Update: Two top officials of the Trump campaign have denied that the Republican candidate made the apology contained in the story below, and further denied that the published email interview was facilitated by campaign’s Indiana State Director Suzanne Ryder Jaworkski or that it ever took place at all. Jason Miller, senior communications director of the campaign, said in a statement: “Mr. Trump never gave an interview to the Serbian weekly magazine Nedeljnik as falsely reported by the discredited Newsweek, nor was such an interview conducted through our Indiana State Director. This was a hoax and we look forward to receiving a formal retraction and apology from all involved.”
Several news outlets, including CNN, Newsweek, and Buzzfeed have all made unsuccessful attempts to reach the managing editor of the Nedeljnik for a response to the denials.
Foreign Policy points out:
By late Thursday afternoon, the magazine’s editorial board issued an explanation of how the interview was obtained and admitted it should have vetted its sourcing more rigorously, according to an English translation. However, it still did not correct its reporting. Nedeljnik confirmed to FP it had taken down its interview “for the time being, and until we get to the end of this” in order to investigate its internal reporting, noting [that Vladimir Rajcic, an intermediary in obtaining the alleged interview] continues to maintain the interview’s authenticity.
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In an interview in the Serbian weekly Nedeljnik, Donald Trump has apologized for the U.S.-NATO airstrikes on Serbia during the 1990s. No doubt this latest stab at the Clintons put a smile on faces in the Kremlin, since Russia is a strong ally of Serbia.
Not a word in that apology about the motive behind the strikes. And not a word from right wingers who have excoriated President Obama for allegedly kowtowing to foreign governments with an “apology tour”:
"First of all let me tell you it was a great mistake to bomb the Serbians who were our allies in both world wars. Serbians are very good people. Unfortunately Clinton’s administration was very damaging to the Serbians, they made a mess in the Balkans. I have apologized before to the Serbians for the actions and our policy primarily Clinton’s. I will strengthen the relationship with the Serbian government. When I take office the foreign policy will change the course for the better", said Trump.
Trump also said that he will make sure that "US has better relationship with Russia."
Trump has a big hole in his brain where his knowledge of Balkan history should be. But that is hardly a surprise given his penchant for rambling on about other subjects he knows nothing about.
He can't apologize for calling Mexicans "rapists" and calling for keeping Muslims out of the United States, but he has no qualms about apologizing for the United States intervening to stop mass slaughter in the Yugoslavian civil war. In that war, Serbian-engendered massacres cost the lives of thousands of Bosnians and later Kosovans, most appallingly in the killings of 8,000 captive men and boys in Srebrenica in 1995. As several critics have pointed out, Trump’s stance places him squarely on the side of Moscow’s criticism of U.S.-NATO military actions in the former Yugoslavia. Apparently, Vladimir Putin is one of Trump’s key foreign policy advisers.
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The magazine interview, in which Trump answered questions via email, came about thanks to contacts made by Vladimir Rajcic, an actor who is running for president of Serbia in next year’s election and who apparently has ties to Mike Pence, Trump’s vice presidential running mate.
Hayes Brown writes:
“It comes as no surprise that Donald Trump is trashing the work of America’s military and our NATO allies in order to push the talking points of his ally Vladimir Putin,” Laura Rosenberger, foreign policy adviser to Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, said in an emailed statement. “While Hillary Clinton has stood up to Russia, Trump continues to pander to Putin, and he and his advisers’ far-reaching ties to the Kremlin cast serious doubt over his ability and desire to prioritize American national security interests as president.”
During the 2012 presidential election campaign, Mitt Romney parroted others on the right by bellyaching about President Obama’s supposed “apology tour” in the Middle East and elsewhere. It was claimed by the Heritage Foundation, for instance, that Obama’s alleged apologies for U.S. behavior to people in Europe, the Middle East and the Americas were a “recipe for disaster” that would “weaken American power on the world stage rather than strengthen it.”
Just one problem. It was bullshit. As Michael Cohen wrote in Foreign Policy at the time, the apology claim was "a lie that has been reiterated so often that it has become conventional wisdom on the right." It’s true that in various speeches, Obama had noted flaws and mistakes in certain U.S. policies. But this was always tempered with criticisms of what he labeled unwarranted anti-Americanism. He, in fact, brought some balance to discussions of topics that too many past presidents and other U.S. politicians have covered with chest-pounding. Calling this an “apology tour” was purely propaganda.
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ExpatGirl has a story on this subject here.