Dyer is a 'regime writer'

Please refer to East Timor and Kosovo are different by Gwynne Dyer, (The Jakarta PostSept. 11, 1999, page 5). There was a brand of professionals in former communist countries best described by the prefix "regime" -- regime writers, regime journalists etc. When I read Mr. Dyer's "View Points" I can see parallels in his writing to that of a regime journalist. When his government talks badly of somebody, he talks twice as bad. If his government is silent about a subject, he will fail to acknowledge the subject, be it an elephant or 200,000 people kicked out of their land. Examples?

Mr. Dyer will lie about "daily slaughter of civilians in Kosovo that led to NATO intervention" when there was none, and when NATO's own excuse for war was that Serbians wouldn't sign the (in)famous Rambolier Agreement.

Mr. Dyer will lie about 10,000 Kosovars killed by Yugoslav forces during the NATO war, when NATO found only a couple of hundred graves and this number roughly coincides with the number of people killed in a few refugee convoys hit by brave NATO pilots, not to mention other sites and targets.

The rest of the 2,000 people killed in NATO raids were buried elsewhere in Serbia and Mr. Dyer is not going to have a View Point on that.

Mr. Dyer lies about Serbia "fomenting wars of ethnic cleansing against all neighbors" when in the real world we had 300,000 Serbs cleansed from Croatia to Serbia, we had live CNN coverage of Serbs ethnically cleansing themselves out of Sarajevo, and now we witness 200,000 Serbs forced out of Kosovo by the KLA and escorted by NATO troops. Mr. Dyer, as a regime journalist, of course, makes no comment on that. He knows that would implicate his own government in ethnic cleansing and genocide if only he could bring himself to apply the same rules to the Serbian government as his own.

Mr. Dyer accuses the Indonesian military of committing atrocities in East Timor, but he is silent about his government's responsibility in Kosovo. They actually have troops on the ground in Kosovo and as an occupying force they are responsible for the safety of civilians. And they are doing nothing to prevent or reverse ethnic cleansing of non-Albanians from this territory.

Is Mr. Dyer going to have a View Point about his government's failure to disarm or prevent the KLA from slaughtering the remaining non-Albanians (over 3000 people they were supposed to protect are now dead). Now we have 40,000 NATO troops and only 20,000 Serbs left (two NATO soldiers to one ethnic Serb) but NATO still cannot guaranty their protection.

Do I need to say more to prove my point: Mr. Dyer is a regime journalist.

BRANIMIR SALEVIC

Tangerang, West Java