Regarding the current crisis in the Balkans, we have asked some questions to Emir Kusturica, Yugoslav and Serbian director, of Bosnian origin –he was born in Sarajevo in 1954- author of many films among which the extraordinary Underground ; he has probably currently become the main ambassador of his country in the world. Always concerned by the world of cinema and the promotion of young directors, he has created in the mountains of Zlatvor, near Mokra Gora, a small Serbian Cinecittà that he calls Sharingrad (the multicolour city).

• How do you judge the big demonstration of the 21 in Belgrade, international media have talked of the « return of the Serbian nationalism » and a « Serbian pride in the streets » ?
  • Emir Kusturica : I have seen a strong emotive reaction, I saw a lot of rage in the Serbian people against the irrational decision of the West to remove Kosovo from us, a sort of new military occupancy.
    A real robbery has been committed, the actors, once more, are the United States. It's the same terror that continues against us since 1991-1992, the one that began in Slovenia, then in Croatia and finally in Bosnia and Herzegovina. With the independence of Kosovo, we've reached the final stage of this terror. In insist on the word terror, there's no other word to define it.

• But there were unfortunately the destruction of the embassies, and all the incidents…
  • EK : I must say immediately that I am against any kind of violence, especially regarding these attacks of embassies. But these incidents cannot hide the fact that all started with the recognition of the independence proclaimed in a unilateral way by the leaders of Pristina, against the international law and Serbia. Violences are the result of this “violence” - there.

• What do you think we've discovered now that the young man died in the embassy is a 20 years student, Zoran Vujanovic, refugee in Novi Sad with his family who had fled Kosovo in July 99, a short time after the entry of NATO ?
  • EK : This young lost life in a so tragic way is a symbol. How can't we see it ? That shows how much our tragedy is big. Here is the consequence of the ugly decision to recognize the independence of Pristina. A young man ends his life in the embassy of the country which, by its bombardments and the support for the terrorists, was at the origin of his escape from the place where he was born. Before dying I would really like to see the end of all this terror against us.

• When you spoke at the demonstration in Belgrade, you said, in the middle of the applause, that you do not belong to the mythology of Hollywood. What is the reaction of all the people who like the cinema ?
  • EK : I can only love and respect the cinema. But if I'm reproached to have the “myth of Kosovo” I am obliged to answer that yes, each one has right to his mythology, each people especially. And do the Serb people have the prototype of this extraordinary culture, of this single medieval painting in the world, of writers like Ivo Andrić and Milos Crnjavski. Why somebody would have the myth of Brad Pitt and we could not, us, have this myth of Kosovo where was born our history ?

• What do you think of the role of Italy which always declares being “friendly with Serbs” but initially bombards in a “humane” way by promising that there will have no secession of this territory, and then recognizes the independence of Pristina ?
  • EK : I love Italy, I feel myself very close to Italy. But it's always an American satellite, a serious condition for your autonomy, a harmful condition for Europe. You will see, the recognition that Italy wanted to make of the unilateral independence of Kosovo will become a boomerang which will finish damaging you too.

Interview by Tommaso DI FRANCESCO, translated from Italian by Marie-Ange Patrizio & Matthieu Dhennin