Foreword
My plan was to do a professional job as a journalist, but the past came too close in February 2011 when I met Serbian asylum seekers being returned by Norway in September 2010. The sisters Labuda, Ana and Marija Maslovarić and their families had to leave Kosovo in 1999, and it was our responsibility to protect them against revenge from the Albanians. But we failed, we failed miserably.

When I was alone in my apartment in Belgrade after returning from the refugee camp where the sisters Maslovarić reside, I started to feel a heavy personal responsibility and guilt. I started to cry and I got a reaction, a posttraumatic reaction. It wasn’t like my life was about to break down, but it was a starting signal for me to act. For a long time I have felt a sense of collective responsibility for not being able to protect Kosovo’s minorities but meeting the Maslovarić families made it more personal. This was something my government was directly responsible for.

The result is the book you are holding in your hand now. My hope is that Norwegian and Western politicians reflect more on the enormous moral responsibility of going to war.

My claim is that politicians often do not understand the consequences of going to war, and in this book I will take a closer look at the war rhetoric and the media dynamic before going to war. In the case of Yugoslavia, the media were very one-sided, and they did all they could to portray Slobodan Milošević in the worse possible light.

On March 24, 2011, 12 years after NATO went to war against Yugoslavia, I apologized to the Serbian people on national TV as a former NATO officer because we were not able to protect the minorities in Kosovo. Most Serbian newspapers wrote about this and also the TV station Pink.

In 1999, my country Norway and the NATO alliance went to war against Yugoslavia because they refused to sign the Rambouillet Agreement, and in January 2000 the Norwegian government sent me to Kosovo as an army major to represent the NATO-led KFOR peace keeping force as a press officer from January to July 2000.

Although I do not have any formal education as an officer, I got the rank of an army major because of my press background. The status of an officer is not important in this context, but the point is that Norway sent me to Kosovo to represent KFOR and NATO.

Of course there were reasons for the NATO bombing, but I do not know one single country that would accept the Rambouillet Agreement. According to this agreement, NATO would occupy the entire territory of Yugoslavia, air, sea and land and the free use of airports, harbors and roads without compensation or criminal responsibility. Later on in this book, I will take a closer look at the Rambouillet Agreement.

On June 12 1999, the international community took responsibility for Kosovo according to the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244 and the Military Technical Agreement. Our job was to protect Serbs and non-Albanians from repercussions from the Albanians, but our mission failed.

Under our watch, 250,000 Serbs and non-Albanians were ethnically cleansed from Kosovo. Of course I do not defend the ethnic cleansing of 800,000 Albanians during the NATO bombing, but the Yugoslav government, not NATO, was responsible for this. However, it is not clear to what extent Albanian leaders influenced their own people to seek refuge in Albania and Macedonia to make the bombing continue.

In my view, we made two main errors in KFOR:

1. We should have enforced martial law from the first day we came to Kosovo on June 12 1999. Then there would be no question that we were in charge. Anyone out after dark would be arrested and put in a camp with barbed wire around for a week or two, regardless if it was a Serb, Albanian or something else. We were too concerned about playing the role as liberators for the Albanians.
2. We were too cowardly when we allowed the Kosovo Liberation Army (UÇK) to transform into the Kosovo Protection Corps and later Kosovo Police Service in Аugust 1999. Thus, the criminal elements from UÇK were legitimized into the governing structures in Kosovo. The Serbian government has outlined this very well in the Whitepaper on organized crime and terrorism in Kosovo and Metohija. Among officers in KFOR, there were many who didn’t like this, but we made this choice to protect our own forces from attack from the Albanian extremists.

Before I went to Kosovo, I spent a lot of time at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs to study the conditions in Kosovo, and I was therefore prepared for an area where Albanian organized crime was rampant with trafficking of narcotics and people. Still, I was not prepared for the realities on the ground, and while I was working in KFOR, I was not aware that we did not do our job.

I hope to raise a debate in Norway and other NATO countries about the heavy moral responsibility of going to war. Can I change something? I don’t know, but I will try.

As a former NATO officer, I would like to offer my apology to the Serbian people for not being able to protect the minorities in Kosovo.

Preliminary table of contents

1. A closer look at the Rambouillet agreement, especially the last part, Appendix B: Status of Multi-National Military Implementation Force with very harsh conditions for the NATO operation where Yugoslavia would have to accept the unlimited use of airports, ports roads without criminal responsibility or compensation. We basically gave Yugoslavia the option of being occupied or bombed.
2. The current Norwegian Defense Minister Espen Barth Eide was one of those most critical to the NATO bombing in 1999 as a senior scientist at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. I have an interview with Barth Eide where he says that Rambouillet was not sufficient reason to go to war.
3. Former Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik was responsible for starting Norway’s first war without authorization from the UN since Norway-Denmark went to war against Sweden in the Theater War in 1788. After he finished his term as a politician, Bondevik is now leading the Oslo Center for Peace and Human Rights. One should think that a professional peacemaker would be able to give good reflections after starting a war, but he still maintains that war was the only possible option. After my interview with Bondevik, he still maintains that there were ethnic cleansing before we went to war, but he was not willing or able to give me the references for this.
4. Former Foreign Minister Knut Vollebæk was also the head of the OSCE when NATO went to war against Yugoslavia. He says this book raises very important issues, and he has agreed to an interview. It would be interesting to get his perspectives on the Kosovo Verification Mission and how much intelligence agents were involved in the mission.
5. The current Norwegian Ambassador to Kosovo Jan Braathu was representing the OSCE leadership in the Rambouillet talks. However, when I talked to Braathu, he gave Yugoslavia the sole responsibility for the breakdown of the talks, and he did not agree that the terms in Rambouillet were too harsh. He said that the use if Yugoslav infrastructure was just of technical nature and not an occupation, and he claimed that this was a similar deal accepted by Albania and Macedonia. The difference, however, is that Albania and Macedonia never had the threat of bombing before the deployment of NATO forces.
6. Former Defense Minister Eldbjørg Løwer had only been the defense minister for one week when we started the war on March 24, 1999. It was a difficult decision for her to lead Norway into a war, and in her written reply, she also speaks about the need to prevent ethnic cleansing and genocide. However, our bombing escalated the ethnic cleansing, and there was never any genocide in Kosovo.
7. An analysis of the one-sided media coverage of Kosovo based on a thesis by journalism professor Rune Ottosen at Oslo University College.
8. The UN, NATO, and International Law After Kosovo. The renowned Rights Quarterly published a critical analysis of NATO’s decision to go to war without UN authorization.
9. A closer look at A perfect failure, NATOs war against Yugoslavia published on JSTOR, a not–for–profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive of over one thousand academic journals and other scholarly content.
10. The bombing of Serbia’s national TV station RTS on April 16, 1999 where 16 civilian workers were killed. Post doctor Terje Einarsen at the Faculty of Law at the Unicersity of Bergen thinks the NATO’s intervention was legitimate, but he is critical to the bombing of civilian targets and the treatment of the families of the victims in the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Together with two colleagues, he wrote The NATO bombing case (Bankovic et al. v. Belgium et al.) and the limits of Western human rights protection giving interesting perspectives.
11. Experiences and impressions from my time in KFOR from January to July 2000. Here I will write about the difference between being an information officer and a journalist. Unconsciously you change your statements because you represent an organization, not yourself. Reading what I wrote as an officer in 2000 has not been a pleasant experience at all, and I had a naïve belief that KFOR and the international community was able to create a well-functioning multinational community in Kosovo.
12. The time as a journalist in a region full of conflicts after I was finished in KFOR. I will write about how I experienced Feb. 16, 2001. Then I was present and saw the results of an Albanian IED outside Podujevo, killing 11 Serbs, including a two year old boy in a bus headed for the Serbian enclaves. I got lots of stories from this time, and I gained operational experience receiving fire from mortars, artillery and snipers. There is a thin line between bravery and stupidity, and sometimes I’ve crossed over.
13. Peć 2005. Visiting two apartments and a fire ruin. Since 2001, I’ve known Sandra Popović Nadaždin and her husband Siniša to whom I was the best man in 2007. Sandra and her family had to run away from Peć in 1999, and her grandfather is one of the missing Serbs from Kosovo. In Peć I was talking to the Albanians currently occupying their apartments.
14. Reactions from former KFOR colleagues and reserve officer attacking me because I am not an officer. Here I am using quotes from Sveinung Larsen and Jørgen Fodstad ho has posted public statements on my Facebook profile.
15. I cannot demand forgiveness. Anonymous reactions from nationalistic Serbs asking me to get back to Norway or to die a “glorious” death in Afghanistan. I have also been compared to the Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik because we both like to kill innocent people.
16. Interview with Norwegian soldiers with a task of protecting Serbs and non-Albanians.
17. Interview with Serbs and non-Albanians who had to flee from the Norwegian area or responsibility.
18. Oliver Ivanović, the Serbian state secretary for Kosovo is a good resource with a very good overview of the links between organized crime and the present Albanian leadership in Kosovo. A statement is available on YouTube (an interview I did in Serbian).
19. Quotes and summary of the Serbian whitepaper on terrorism and organized crime in Kosovo & Metohija. One example from this whitepaper could be Barry Fletcher, an American police officer and spokesman for the UN police UNMIK Police. Fletcher was one of my colleagues when I was working in KFOR, and he said for instants the following: “Whenever we arrest a gang leader, he wraps himself up into an Albanian flag and the streets become flooded with demonstrations. This is not a society affected by organized crime, but a society founded on organized crime.” However, my aim is not that the book becomes a one-sided Serbian propaganda book.
20. An analysis of the flourishing of crime in Kosovo as a result of the unclear legal status for Kosovo. Here I have good contact with professional Serbian criminals that could give an interesting perspective.
21. Recognition of Kosovo in 2008. What was the reasoning for Norway to recognize Kosovo? Why was it in Norway’s interest to recognize Kosovo? What are the long term consequences of recognizing Kosovo as an independent state?
22. Change of practice (document in Norwegian) for Serbian asylum seekers. After Norway recognized Kosovo, they changed their practice for Serbian asylum seekers from Kosovo. I have quotes from the press spokesman in the ministry of Justice and the Norwegian immigration authority. The Serbian asylum seekers were not returned to Kosovo but to Belgrade. I do not claim that Serbs from Kosovo should be granted political asylum, but Norway should be more flexible in creating a good future for these people in Serbia and Montenegro.
23. Norwegian Peoples Aid and Amnesty International support the extradition of the Serbian asylum seekers at the same time as they are supporting Madina Salamova who lived illegally in Norway for many years under false identity. I have quotes from both organizations where I am asking them if they think Norway has a moral responsibility for the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo.
24. Epilogue. Libya. We went to war against Libya with about 50,000 people killed in this war. There did not seem to be a clear objective in this war. Espen Barth Eide warned against Western involvement before warned against Western involvement before we decided to go to war in Libya, but now he has modified his statements somewhat.
25. References with link to a web page with clickable references.
26. Index

Мој план је био да се бавим професионални послом новинара, али ме  је прошлост стигла фебруара 2011. године у сусрету са српским азилантима које је Норвешка вратила септембра 2010. године.  Сестре Лабуда, Ана и Марија Масловарић са њиховим фамилијама су морале да побегну са Косова 1999.е године, а наш је посао (посао НАТО-а) био да их заштитимо од одмазде Албанаца, али ми смо отказали, тотално отказали.

Када сам после посете избегличком логору у коме сестре Масловарић живе, остао сам у свом стану у Београду, почео сам да осећам тешку личну одговорност и кривицу. Плакао сам и доживео интензивну психичку реакцију, једну пострауматску реакцију. Није било тако да се све срушило око мене, али то је био стартни хитац да делујем.

Резултат је ова књига коју држите у рукама. Моја нада је да ће норвешки и западни политичари који читају ову књигу у вишем степену да рефлектирају о огромној моралној одговорности коју  имају започињањем рата. Моја тврдња је да политичари не разумеју последице својих одлука и ова књига зато улази дубоко у ратну реторику и медијску динамику која претходи  свакоме рату.

Медији су били јако једнострани и сви су се трудили да представе вођу Југославије, Слободана Милошевића у најнегативнијем светлу. Западне владе су морале да оправдају рат и сва средства су стављена у употребу.

24. марта 1999. ушли су Норвешка и НАТО у рат противу Југославије пошто она није пристала да потпише Договор у Рамбујеу (Rambouillet). Јануара 2000 Норвешка влада ме шаље на Косово као мајора – официра информација да бих представљао КФОР, односно НАТО-ове јединице за очување мира. Ја нисам професионални официр са војним образовањем, али сам одмах био унапређен  као мајор због мог образовања као новинар. Чин официра је небитан у овом склопу, али је поен да је мене норвешка власт послала на Косово да бих представљао НАТО и КФОР.

Наравно да су постојали разлози за бомбардовање Југославије али ја не бих могао да нађем једну једину земљу која би прихватила Договор у Рамбујеу. По њему би НАТО снаге имале слободан приступ ваздуху, мору, водама и копну на читавој територији Југославије.

По Резолуција Савета безбедности ОУН 1244 и на основу војно-техничког уговора наш посао у КФОР би био да заштитимо Србе и не-Албанце од освете Албанске већине, али ми смо отказали, ми смо потпуно отказали.

У току наше одговорности за сигурност  са Косова је етнички очишћено око 250 000 Срба и других не-албанца. Наравно да ја не оправдавам етничко чишћење око 850 000 Албанаца у току НАТО бомбардовања, али за њега је одговорна Југословенска влада, а не НАТО. За сада је јако нејасно у ком степену је албанска герила радила на подстицању својих да побегну од НАТО да би НАТО наставио да бомбардује Југославију. Албанска река избеглица ка Македонији и Албанији је била одлучујућа политичка премиса да се настави бомбардовање.

Ми у КФОР-у смо, према мом мишљењу, направили две кључне грешке:

1. Ми смо требали да уведемо ванредно стање од првог дана када смо добили одговорност над Косовом, још 12. јуна 1999. Тада не би било питање ко одлучује. Свако ко се креће ван означене зоне био би ухапшен и послат у логор са бодљикавом жицом на недљу или две независно о томе да ли се ради о Србима, Албанцима или некој другој националној мањини. Ми смо били превише обузети играњем улоге ослободиоца Албанаца.
2. Ми смо били кукавице када смо дозволили да се Ослободилачка војска Косова (УЧК) претвори у Заштитини корпус Косова у септембру 1999 и касније у Косовску Полицију. На тај начин су криминални елементи добили легитимни статус у Косовским институцијама. Српска влада је то обрадила јако добро у једном извештају из 2003. Међу КФОР официрима је било много оних који то нису волели, али је такав избор начињен да би нас осигурао од напада Албанских есктермиста.

Пре него што сам отишао на Косово, ја сам напустио свој посао да бих студирао односе на Косову па сам провео много времена у НУПИ, Норвешки институт за међународне послове. Зато сам био припремљен да се нађем у области где  влада  организовани криминал. Ипак, нисам био довољно припремљен за реалност на терену, а док сам радио у КФОР, нисам био свестан тога да ми уствари нисмо радили свој посао. Због свега тога нисам касније мање осећао кривицу да ми нисмо били у стању да заштитимо мањине на Косову.

Септембра 2010 су  Норвешке власти послале натраг 70 Срба са Косова који су тражили азил. Норвешка је признала Косово као независну државу 2008, и исте године је влада променила своју праксу тако да Косовски Срби нису више имали право на заштиту. Срамота је да Норвешка на такав начин поступа према Косовским Србима. Ми смо направили проблем избеглиштва и онда се овако понашамо према избеглицама.

Као бивши НАТО официр, желим да се извиним народу Србије јер нисмо били у стању да заштитимо мањине на Косову.

___________________________________________
Привремени садржај, Бивши НАТО официр се извињава

1. Анализа једностраног медијског покривања рата на Косову базираног на докторској дисертацији професора журналистике  на Вишој школи у Ослу, Руне Отосен-а (Rune Ottosen).
2. Еспен Барт Еиде (Espen Barth Eide) је као НУПИ,  Norwegian Institute of International Affairs) истраживач био међу најкритичнијима према НАТО бомбардовању 1999 и ја ћу да цитирам његове тим поводом дате изјаве у медијима. Овде ћу да цитирам шта су он и Тор Танке Холм писали о Косову 1998 и 99 о мафија криминалитету.
3. Ћел Магне Бондевик (Kjell Magne Bondevik) је као премијер  Норвешке био главно командујући  за започињање првог Норвешког рата после Другог светског рата, и ја желим да се ближе упознам са процесом одлучивања да бих добио свар, да ли су они стварно читали уговор из Рамбујеа (Rambouillet) пре него што је рат започео. Норвешка је ушла у рат. Да ли је сматрано да је прихватљиво да Југославија прихвати НАТО окупацију?
4. Ближи увид у Рамбује-уговор, посебно онај у полсдњем делу Appendix B: Status of Multi-National Military Implementation Force (Статус Мултинационалних имплементираних снага) који поставља јако строге услове за НАТО операцију у Југославији.
5. The UN, NATO, and International Law After Kosovo. (Уједињене Нације, НАТО и интернационално право на Косову после НАТО-а). Реномирани Human Rights Quarterly је фебруара 2000 публиковао једну критичну анализу о НАТО-овом процесу одлучивања да иде у рат без дозволе Уједињених нација.
6. Може да буде актуелно цитирање из A perfect failure, NATOs war against Yugoslavia (Перфектне грешке, НАТО-ов рат противу Југослвије), које је публиковао на JSTOR (a not–for–profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive of over one thousand academic journals and other scholarly content.) једном непрофитном сервису за помоћ школама, истраживачима и студентима за рад  и употребу на шириком и свеобухватном садржају електронских архива у преко хиљаду академских часописа и у другом школском материјалу.)
7. Руска амбасада у Београду је спремна да помогне на прикупљању материјала од  стране Руских истраживача и официјелне Руске документе који дају Руску перспективу о томе шта се десило на Косову. То ће бити јако важна корекција норвешких медија.
8. Доживљаји и моји утисци из мог времена у КФОР-у од јанура до јула месеца 2000. Овде бих да пишем како је то радити као радник на информисању и новинар и како се несвесно мењу твоја лична мишљења зато што представљаш једну организацију, а не себе самог.
9. Време као новинар у региону конфликта пошто сам завршио са радом у КФОР. Описаћу и како сам доживео 16. фебруар 2001 када сам  присуствовао резултатима једне албанске бомбе у аутобусу испред Подујева која је убила 11 Срба, укључујући и дечака од 2 године. Не знам колико је актуелно цитирати из чланка које сам ја писао у то време, али имам много историја које сматрам да су интересантне. Као војник нисам имао никакво оперативно искуство, али као новинар сам био испред бацача бомби,  артиљерије и снајпера.  Танка је линија између глупости и херојства и понекад сам прелазио ову линију.
10. Пећ 2005. Посета у два стана и једном плацу који су изгорели до темеља. Од 2001 сам познавао Сандру Поповић Надаждин и супруга Синишу којима сам ја био кум 2007. Сандра и фамилија су морали да побегну из Пећи 1999 и њен деда се још увек води као нестао. У Пећи сам разговарао са Албаницима који сада живе у њиховом стану.
11. Реакције ранијих колега и резервних официра који ме нападају јер нисам школовани официр. Овде ћу да користим цитате Свеинунг Ларсен-а (Sveinung Larsen) и Јорген Фодстад-а (Jørgen Fodstad) који су своје коментаре поставили на моју фејсбук страницу.
12. Ја не могу да тражим опроштај. Анонимне реакције Српских националиста који ме шаљу претње
    • Врати се одакле си дошао норвешки мајмуне/ кретену!
    • Гони се одавде ништаријо!
    • Покупи се и врати се у своју Норвешку селендру из које си дошао!
    • или иди у Авганистан да браниш Норвешку са својим друговима и да часно умреш што пре то боље!
    • А да смо ми на твом месту не би ишли у страну земљу да помажемо етничко чишћење. Неко ко је признао да је помагао злочине, захтева поштовање – стварно јадно, теби је место у затвору са осталим злочинцима!
13. Интервју са норвешким војницима који су имали за задатак да заштите Србе.
14. Интервју са Србима који су морали да побегну са норвешке зоне одговорности.
15. Оливер Ивановић, државни секретар за Косово је   способна особа са добрим прегледом повезаности између орагинозованог криминала и данашњег албанског руководства на Косову. Изјава је приступачна на ЈуТјуб
16. Цитати из српске Беле књиге Албански тероризам и организовани криминал на Косову и Метохији. Један од примера из ове Беле књиге може да Бери Флетчер (Barry Fletcher), амерички полицајац и предствник за штампу за УН и полицију УНМИК Полиција са којим сам радио заједно у КФОР. Он је рекао између осталог и следеће: Кад год смо ухапсили неког вођу банде, он се увијао у албанску заставу и улице су биле преплављене демонстрантима. То није друштво нападнуто од стране организованог криминала, то је друштво засновано на криминалитету.
17. Анализа расцветалог криминалитета на Косову као резултат нејасног статуса. Овде имам добре контакте са српским криминалцима који имају интересантне перспективе.
18. Признавање Косова 2008. Шта је била основа за Норвешко признавање Косова? Шта су дуготрајне последице признавања Косова као државе?
19. Промена праксе за српске избеглице. Пошто је Норвешка признала Косово, промењена је пракса за српске избеглице са Косова. Цитати атешеа за штампу Норвешког Министартства Спољних посолова и Министарства за правду. Српске избеглице нису послате на Косово него у Београд.
20. Норвешка Народна Помоћ и Амнести интернешнал подржавају слање српских азиланата истовремено када подржавају кампању  подршке Mадини Саламовој која је живела под лажним идентитетом у Норвешкој. Имам цитате обеју организација где им постављам питање шта мисле о норвешкој моралној одговорности за етничко чишћење Срба и других не Албанаца са Косова.
21. Завршна реч. Либија. Не изгледа да су западни политичари нешто научили. Ушли смо у рат без јасног циља. Цивили умиру. Еспен Барт Еиде је упозорио противу западног мешања у Либију, али је касније променио курс.
22. Референце са  везама на интернет страницама које се могу наћи ”online”.
23. Индекс

I was present in trial, and I was quite puzzled by the public prosecutor Vera Stanić. She was very passive, and she did not have many questions for the defendants or the witnesses. SMS messages from mobile phones were central evidences for the prosecution, but I was very surprised when Stanić did not challenge Obradović when he provided documentation of the activity in court. The judge asked her if she had any questions, but she declined. The prosecution had seven months to prepare this trial, and I was surprised by they passivity.

In addition to the video, you can also see photos.

By Kristian Kahrs, former NATO officer

In 1999, my country Norway and the NATO alliance went to war against Yugoslavia, and in January 2000 the Norwegian government sent me to Kosovo as an army major to represent KFOR as a press officer.

Of course there were reasons for the NATO bombing, but I do not know one single country that would accept the Rambouillet Agreement. However, I cannot take responsibility for the bombing because I was not a part of NATO at that time.

Our job in KFOR, according to the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244 and the Military Technical Agreement was to protect Serbs and non-Albanians from repercussions from the Albanians, but we failed, we failed miserably.

Under our watch, 250,000 Serbs and non-Albanians were ethnically cleansed from Kosovo. Of course I do not defend the ethnic cleansing of 800,000 Albanians during the NATO bombing, but the Yugoslav government, not NATO, was responsible for this. However, it is not clear to what extent Albanian leaders influenced their own people to seek refuge in Albania and Macedonia to make the bombing continue.

In my view, we made two main errors in KFOR:

1. We should have enforced martial law from the first day we came to Kosovo on June 12 1999. Then there would be no question that we were in charge. Anyone out after dark would be arrested and put in a camp with barbed wire around for a week or two, regardless if it was a Serb, Albanian or something else. We were too concerned about playing the role as liberators for the Albanians.
2. We were too cowardly when we allowed the Kosovo Liberation Army (UÇK) to transform into the Kosovo Protection Corps and later Kosovo Police Service in Аugust 1999. Thus, the criminal elements from UÇK were legitimized into the governing structures in Kosovo. The Serbian government has outlined this very well in the Whitepaper on organized crime and terrorism in Kosovo and Metohija. Among officers in KFOR, there were many who didn’t like this, but we made this choice to protect our own forces from attack from the Albanian extremists.

Me in front of the bombed defense ministry and chief of staff in Belgrade. Photo by Boško Karanović, Press.

Before I went to Kosovo, I quit my job to study the conditions in Kosovo, and I was therefore prepared for an area where Albanian organized crime was rampant. Still, I was not prepared for the realities on the ground, and while I was working in KFOR, I was not aware that we did not do our job.

However, for a long time I have felt a sense of collective responsibility for not being able to protect Kosovo’s minorities. In September 2010, Norway sent back 70 Kosovo Serb refugees who had applied for political asylum. Norway recognized Kosovo as a separate state in 2008, and now I am ashamed that the Norwegian government is sending the Kosovo Serbs back to Belgrade. We created the refugee problem, and this is how we are dealing with it.

After I met some of these Kosovo refugees (Norwegian text) in the refugee camp in Resnik close to Rakovica, Belgrade as a journalist, I also got a strong personal reaction. I am not talking about posttraumatic stress disorder, but I felt a sense of personal responsibility, and I cried. But my personal reaction can also be used for something good. I hope to raise a debate in Norway and other NATO countries about the heavy moral responsibility of going to war. Can I change something? I don’t know, but I will try.

As a former NATO officer, I would like to offer my apology to the Serbian people for not being able to protect the minorities in Kosovo.

Kristian Kahrs is a Norwegian journalist and business adviser, living and working in Belgrade, and he was serving in KFOR from January to July 2000. More about Kahrs on his webpage serbtrade.no and facebook.com/kahrs

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