Pro-European PES and the Bow to the Time of Evil: The Case of Revoking the Award to Criminal Radovan Karadžić

Written by: Nevena Kovačević

Everything you need to know about the orientation of the Europe Now Movement was said last night at the session of the Bijelo Polje Municipal Assembly.

Although the Mayor of Berane last week called the civic state a state of constituent peoples, and that statement was promptly shared on the official party X account, MP in the Parliament of Montenegro and councilor in the Bijelo Polje Municipal Assembly, Jelenka Andrić, still managed to hit rock bottom.

The award to Karadžić, Andrić said, is a testament to a time. Absolutely – a time of brutal murders, rapes, kidnappings, deportations driven by hatred of diversity, by an inhuman urge for ethnic cleansing of the non-Serb population. And all of that for the sake of the same hegemonic project, whatever it was called and whoever its ideologues, protagonists, and exponents were for centuries.

It was a time of genocide and the bloodiest crimes in the Balkans. It was a time of madness, ruthlessness, and, so to speak, wild, inhuman instincts for fulfilling Greater Serbian goals. A time of systematic persecution, terror, atrocities, and torture leading to extermination. The consequences of that time, unfortunately, we still live today, in peacetime conditions.

But, it seems, MP Andrić does not view the time of evil through the same paradigm. She has actually revealed to us that for PES, instead of punishment, it is legitimate to reward criminals. Karadžić, who is the personification of Balkan bloodshed, according to the delusional logic of PES, should be admired, and the time in which he and his comrades committed brutal deeds should be slavishly bowed to. Because everything else is, as we heard, illegal, legally impossible, and so on... But the award for genocide, according to the stance of ignorant politicians, is completely legal and legally grounded.

And they do not care about the shame brought upon the city, the country, the event. After all, who cares about the suffering and ordeal that befell innocent civilians. Clear messages to pro-Serb voters in Montenegro, whom PES, on the brink of extinction, has long been targeting.
The lack of support from DF and Democrats is not even worth commenting on, because the Chetnik duke and the most honorable Bečić have long proven their loyalty to the Chetnik movement. Only PES, on shaky legs, held onto a third-way strategy, which leads nowhere else but into the Chetnik sediment.

Last night's refusal to vote for the initiative to revoke the unjustly awarded prize to a convicted war criminal, sentenced for the most serious crimes, sent a message to the Montenegrin, regional, and European public. Clear, it could not be clearer. Loud, it could not echo louder. This is not a symbolic, but an ideological level.

Spajić equals Mandić and Bečić. PES equals DF and Democrats. The whole is complete. The only question is whether we view it realistically, or as Europe too often does, pragmatically and without deep insight. PES tells us that we should heroize criminals and that instead of deep contempt, with which, for example, the famous Montenegrin writer Jevrem Brković refused the Risto Ratković award, or later one of the most famous regional writers Marko Vešović, and instead of confronting the past, we should nurture memories of criminals with awards.

The question arises – are declarative Europeans imposing on us, under the radar, the narrative that victims are to blame for becoming targets of bloodthirsty executioners and butchers? It is dangerous to absolve those who rampaged in a time of evil, while regional sowers of hatred do not rest, and military parades serve them as events to showcase expensive toys, which are, well, stored, because you never know when they might be needed. It is sad to rhetorically amnesty Balkan bloodletters, while the region and the world passively watch the suffering and pain of the Palestinian population.

Last night's session was also the final test for the self-proclaimed civic-minded individuals, who, as befits them, church-blessed, remain on the wrong side of history. And these are pages that cannot be erased, the proof will be an even more difficult political debacle. Because in the embrace of the Chetniks, there is no other path. And when they defend Karadžić like this, let us not be surprised that the bronze Pavle has again escaped the chair-hungry majority and continued his Berane tour God knows where, under the auspices of the untouchable church.

Finally, for the umpteenth time – a question for the Bosniak Party – do you have an ounce of integrity to leave the Chetnik government, which has humiliated you countless times at the state level, and last night at the local level. The answer, I fear, we already know. All for the sake of positions – even pretending that they believe Spajić is a civic-minded person, Mandić a peacemaker, and Bečić an honorable dispenser of justice.

Unlike them, who are intoxicated by their chairs, PES can no longer deceive anyone who thinks even a little rationally, after its undisguised bow to a war criminal and the ideology of blood and soil.

Nevertheless, thanks to NGOs and civic activists, the civic and anti-fascist Montenegro has clearly opposed fascism and criminal policies, removed another dark stain from its face, and shown that it has the strength and capacity to remain on the right side of history despite the switchmen in power.

And let the rulers deal with their own disgrace. Time is a masterful sieve and will show the centrists where their place is, hopefully, as soon as possible, far from the political pedestal.