Anti-Military Disposition in Cetinje

Defence or Occupation?

"We cannot but raise our voices and say that Cetinje will not be the site of a split among brethren and a pretext for the beginning of a new fratrecidal war", was the message from the first anti-military citizens' gathering in Montenegro. The old Montenegrin capital was the site of the first major conflict between civilians and members of the Army of Yugoslavia

AIM Podgorica, 26 May, 1999

A few days ago, Cetinje was the centre and scene of the first citizens' unrest because of actions of the Army of Yugoslavia in the ancient town under mount Lovcen. In front of the building of the municipal assembly, a few thousand citizens of Cetinje gathered, carrying banners which read: "This is not a NATO base", "Cetinje will be defended by its citizens", "Army, do not defend us from ourselves", "Montenegro is forever", "We want the smell of lime-trees, not of gun-powder", "Milosevic, keep your hands off this city"... >From the balcony of the municipal building, two girls, a mother and a pensioner addressed the gathered citizens. It was obvious that the organizer of the gathering, the Civil League for Peace, wished to prevent any possible abuse of the gathering for political purposes.

The city at the foot of mount Lovcen, the ancient Montenegrin capital, was disturbed by the arrival of several hundred soldiers of the reserve forces to the city barracks, but also because the barrels of cannons in the surrounding hills were turned towards the city. In the days when the gathering was organized, the Army blocked the road from Cetinje towards Budva. This was sufficient for the citizens to feel under some kind of a siege. Cetinje is the only city in Montenegro and certainly in FR Yugoslavia where it was made clear to military police that it had no business in it. Self-organized groups of young men from Cetinje who ever since the beginning of Milosevic's wars had developed a very keen sensibility aganist all his moves which endanger Montenegrin national and state integrity, intercepted members of military police at the entrance to the city and told them that they would report by their "own free will when Montenegro is threatened".

This was a message with more than one meaning which was obviously not forgotten. During the night new reserve forces were brought in who, at least for the beginning, were expected to warn the people of Cetinje, but also probably the Montenegrin authorioties, whose orders were to be obeyed when official Belgrade proclaimed the state war. Mayor Savo Paraca, in fear of possible incidents, publicly expressed disapproval because the army troops were stationed in the city and declared that his atempts to establish direct contact with colonel Janko Zurica, commander of the military barracks in Cetinje, had failed.

The quiet disapproval from city squares, cafes and homes, was articulated publicly at the mentioned gathering which was given great publicity in Montenegrin and foreign media. "Cetinje is neither the source nor the cause of the tragedy of those in uniform who have come under the pretext that they are protecting us". "Those of you who have children here with you, raise them high so everybody can see that our hands are full of gold, and not weapons", "It is strange that the men in uniform have not gone to protect from fear their own children above whose heads the bombs are actually falling, but they have come to frighten ours" - these were just some of the messages of the gathering in Cetinje. A warning was issued that Cetinje would not be another Sarajevo, nor another Vukovar, that Milosevic was wrong if he believed that Montenegro were like Slavonija or Kosovo. "Many, but primarily malevolent eyes in Montenegro and outside it are fixed on Cetinje and its reaction. We cannot but raise our voices from this place and say that Cetinje will not be the place of brotherly splits and a pretext for the beginning of a fratricidal war. We wish to believe that civilian authorities in Montenegro, in accordance with their statements, have the power to preserve civil peace". Pensioner Milo Dapcevic said that the citizens of Cetinje were patiently waiting for the reaction of the authorities, but "should hopes in the benevolence and intentions of the current authorities be dashed, citizens of Cetinje will find means to protect themselves and their families".

Immediately after the protest, Cetinje was visited by Montenegrin prime minister Filip Vujanovic who declared that objectively there was no need for the army in Cetinje. "As a citizen I understand discontent of the people in Cetinje because of such massive presence of the army with weapons in the streets and deployment of artillery weapons in the vicinity of the city". Barricades of military police on main roads were marked by Vujanovic as "the maximum abuse of the army and usurpation of authority which does not belong to it".

But, protests of the officials from the ranks of Montenegrin authorities are more declaratvive than they reflect actual power and will to resist increasing broadening of the authority of the army and the increasing number of incidents caused by its members. And these range from causing traffic accidents because of drunkenness of its members of the reserve forces to planned and intentional endangering of the lives of Albanian refugees from Kosovo who are seeking refuge in Montenegro.

In Cetinje itself, however, tensions were not relieved even after these public protests. On the contrary. Two days ago, in one of the city cafes, a fight broke out between three young men from Cetinje and four members of the Army of Yugoslavia. Eye-witnesses claim that one of the men from the reserve forces provoked the owner of the cafe and the guests by saying: "You are Ustashe, you look upon us as an occupation army". City police prevented the conflict from turning into a major tragedy. One of the soldiers who wore the coat-of-arms and the insignia of the army of Republika Srpska on his shoulder, ended up at the surgery department of the city hospital, and Montenegrin state television reported that he threatened from the hospital bed that he would be the one who would provoke a civil war in Montenegro.

The words of this irritated soldier perhaps should not be taken too seriously. Because it is clear that such a danger does not really exist if it were not part of a plan devised in Belgrade offices of the highest military commanders who are directly connected with Milosevic. But, there is no doubt that tensions in Montenegro, but especially in Cetinje, have reached a critical point at which it is easy to light the spark with tragic consequences. There have already been many situations, not only in the ancient Montenegrin capital in which members of Montenegrin police loyal to president Djukanovic looked daggers at members of the Army of Yugoslavia loyal to federal authorities and Milosevic. For the first time now, however, it happened that the citizens came into conflict with its uniformed and armed members, which unfortunately cannot be interpreted as an ordinary brawl of quarrelling young men.

In conversation with ordinary citizens of Cetinje, it can be concluded that they do not experience the Army of Yugoslavia as their own. This is not unusual when one knows that Milosevic's policy is partly directed towards full control of Montenegro and its incorporation into the ethnic and state project of "Greater Serbia". NATO bombing is an excellent pretext, under the shield of the state of war, for re-establishment of full control of the smaller Yugoslav republic lost in the past Montenegrin parliamentary elections. These elections, however, showed that majority of citizens of Montenegro share the stand of the citizens of Cetinje, who for historical reasons, which is understandable, feel to be the pioneers and the most articulated advocates of Montenegrin interests.

Gordana BOROVIC

(AIM)