Balkans Quotes

• If this war is not fought with the greatest brutality against the bands both in the East and in the Balkans then in the foreseeable future the strength at our disposal will not be sufficient to be able to master this plague.

  Wilhelm Keitel

  War, Brutality, East

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• There are some common problems in the Balkans in the settlement of which Bulgaria should also participate.

  Todor Zhivkov

  Common, Problem, Should

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• If the Europeans want to intervene, that's their business. But if I were president, I would remove every United States soldier from the Balkan peninsula.

  Pat Buchanan

  Soldier, President, United States

  "Crossfire transcript: Sen. John McCain calls for resolve in Yugoslavia". www.cnn.com. April 1, 1999.

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• One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans (1888).

  Otto von Bismarck

  War, One Day, Foolish

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• Once over there [Balkans], I felt extremely patriotic. Here are these people, from 18-year-olds to military veterans, enduring real duress for the cause of peace. I don't ever want to play for a regular audience again, only military folks who are starving for music.

  Sheryl Crow

  Military, Real, Patriotic

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• We are not only talking about waves of refugees coming to Greece, to Italy, and elsewhere. Destabilizing the Balkans means Lebanonization, and that means destabilizing all of Europe.

  Fatos Nano

  Mean, Talking, Europe

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• Grouping and mutuality of countries and peoples in the Balkans is the only road that leads to economic, national and political liberation.

  Dimitrije Tucovic

  Country, Political, Economic

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• Ballet's image of perfection is fashioned amid a milieu of wracked bodies, fevered imaginations, Balkan intrigue and sulfurous hatreds where anything is likely, and dancers know it.

  Shana Alexander

  Imagination, Perfection, Dancer

  Shana Alexander (2015). “Nutcracker: Money, Madness, Murder: A Family Album”, p.235, Open Road Media

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• There has been enough blood in the Balkans. Serbia is offering its hand. Let us turn to the future and not deal with the past.

  Ivica Dacic

  Past, Offering, Blood

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• [The Balkans] produce more history than they can consume.

  Winston Churchill

  Produce

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• For people may not know what they think about politics in the Balkans, or the vexed question of men and women, but everyone has a definite opinion about the flavour of shredded coconut.

  Louis Simpson

  Men, Thinking, People

  Louis Simpson (2003). “The Owner of the House: New Collected Poems, 1940-2001”, p.293, BOA Editions, Ltd.

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• Let us turn to the future and not deal with the past.

  Ivica Dacic

  Past, Deals, Turns

  "Ex-Milosevic spokesman becomes new Serbia prime minister". www.foxnews.com. July 27, 2012.

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• Unlimited enmity of the Albanian people against Serbia is the foremost real result of the Albanian policies of the Serbian government. The second and more dangerous result is the strengthening of two big powers in Albania, which have the greatest interests in the Balkans.

  Dimitrije Tucovic

  Real, Government, Two

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• While Financier George Soros was investing money in Kosovo's reconstruction, the George Soros Foundation for an Open Society had opened a branch office in Pristina establishing the Kosovo Foundation for an Open Society (KFOS) as part of the Soros' network of "non-profit foundations" in the Balkans.

  Michel Chossudovsky

  Investing Money, Office, Branches

  "The Globalization of Poverty and the New World Order". Book by Michel Chossudovsky, 2003.

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• The Balkans arent worth the life of a single Pomeranian grenadier.

  Otto von Bismarck

  Pomeranians

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• If you go to former Yugoslav states, the Balkan states, Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, Slovenia, the situation is dire. Not to mention Bosnia, which is just run like a colony. The way they used to stand up and sing hymns to President Tito, they now salute the EU flag. It's a very strange transition that we're witnessing in most of Europe, and I don't think it's going to work.

  Tariq Ali

  Running, Thinking, Europe

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

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• I distrust all multiculturalism, liberal or conservative. The Balkans amply demonstrate the perils of Balkanization.

  Charles Krauthammer

  Conservative, Peril, Distrust

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• Americans and Englishmen, when they become acquainted with the Balkans, feel an astonished contempt when they study the mutual enmities of Bulgarians and Serbs, of Hungarians and Rumanians. It is evident to them that these enmities are absurd and that the belief of each little nation in its own superiority has no objective basis. But most of them are quite unable to see that the national pride of a Great Power is essentially as unjustifiable as that of a little Balkan country.

  Bertrand Russell

  Country, Pride, Enmity

  Bertrand Russell (1996). “Unpopular Essays”, p.170, Psychology Press

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• A history of perceived humiliation, after all, lurks behind many acts of terror. And competing narratives of victimhood and insults sustain conflicts in the Balkans, the Caucasus, the Middle East and many other regions.

  Serge Schmemann

  Middle East, Narrative, Insult

  "From the Editor" by Serge Schmemann, www.nytimes.com. December 02, 2010.

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• Perhaps the most troubling area in the world goes from the Balkans through the Middle East and in Central Asia.

  Brent Scowcroft

  Middle East, World, Asia

  Source: www.nytimes.com

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• Turkey is a European country, an Asian country, a Middle Eastern country, Balkan country, Caucasian country, neighbor to Africa, Black Sea country, Caspian Sea, all these.

  Ahmet Davutoglu

  Country, Sea, Turkeys

  Interview with Marc Grossman, www.cfr.org. April 14, 2010.

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• It is clear that several countries, in the Balkans for example, need to be considered countries of safe origin. But others like, in my opinion, Eritrea, undoubtedly need to be considered a country of origin with a valid claim to asylum. And with a third group of states, like Nigeria for example, each individual case needs to be evaluated. Then there are also very controversial cases like Afghanistan. In any case, united European action is needed. This argument for Europeanization may sound utopian, but there is no alternative.

  Paolo Gentiloni

  Country, Alternatives, Eritrea

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• Diplomacy has been exhausted .. Continued instability in the Balkans threatens important U.S. national interests,.

  Tom Daschle

  Important, Exhausted, Diplomacy

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• We have taken a grave and hazardous decision to sustain the Greeks and try to make a Balkan Front.

  Winston Churchill

  War, Taken, Decision

  Sir Winston Churchill (1950). “The Grand Alliance”, p.85, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• From the Balkans to Africa, from Asia to the Middle East, we have witnessed the weakening or absence of effective governance leading to the ravaging of human rights and the abandonment of longstanding humanitarian principles. We need competent and responsible states to meet the needs of "we the peoples" for whom the UN was created. And the world's peoples will not be fully served unless peace, development and human rights, the three pillars of the UN, are advanced together with equal vigour.

  Ban Ki-moon

  Rights, Together, East

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