The Balkans - a hub of worldwide terrorist network

leadership and development, retained close connections with international criminal enterprises connected with terrorism, such as traffickers of heroin originating in Afghanistan and human traffickers who have abetted the movement of terrorist fugitives moving to and from Western Europe.



Finally, along with and connected to the policy flaws has been an undeniable tendency in the Western media to downplay the threat and even to criticize those who speak of it. The reasons for this ignorance and bias are more complex, considering that the enormity and amorphousness of the Western media precludes blanket assessments; nevertheless, it is clear that for those journalists and think-tank ‘experts’ who have made reputations based on supporting governmental policy in the Balkans, being forced to admit the catastrophic results of that policy would be both embarrassing and damaging. Nevertheless, the media’s relative failure to connect the dots in terms of Western policy, execution and structural flaws has meant that a vital mechanism for exerting pressure on policy makers – that is, media-influenced public opinion – has by and large not been activated.



Results: Terrorist Activities and Radicalized Societies



One serious repercussion, therefore, of the flawed policies, doomed peacekeeping structure and execution, and an acquiescent media in the contemporary Balkans has been the creation of a criminal and terrorist transfer zone through the heart of southeastern Europe, as well as the gradual creation of a new culture of fundamentalism among a minority of local Muslims exposed to foreign preaching and funding. Today, it is undeniable that a security vacuum which simply did not exist at the end of the Cold War has come into existence, one which has had and will continue to have a direct effect on the increasing likelihood of terrorist activity throughout Europe. In recent months, police actions and intelligence summaries announced by the governments in Germany, Austria, Spain, the UK and elsewhere attest that the threat of new terrorist attacks remains persistent.



To illustrate the severity of the threat, one might examine the following, very partial list of Balkan-linked terrorist plots noted since 9/11; the details around these plots indicate the stated relational dynamics of terrorism and the particularities of the region. They range from links to organized crime and radicalized Balkan Muslims, to foreign extremist involvement and foreign funding that has facilitated the activity of would-be terrorists. ...