And shouldn’t they be grateful to Serbia for letting them in?
The implication is that Albanians, as ungrateful immigrants that they are, cannot possibly take Kosovo from Serbia and become independent.
That Albanians are immigrants to Serbia is a callous lie, aimed at immigrant-weary Westerners. Serbs use every chance they get to ask, for instance, whether the English would allow recent south Asian immigrants to take part of London and turn it into an independent country. The two situations are completely different, however.
While we can argue about medieval or classical times, there is no question that when Serb armies invaded Kosovo in 1912, the territories that are now known as Kosovo had undisputable Albanian majorities. Serbia itself had gained independence from Turkey in 1878, with the help of Russia. Immediately thereafter, Serbia continued on a course of territorial expansion which included the violent occupation of Kosovo in 1912.
For Serbia, expansion in the south was not enough, however, and a Serb terrorist group killed Franz Ferdinand in 1914 and thus started World War 1, which ended in 1918. Many Albanians were killed, and many were forced to leave. Yet, at the end of this painful period, one J.S. Barnes wrote in “The Geographical Journal”:
The Bistritsa of Petsh (Ipek) is the chief tributary of the White Drin, which drains the fertile upland plains on which are situated the cities of Petsh, Dyakova, and Prizren. The whole of the district was excluded from Albania at the London Conference. Yet the Serbs can urge but little right to it, always excepting that of recent conquest and certain ancient historical associations. There is no question as to its overwhelmingly Albanian character…. The Albanian claim to districts beyond these limits is far more valid than the Serbian claim to districts within them. The Kossovo plain is inhabited by a distinct Albanian majority.
Source: http://links.jstor.org
Again, the Albanian majority in Kosovo existed prior to the creation of the Serbian state in 1878. Indeed, ever since Serbia acquired Kosovo in 1912, replacing the Albanian population with Serbs has been the national goal of consecutive Serbian governments. Many Kosovo Serbs are descendants of settlers who were brought in in order to change the ethnic balance of Kosovo. Multiple sources describe this immigration and settling of Serbs in Kosovo. Below is the summary of a paper froma Serb author by the name of Vladan Jovanovic:Settlement of Macedonia, Kosovo and Metohia was a result of both socioeconomicand political needs of non-consolidated Kingdom of SHS/Yugoslavia,whose undisguised national ambitions were vindicated by the ethnic structure ofsettlers (90% Serbs, 10% Croats). The purpose of settling mostly Serbian populationthroughout the regions which had been, starting from the Balkan Wars, subjectedto the Turkish administration, was the intended realization of two objectives:establishing of masses of the poor from underdeveloped parts of the stateand, at the same time, changing the national structure of the district that was beingincreasingly left by both Turks and Albanians. However, the initial enthusiasmsimmered down soon, as the mentally and climatically maladjusted settlers, arrivingto the Southern regions, faced numerous obstacles: inadequate supply, persistingKomita guerilla actions, officials’ tyranny, natives’ dissatisfaction, and thelike. Since the majority of settlers were unskilled farmers, the land property generallygranted to a settling family (some more than eight hectares of non-cultivatedland), was not enough to satisfy their existential necessities. In spite of problemsof updating the persistently fluctuating number of settlers the state administrationwas facing, there were more than 19,508 settler’s families registered in1,078 settlements throughout the so-called Southern Territories in 1940. Togetherwith native families, granted a land themselves as well, the final number of familiesdirectly included in the settlement and land reform processes amounts morethan 48,000, whereby a fifth of the total number of houses built up was funded bythe state. The price of a Rich Kosovo stereotype, and South Slav Heaven andcheep [sic] settlement as well, was paid by the settlers themselves. Their moral wascrucially influenced by bad public security atmosphere, by weakness of the stateadministration and by lack of both continuity and mission spirit. No wonder thatmore than half the total number of settlers got back home by 1928. A social agonywas not dealt with but was only deepened instead, causing numerous far reachingconsequences in both political and economic domains.
Source: Tokovi i ishod medjuratne kolonizacije Makedonija, Kosova i Metohije
