yugoslavias implosion

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ChApter 3
inter-nationality relations,” any incident from the domain of “classic
crime” assumes a special significance. It warned that any ethnic
crime treated as a political act and a manifestation of national
hatred, if given publicity (as was the practice and strategy at the
time), could frighten the people of Kosovo and that the “conspicuous
tendency for classic criminality to be experienced, and even treated,
as political is in itself a ‘pathological’ phenomenon which corroborates
the Commission’s thesis about the relationship in Kosovo being
one of longstanding exclusion and domination.” 351 However, the
report failed to attract public attention in Serbia.
There was at least one other attempt to come to terms with the
Kosovo question. Professor Branko Horvat of Zagreb wrote Kosovsko
pitanje (The Kosovo Question) in which he sought to consider every
aspect of the problem, but his idea of encouraging a nationwide dialogue
on Kosovo was not well received.
KOSOVO’S AUTONOMY IS ABOLISHED
The drama intensified during the preparation of the new Serbian
Constitution that would, when promulgated in 1990, abolish the
autonomy of Kosovo and Vojvodina under the slogan “tripartite Serbia
will be one again.” Slobodan Milošević was determined to press
ahead with this policy and he could count on considerable popular
support. The extent to which ordinary Serbs embraced this idea
was illustrated by a 1988 rally in New Belgrade attended by one million
people. Milošević also enjoyed strong support among the political
and intellectual elite in Serbia. In the fall of 1989, Politika launched
a column entitled “Odjeci i reagovanja” (“Repercussions and Reactions”)
as a forum for discussing the issues raised in the Memorandum,
including the demands for amending the 1974 Constitution
and the alleged genocide against Serbs and Montenegrins in Kosovo.
The column provided evidence of the extent to which the media
351 Ibid. p . 47 .