Protesters Break Into U.S. Embassy in Serbia

ledvedderman

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23277147/

TheVoiceInside

ledvedderman wrote:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23277147/

Thats fucked up. I wonder why the US let this happen.

ledvedderman

TheVoiceInside wrote:

Thats fucked up. I wonder why the US let this happen.

I think our recognizing Kosovo's independence might just have the slightest bit of something to do w/ this.

acoustic guy

Fuck, I just hired three kosovo students to come to my store and work this summer through a interexchange program.
I guess that's a dead deal huh?

Anyone wanna job for the summer on the Boardwalk in Ocean Ciy NJ?

Nevermind

acoustic guy wrote:

Fuck, I just hired three kosovo students to come to my store and work this summer through a interexchange program.
I guess that's a dead deal huh?

Anyone wanna job for the summer on the Boardwalk in Ocean Ciy NJ?

i do.

TheVoiceInside

ledvedderman wrote:

I think our recognizing Kosovo's independence might just have the slightest bit of something to do w/ this.

I know thats the reason. What I meant was why didnt they protect the embassy. Wouldnt this qualify as an attack on the US?

tybird

ledvedderman wrote:

I think our recognizing Kosovo's independence might just have the slightest bit of something to do w/ this.

Maybe just a wee bit.....;)

jeffbr

TheVoiceInside wrote:

I know thats the reason. What I meant was why didnt they protect the embassy. Wouldnt this qualify as an attack on the US?

The Serb police should have been protecting it from the outside. And embassy workers were told not to be there, so the risk was minimized. I guess our Marines could have started shooting the assholes who climbed the walls, but that might have been considered counterproductive.

gabers

Also, why the hell is our embassy being firebombed when there were several other countries who recognized Kosovo's independence as well. We're just the easiest target I guess.

josevolution

they must of thought their was a presale to VEDDER show ...that's all i can come up with.

gimmesometruth27

jeffbr wrote:

The Serb police should have been protecting it from the outside. And embassy workers were told not to be there, so the risk was minimized. I guess our Marines could have started shooting the assholes who climbed the walls, but that might have been considered counterproductive.

yes, we pulled our people out of there because we were expecting something like this to happen. and it will probably happen again there if security is not increased.

i dunno, why don't we have blackwater there instead of having them "wining hearts and minds" in iraq? wouldn't they be better served to protect our embassies than screw up what we are trying to accomplish in iraq?

WantedTo

Hey holdon a minute, there's more embassies in Belgrade than the US's! What about the Turkish, French and British ones? They got ransacked too you know.

Which is completely not anyone's concern except ours obviously

gimmesometruth27

WantedTo wrote:

Hey holdon a minute, there's more embassies in Belgrade than the US's! What about the Turkish, French and British ones? They got ransacked too you know.

i hadn't read that part yet, just got home from work.

polaris

from yahoo.com

***********
On Thursday, the neighboring Croatian Embassy also was targeted by the same group of protesters at the U.S. Embassy, and smaller groups attacked police posts outside the Turkish and British embassies in another part of the city but were beaten back
***********

CrazyMarko94

whose embassy do you think you all would attack if serbian government sponsored and recognized (and influenced a whole bunch of other countries to do the same) a new country within U.S. territory? i'm not saying what those protesters did was justified, of course it's not, i'm just trying to make sense of what they did.

WantedTo

polaris wrote:

and smaller groups attacked police posts outside the Turkish and British embassies in another part of the city but were beaten back

Howcome they did have police policing?

polaris

WantedTo wrote:

Howcome they did have police policing?

heck i know ... i'm guessing the largest crowd went to the US embassy and the guards they have there were probably overwhelmed ...

WantedTo

As far as I heard there weren't any guards at the US embassy at all. Like, none.

Commy

WantedTo wrote:

As far as I heard there weren't any guards at the US embassy at all. Like, none.

The embassy was evacuated because US officials knew what was coming.

edit-According to Fox they still have some military personel in the embassy.

ledvedderman

One confirmed dead at the US embassy

LikeAnOpeningBandForTheSun

whats that? we're being invaded by serbs now?

WantedTo

MrSmith wrote:

whats that? we're being invaded by serbs now?

Yeah they just swam the Atlantic, bet you you won't sleep soundly tonight!

jeffbr

ledvedderman wrote:

One confirmed dead at the US embassy

Sounds like the crispy critter is one of the protesters. The body was found in the area protesters were burning, and all embassy personnel have been accounted for.

olivine

I never wanted my first post to be abut this. Really. I am generally shy when it comes to posting, but I just love to be part of PJ community.

Now, perhaps I can tell you a bit more about what happened here tonight. I live in Belgrade and yes, there were riots on the streets. Violence emerged among a relatively small group of people after the peaceful protest against Kosovo independence. You see, the peaceful meeting brought people from all over the country to Belgrade and that was supposed to be news of the day.

However, a group of idiots started those riots after the meeting. I honestly thing it was bunch of hooligans who came to the meeting but destroyed everything along the way because the were so drunk. Most of them were kids, 17, 18 to 20 years old. It happens everywhere. As far as I know, US embassy and all the other embassies were evacuated long before the meeting, as a precaution. From what I've heard, person who died was not a US citizen, it was one of the hooligans. This is not confirmed, though. There were riots outside Croatian embassy as well, and some others, along with stores and local McDonald's.

So, why protesting in the first place? It's because of Kosovo independence, which is a really dark story that can not be explained in two words. You simply can't trust everything you see on the news. The story of Kosovo independence is not a "fight of poor, innocent people who did not have their own country and lived under the evil Serbs government, until finally gained its freedom and country they never had".

I don't think any country would be happy to see cutting of its territory, an important cultural center, and, of course, its people who still live there. So, anxiety and mixed feelings and anger are understandable.

But those people who started riots are idiots. There were about 500 of them, and over two million of people live in Belgrade, several millions in whole Serbia. So, 500 morons sent a totally bad message to both Serbia and the world. They made us look like monsters, and journalists just love to make it everything look even worse than it was. So, 500 idiots are identified with the whole nation- that's not fair. I honestly don't know who those people are or what happened in their brains (if there is a brain to start with). That is precisely the OPPOSITE way of protecting your own country, and honestly, most of the Serbs do not agree with that, which does not mean Serbs agree with Kosovo independence.

Thanks for listening. Once again, it really sucks that my first message had to be this one.

Iva...

It sucks that my first post has to be in this thread too, but I just want to confirm everything olivine said.

And the most of my foreign friends who care agreed that it'd be the same anywhere else: there are always aggressive monsters, football fans and mad drunks who start riots as all they want and do in their life is to be aggressive.

:(

acoustic guy

olivine wrote:

I never wanted my first post to be abut this. Really. I am generally shy when it comes to posting, but I just love to be part of PJ community.

Now, perhaps I can tell you a bit more about what happened here tonight. I live in Belgrade and yes, there were riots on the streets. Violence emerged among a relatively small group of people after the peaceful protest against Kosovo independence. You see, the peaceful meeting brought people from all over the country to Belgrade and that was supposed to be news of the day.

However, a group of idiots started those riots after the meeting. I honestly thing it was bunch of hooligans who came to the meeting but destroyed everything along the way because the were so drunk. Most of them were kids, 17, 18 to 20 years old. It happens everywhere. As far as I know, US embassy and all the other embassies were evacuated long before the meeting, as a precaution. From what I've heard, person who died was not a US citizen, it was one of the hooligans. This is not confirmed, though. There were riots outside Croatian embassy as well, and some others, along with stores and local McDonald's.

So, why protesting in the first place? It's because of Kosovo independence, which is a really dark story that can not be explained in two words. You simply can't trust everything you see on the news. The story of Kosovo independence is not a "fight of poor, innocent people who did not have their own country and lived under the evil Serbs government, until finally gained its freedom and country they never had".

I don't think any country would be happy to see cutting of its territory, an important cultural center, and, of course, its people who still live there. So, anxiety and mixed feelings and anger are understandable.

But those people who started riots are idiots. There were about 500 of them, and over two million of people live in Belgrade, several millions in whole Serbia. So, 500 morons sent a totally bad message to both Serbia and the world. They made us look like monsters, and journalists just love to make it everything look even worse than it was. So, 500 idiots are identified with the whole nation- that's not fair. I honestly don't know who those people are or what happened in their brains (if there is a brain to start with). That is precisely the OPPOSITE way of protecting your own country, and honestly, most of the Serbs do not agree with that, which does not mean Serbs agree with Kosovo independence.

Thanks for listening. Once again, it really sucks that my first message had to be this one.

Wow, welcome to the community. Your post was very insightful.
FYI.....Beware of this room.

Hinny

The Aussie one escaped this, despite us siding with the Kosovar independence. The Serbs in the homeland probably noticed just how many people were supporting Novak Djokovic in the tennis tournament here and said, hey, they like us, and gave us a pass

olivine

Thanks for your welcome, acoustic guy.

Hinny: Australian embassy was not on their way, it's located in a small street (in my neighborhood, actually). Plus, not many of those kids knew Australia declared Kosovo independence.

They trashed local stores, and stole sneakers and stuff. Now we have to pay for the damage, both political and material. But, like I said, there were at least 200 000 people on the meeting (not the mention couple of millions in the city) and 500 idiots made it look like we're all morons.

Oh, another thing: peaceful protest was not anti- US, it was a protest against Kosovo independence. Belgrade, Serbia is not the only place on Earth where people are not big fans of US government, there are many such places. Personally, I'm not one of those people who will identify the whole nation with couple of its idiots (presidents included).

CrazyMarko94

dobro nam dosli drugari iz beograda...

Soldier of Love

olivine wrote:

I never wanted my first post to be abut this. Really. I am generally shy when it comes to posting, but I just love to be part of PJ community.

Now, perhaps I can tell you a bit more about what happened here tonight. I live in Belgrade and yes, there were riots on the streets. Violence emerged among a relatively small group of people after the peaceful protest against Kosovo independence. You see, the peaceful meeting brought people from all over the country to Belgrade and that was supposed to be news of the day.

However, a group of idiots started those riots after the meeting. I honestly thing it was bunch of hooligans who came to the meeting but destroyed everything along the way because the were so drunk. Most of them were kids, 17, 18 to 20 years old. It happens everywhere. As far as I know, US embassy and all the other embassies were evacuated long before the meeting, as a precaution. From what I've heard, person who died was not a US citizen, it was one of the hooligans. This is not confirmed, though. There were riots outside Croatian embassy as well, and some others, along with stores and local McDonald's.

So, why protesting in the first place? It's because of Kosovo independence, which is a really dark story that can not be explained in two words. You simply can't trust everything you see on the news. The story of Kosovo independence is not a "fight of poor, innocent people who did not have their own country and lived under the evil Serbs government, until finally gained its freedom and country they never had".

I don't think any country would be happy to see cutting of its territory, an important cultural center, and, of course, its people who still live there. So, anxiety and mixed feelings and anger are understandable.

But those people who started riots are idiots. There were about 500 of them, and over two million of people live in Belgrade, several millions in whole Serbia. So, 500 morons sent a totally bad message to both Serbia and the world. They made us look like monsters, and journalists just love to make it everything look even worse than it was. So, 500 idiots are identified with the whole nation- that's not fair. I honestly don't know who those people are or what happened in their brains (if there is a brain to start with). That is precisely the OPPOSITE way of protecting your own country, and honestly, most of the Serbs do not agree with that, which does not mean Serbs agree with Kosovo independence.

Thanks for listening. Once again, it really sucks that my first message had to be this one.

well put Olivine - People's ignorance is just amazing...i copped shit at work today over it. I would've thought that after everything that's going on in the world, people would realize by now, not to take everything they read for gospel...or atleast do a little research themselves...

yoke

acoustic guy wrote:

Fuck, I just hired three kosovo students to come to my store and work this summer through a interexchange program.
I guess that's a dead deal huh?

Anyone wanna job for the summer on the Boardwalk in Ocean Ciy NJ?

We always get Polish and Russian in Belmar...