is a mirror reflecting the kinds of ideas and feelings that are expressed in hate speech, and their cultural and historical context. Although translated into and thus in a sense homogenized into the English language, this report conveys the taste, the texture, the interior moods of the language that incites racial and ethnic violence, the rejection of international human rights standards, and contributes to violations of human rights in the Balkans. In constructing this mirror, which is of course not a large or perfect one, we invite not only our colleagues in the Balkan media but all members of our societies to take a hard look. Hate speech in the media inspires ethnic hatred and prejudice, but also feeds upon their presence among the population, the media market. If the consumers of the media reject hate speech, it will recede. If professional journalists distinguish between fact and opinion, and indeed act professionally by rejecting the role of conduits for nationalistic hate speech, human rights and peace will have a better chance everywhere. Aaron Rhodes Executive Director International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights 5 6 part I general presentation panayote elias dimitras nafsika papanikolatos 7 general presentation Introduction formation in the region (early 19th century) to this very day, there has been an almost The wars of the 1990s in the former systematic will to refuse the existence of Yugoslav republics shook European public the neighbor nation in the Balkan opinion. It was thought that, since World peninsula. The Illyrianist movement in its War II, only third world countries and/or Pan-Croatian form (19th century) authoritarian regimes were barbaric considered all Southern Slavs as Croats. It enough to resort to violence to solve their was reciprocated (in the 20th century) by a problems; European countries were denial of the existence of separate Croat thought to be exempt from such savagery. and Slovene identities by Pan-Serbian Then came the Yugoslav crisis, and the nationalists like the inter-war Radicals. West woke up to a dreadful reality. Likewise, the Bulgarian distinct nation was challenged by Croats, Serbs and Greeks. Not only was war used to (re)define the Serbian nationalism also considered post-Yugoslav configuration of that part of Albanians lost Serbs, who had become Southeastern Europe; it was supplemented savages, and their nationalism was the by atrocities