June 7^th 1999

Kosovo as an integral part of Serbia

Claire, bigpond.com

    Q: Why does Serbia view Kosovo as being an integral part of Yugoslavia when...1) the federal Republic of Yugoslavia is, or was an artificial state fashioned out of a number of countries, including Serbia

    You made big mistake in your question. Kosovo is not only integral part of Yugoslavia, it is an integral part of Serbia too.Socialistic federal republic of Yugoslavia formed in 1945 by a comunist, was federation of six republic:Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegivina,Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia. In 1990-1991 Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Macedonia became an independent states. In 1992 ,Serbia and Montenegro ( not Kosovo) formed Federal Republic of Yugoslavia(FRY), and it still exists at list formally, just Serbia or Montenegro can leave FRY becouse they are conctitutional federal units (Kosovo isn't) of Yugoslavia.

    Q: according to a history...the Serbian army lost the medieval battle that was fought against the invading Ottoman empire, so how can Serbia claim that it belongs to them when it was lost a few hundred years ago?

    Yes, Serbian army had lost that battle and whole Serbia including Kosovo was occupayed by Turks,about four hundred years later in 1830 Serbia started to fight for it indenpendence. One by one all parts of Serbia had been liberated since 1913. Among them, Kosovo become free in 1912. At that time Serbs were major population of Kosovo, but after 1960 lot of Albanian immigrants came from Albania to Kosovo, since than lot of Serbs becouse of various kinds of pressure made by Albanians left Kosovo and move to central Serbia.