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Calm in Pristina

I’ve been in Pristina all week, where yesterday Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj resigned. A Special Tribunal concerned with crimes committed after its 1998-99 war has summoned him to The Hague. It is not yet known whether he is an indictee or a witness. He has been tried twice before at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and found not guilty.

I talked with the Prime Minister Wednesday. He gave no hint of what was coming and likely didn’t know.

It’s a fraught time here. Tariffs Ramush levied on Serbian imports have stalled a European Union dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina that aimed to resolve the many issues remaining a generation after Slobodan Milosevic expelled half of Kosovo’s Albanian population but yielded after a 78-day NATO bombing campaign to UN administration of the Serbian-ruled province. Kosovo is now a parliamentary democracy–not yet recognized as sovereign by some–that requires elections within 45 days of resignation of the prime minister. The opposition, which had aimed for elections in October, is unlikely to be ready for them by the beginning of September.

Some will wonder whether the United States is behind the judicial maneuver that caused Ramush to resign. The Special Court is constituted under Kosovo law, but manned by mostly Europeans with an American chief prosecutor, one appointed by the Trump Administration. You don’t even have to be a practiced conspiracy theorist to imagine that the Americans, who were upset with Ramush’s tariffs and opposition to an ethnically based land swap deal with Belgrade, decided to get rid of him.

If so, they’ve made a big mistake. Ramush’s previous two court battles in The Hague did nothing but increase his popularity here. The tariffs and opposition to the land swap deal are popular here. Ramush’s summons to The Hague is far more likely to strengthen his political support than diminish it.

But it may well be that the court, acting on its own volition, thinks it has reason to question Ramush or even indict him. We just don’t know. Certainly Serbs and Albanians were murdered after the war; most people here think the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) of which Ramush was then a regional commander was in part responsible. I would favor holding the guilty accountable for those crimes. But it would be entirely premature to judge who.

So far, the popular reaction to Ramush’s resignation is calm. We attended the ongoing Pristina Film Festival last night, across from the Prime Minister’s office. A street basketball tournament occupied the space between the two. Families strolled happily in Mother Teresa Boulevard. Of course all that could change, but for the moment people seem more interested in enjoying the relatively cool, clear weather than worrying about what has happened to their prime minister.

Kosovo President Thaci, also a former KLA cadre, will need now to oversee the formation of some sort of caretaker government. That itself will be difficult as Ramush had a narrow margin in parliament. The election outcome is unpredictable. That’s the good news: despite political party abuses both in the campaigns and at the polling places, the press here is free by Balkan standards and elections are serious political contests. Coalition formation before and after leaves a lot uncertain about their outcome.

Elections are inherently divisive. Before it goes back to talks with Belgrade, Pristina will need more unity than it has had during Ramush’s tenure. My advice to whoever the powers will be: the only way to get a good deal is to be willing to walk away from a bad one. And the only way to make a good deal stick is to ensure that most of the citizens are convinced it is good.