Volume 46, Number 10 · June 10, 1999
Kosovo and the End of the Nation-State
By Václav Havel
The following is the address given by President Václav Havel to the Canadian Senate and the House of Commons in Ottawa on April 29. The NATO bombing of Yugoslavia was then in its sixth week. The Czech Republic, along with Poland and Hungary, had recently become members of the alliance, but in Prague, the bombing was not popular: according to recent polls, only 35 percent of the population supported it. The Czech prime minister, Miloš Zeman, compared the conflict to 'cavemen throwing rocks' and asked whether the Czech Republic had joined NATO to protect itself from Yugoslavia. Moreover, the Czech government was vacillating on sending ground troops to the Balkans. Havel publicly called his government's lack of commitment 'an embarrassment.'
Feature, 3034 words
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