Tag: Balkans
Tough enough
While I confess to being thoroughly preoccupied with the Libyan revolution, I have tried also to keep an eye on German Chancellor Merkel’s visit to Belgrade. This is important because it is an opportunity to make clear to Serbia what it will need to do in order to gain EU candidacy status, which it hopes will be granted late this year or early next. Any ambiguity will be seen in Belgrade as opening up room for partition in Kosovo, an ambition that Serbia has not yet abandoned.
Merkel appears to have been tough enough: she reportedly asked Belgrade to renew the dialogue with Pristina (that’s easy!), allow the EU rule of law mission (EULEX) to establish its authority on the whole territory of Kosovo (hard for me to understand how that would be difficult for Belgrade, since EULEX regards itself as operating under UNSC resolution 1244) and abolish Serbian “parallel” institutions in north Kosovo, where they essentially govern the majority-Serb population without reference to Pristina (in clear violation of 1244).
It’s this last item that seems to have given Belgrade heartburn. The German ambassador to Berlin is quoted on B92:
Belgrade is not surprised by the German chancellor’s requests. This could be anticipated from the previous messages we were getting, maybe just the sharpness of the request to abolish the institutions in northern Kosovo is something that was not expected….The request is something that Serbian authorities absolutely cannot accept at the moment. They have some calculations and I am afraid that one of them that we are giving in to everything because of the candidacy and our wish to join the Union. We have warned them, but unfortunately the German side’s firm positions remain.
Note that “we have warned them,” as if Serbia is in a position to dictate to Germany what it should say and what not. But note also the “at the moment.” There could be a big opening in those three little words.
I suppose in a back-handed sort of way, Belgrade’s insisting that its institutions have to remain in north Kosovo is an implicit acknowledgement that the rest of Kosovo is lost, but that is little comfort to those who worry that partition of Kosovo could lead to instability in other parts of the Balkans, as different ethnic groups seek to adjust borders to suit their preferences. This is a first-order European and American concern that Belgrade fails to take into account, even though it could well affect southern Serbia and Sandjak.
Kosovo in resolution 1244 is a single entity. Belgrade’s lawyers would do well to note that, and recall all their own pronouncements about how Kosovo cannot be divided. The Church is also adamant against partition, fearing rightly that the enclaves south of the Ibar might also be lost if Kosovo is divided.
That said, there is room for compromise, just not on the issue of sovereignty and territorial integrity. Pristina may want some of the Serbian institutions to stay in north Kosovo in one form or another, to assist with maintaining Serb education and culture and even to encourage Serbs to remain there, as they have done in the enclaves south of the Ibar, consistent with the Ahtisaari plan. That kind of compromise is something Belgrade will have to discuss with Pristina, not assert as a unilateral fiat.
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Still another Balkans interview?
I did this one for Dejan Kozul of the Croatian weekly Novosti:
Q. You have been in Kosovo. Can you describe general feeling after latest problems in north Kosovo?
A. I was in Kosovo late last week, over the weekend in north Mitrovica, and in Pristina again Monday-Wednesday. People in the north are frightened of Pristina and resentful of what they consider abandonment by Belgrade. People in Pristina are so far satisfied with the results of their initiative at the border but anxious to establish permanently Kosovo’s customs and police authority there.
Q. Serbian press writes about autonomy for north Kosovo but on the other side Serbian officials deny that they discussed it. Do you think that this might be proper solution?
A. A very wide measure of self-governance is provided for the Serb-majority communities in northern Kosovo under the Ahtisaari plan. That is still on offer. I imagine there might also be implementation agreements that would meet legitimate concerns of the Serbs in northern Kosovo. But anyone who imagines that northern Kosovo will be allowed to develop into the kind of autonomy that Republika Srpska is claiming in Bosnia is kidding themselves. It isn’t going to happen because Pristina, the EU and the U.S. will not want it.
Q. Can you compare the situation in Kosovo with the situation in Croatia during the nineties where autonomy was also solution for Croatian Serbs but in the end Milan Martic and authorities in Krajina refused it? Could it be compared at all (Krajina was not part of Serbia but Kosovo was)?
A. I think there is some analogy. But the kind of very wide autonomy that Milan Martic refused is not being offered and would not be acceptable to Pristina. Reintegration with self-governance is what is being offered, and it is not a bad deal if implemented correctly.
Q. When we speak about Croatia it is well known that Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor is supposed to visit Pristina. What are the reasons for this invitation and do you think that this is the right time for it?
A. I think it natural that the Prime Minister of Croatia visit Kosovo, which after all is a neighbor, even if not an immediate one. And certainly there is a good deal Croatia can now do to help Kosovo prepare for EU membership. Neither Serbia nor Croatian Serbs should regard a visit of this sort as anything more than routine.
Q. Two customs stamps, a Serbian and a Kosovo Albanian one, are mentioned as one of the possible solutions for stamp problems. Do you think that this might be good solution for beginning and is this problem taken too seriously? There are much bigger problems in Kosovo then the stamp question but it is used as a cause.
A. There are many solutions for the customs stamps, if there is good political will. We’ll have to wait until September when the Pristina/Belgrade dialogue reconvenes to see if that exists. It is important in my way of thinking that Belgrade accept the fact that the Kosovo government is the legitimate authority in all of Kosovo, even if Belgrade still refuses to accept its independence. What is needed in northern Kosovo is cooperation between Belgrade and Pristina to end a lucrative smuggling trade that is financing organized crime on both sides of the boundary/border.
Q. Ivica Dacic few months ago was the first Serbian official who mentioned that splitting Kosovo is the only solution. Do you think that this might be the official Serbian policy? What implications would there be?
A. Serbia denies this is the official position, but it seems clear to me it is what Belgrade wants. Even if you think it might solve one problem, however, it would reopen five or six other problems in the Balkans. Neither Serbia nor Kosovo can afford today to be a source of such instability. The Serb-majoirty communities in northern Kosovo have been offered a good deal under Ahtisaari. They should appreciate it and start negotiating about implementation issues.
Q. Recently, in Macedonia you mentioned that this is the era of reintegration. For something like that Serbia has to change its constitution and admit Kosovo’s independence. Under what condition do you think this might be possible?
A. That’s for Belgrade to figure out: they painted themselves into a corner with a constitution that they claim passed even though the requirement for 50 per cent of registered voters to vote was not met. It would be no easier for Pristina to change its constitution to allow the north to leave Kosovo, a proposition that clearly violates UN Security Council resolution 1244, which Belgrade refers to so often. It will not be easy to change the constitution, but it will, so far as I understand, be necessary before Belgrade can enter the EU.
Q. Do you think that referendum about Kosovo or EU might be solution?
A. That’s for Belgrade to decide. It is a possible solution, but not the only one.
Q. How do you see regional scene? The EU has so many problems. Do you think that Brussels has the will and strength to help the Western Balkans avoid more confrontations and to lead the region to EU membership?
A. The Balkans are an EU burden, but not an enormous one. Several of the countries are already de facto in the euro zone, and the Stabilization and Association Agreements give the Balkans countries many of the economic advantages of membership. What Europe has lacked is clarity about the Balkans. I hope they find it.
Q. It’s not just Kosovo that is a problem. We still have Bosnia and Herzegovina as a country without Government, we are aware that splitting Kosovo might cause other problems in South of Serbia (Presevo, Bujanovac…) and also in Republika Srpska, maybe in Macedonia, Sandzak…?
A. Yes, that is what I was referring to when I mentioned opening up new problems in the region. That would be a grave mistake, one neither Pristina nor Belgrade would want to make.
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Diplomatic observers in Syria?
Reading the news from Latakia, it is hard for someone just coming out of Pristina not to note the similarity in military technique between Bashar al Assad’s Syrian forces and Slobodan Milosevic’s Yugoslav forces.
Milosevic aimed more explicitly to cause the Kosovo Albanians to flee their homes, using artillery to put holes in roofs and leaving the bodies of prominent people in the centers of towns. But the indiscriminate attacks on one neighborhood after another (or one village after the other in Kosovo) seem to the non-military eye comparable. Ditto the rounding up of young people, the random shootings and the mistreatment and torture in prison.
Also similar is the difficulty the rest of the world is having coming to a clear and unequivocal statement against the violence, which Nadim Shehadi notes is the truly complicated side of the equation. But it is an instructive analogy. When the international community unified and spoke with a single voice, it was always difficult for Milosevic to continue the violence.
We haven’t had that kind of unity yet vis-a-vis Syria. The Security Council has managed a statement, but no resolution. Individual voices have been crystal clear: I am in Istanbul this evening and read a statement from the Turkish Foreign Minister in the English version of Hurriyet that was unequivocal in demanding that the Syrian regime stop. We have to make those many voices one. A Security Council resolution passed with Russian and Chinese support would be the ideal diplomatic vehicle.
There is also a need to operationalize the international community’s concern. In Kosovo, this was done with the Kosovo Diplomatic Observer Mission (KDOM), an effort agreed to by Milosevic that I felt at the time was too little too late. But it was a lot more than has been done or even proposed in Syria, where the regime has kept out even the press. And KDOM ultimately had a big impact, when its chief was shown a massacre site and reacted with appropriate horror, calling Milosevic out for what had been done in Serbia’s name.
Diplomatic observers would do what Robert Ford can’t: be present all over Syria and report on any violations of a ceasefire quickly. They can only be deployed once Bashar al Assad agrees to stop the military action. If and when he does, would it be a good idea?
PS: See Jeff White’s piece, which I don’t seem to be able to HTML: http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/templateC05.php?CID=3393
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Making unity attractive
I’ve just arrived back in Pristina from North Mitrovica, where things couldn’t be calmer. Adults in the shade drinking beer, kids in the sun enjoying a beautiful, warm Sunday, a few in the river getting happily wet. A few people moving back and forth across the bridge between the Serbian-controlled north and the Albanian-controlled south without hindrance.
The only real cloud was the guy in the singlet with Karadzic’s portrait. Who wears the face of someone accused of genocide in another country to the local cafe for a beer with a friend? The nationalist graffiti and Serbian state symbols everyplace are to be expected. The Serbs of northern Kosovo want to remain citizens of Serbia, not of Albanian-majority Kosovo.
The north seems a good deal less populated and the population older than on the south side of the bridge, but the poverty on both sides is all too apparent. It is truly difficult to imagine this as the front line in a confrontation that once absorbed the world’s attention. Today a few bored Italian carabinieri and Romanian police preside over a bridge where nothing has happened for a long time. Even when the Kosovo government sent its special police in late July to seize control of the customs posts along the border with Serbia, the bridge in Mitrovica remained calm.
Two sentiments dominated the few conversations I was able to have with Serbs in the north: fear and resentment. The fear is directed towards the Albanian-dominated institutions headquartered in Pristina. The Serbs cannot imagine trusting the court system, or being governed by institutions that report to Hashim Thaci, Kosovo’s prime minister and a wartime political leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army.
The resentment is directed mainly towards Belgrade, which is viewed as abandoning northern Kosovo in the dialogue it is conducting with Pristina. Belgrade has already “given away” the Serbs south of the Ibar and seems prepared to give away those in the north as well, the Serbs there believe. President Tadic has bought himself little credit by taking what the international community regards as a relatively hard nationalist line, or even by proposing partition.
There is also an edge of resentment for the international community in general, and the Americans in particular. The internationals are collecting nice salaries and doing little. And the American bombing may even have grown in the Serb imagination. One elderly pensioner said he thought the Americans would blow up the whole world.
Everyone, north and south, is awaiting the visit of German Chancellor Merkel to Belgrade August 24. If she tells Belgrade clearly and unequivocally to give up its control of north Kosovo, dreams of partition will be ended. If she doesn’t, or if she leaves even a slight ambiguity, the aggravation on both sides of the Ibar river will continue.
The Pristina government believes it has succeeded in changing the facts on the ground, so that the border crossings in northern Kosovo will not be returned to Serbian control. But that will do nothing to enable Pristina to govern the Serb population in the north. It will need to have the wide degree of autonomy allowed it under the Ahtisaari plan that Belgrade has so far rejected. But even that much will not come easily: people in the north lack confidence in Pristina and will need some clear demonstrations that they can expect fair treatment.
“Making unity attractive” is the apt phrase the Sudanese used to describe what was required to keep north and south Sudan together, an effort that failed. It is what Belgrade failed to do for the Albanians of Kosovo during the Milosevic regime. It is what is needed now from Pristina to gain confidence of a significant portion of the Serb population in the north.
I am under no illusions. Some of the Serbs will leave northern Kosovo no matter how gentle and attractive the offers they get, because they have good reasons to fear Albanian retaliation or because their livelihoods depend on the Serbian administration or the smuggling it has enabled. But the guy who served me burek today may well be one of the many who never did any harm to his Albanian neighbors, would leap at the opportunity to double his sales and can be convinced to stay.
Statecraft is not only knowing when to act forcefully. It is also knowing when to act gently. My advice to Pristina is to be absolutely unequivocal about where the state borders of independent and sovereign Kosovo lie, but at the same time to offer to the Serb population of the north self-governance and even preferential treatment if they will stay and begin to participate in Kosovo’s institutions. I don’t see anything else that has a chance of restoring Kosovo’s territorial integrity.
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Macedonia is not an island
I’ve been out all day getting to Ohrid and back to Pristina, so haven’t posted or tweeted. The best I can do after eight hours of road travel is to offer a few summary tics of what I had to say at the conference celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Ohrid agreement, which ended the fighting in Macedonia in 2001 and ushered in a new era of stronger Albanian participation in the Macedonian state.
- Macedonia is not an island. The Ohrid agreement is mainly about internal governing arrangements: decentralization, representation of Albanians and others in the state institutions, police reform, use of languages. While the agreement unquestionably saved the state, it has also meant that Macedonians and Albanians in Macedonia have spent 10 years focused mainly on their own internal arrangements. There is a tendency to forget that what happens in Macedonia affects the region, and what happens in the region affects Macedonia. It is time for Macedonia to play a stronger role regionally, in particular by helping to make sure Kosovo and Bosnia are not partitioned.
- Changing the status of a boundary is not the same as moving a border to accommodate ethnic differences. Macedonia, Kosovo, Bosnia and Croatia all gained independence within well-recognized and accepted borders, some of which had previously been boundaries internal to former Yugoslavia. But none of these borders was moved from their previous positions. Belgrade today would like to move Kosovo’s border to hive off the Serb-populated portion of the north, with the explicit purpose of accommodating ethnic differences. That is fundamentally different from changing the status of a boundary. If we start down that road, we will never finish, or maybe we’ll finish but not peacefully.
- The era of separations in the Balkans is over, the era of reintegration has begun. In any event, the many after-shocks of the dissolution of former Yugoslavia are now clearly fading in magnitude and significance. There will be no more new states in the Balkans. What people need to focus on now is ensuring equality before the law for all their citizens, which is what makes me comfortable with being a minority in the United States: I’ve got precisely the same rights as the rich, white, male slave-holder Thomas Jefferson. That’s a good deal, if it can be implemented fully. The ultimate paean to the Ohrid agreement will be sung when people tell me its provisions are no longer required to ensure proper treatment of anyone.
This new era of reintegration is going to require vision and leadership that is sometimes lacking. Macedonia is facing a difficult choice. Greece is blocking its path to integration in NATO and the EU by refusing to allow it to enter until it adds a geographical qualifier to its constitutional name, since Greece claims “Macedonia” as its own. Prime Minister Gruevski, who notably did not attend the Ohrid conference and takes a negative view of the agreement, has remained adamant against this change, a position that gains him votes and avoids his having to call a referendum on a new constitution that he might lose.
The Albanian leadership in Macedonia is keen on NATO and EU membership. The former they regard as a guarantee of Macedonia’s internal security; the latter they see as eventually opening up Macedonia’s borders to Albanians in Kosovo and Albania. So refusal to compromise on the “name” issue gives the Albanians of Macedonia real heartburn.
None of this is insoluble. In fact, we’ve gone from doubts about the very existence and viability of the Macedonian state to doubts about what to call it, though I hasten to add that my own preference is to call it what its citizens want it to be called, which for now is “Macedonia.”
PS: I gratefully acknowledge Ylber Hysa, one of Kosovo’s finest, for suggesting the “Macedonia is not an island” theme.
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Reintegration requires a plan
Pristina is a lot cooler than I had anticipated–barely a cloud in the sky too. It looks a lot better under these weather conditions than raining or foggy, that’s for sure!
The weather may be clear and cool, but the security situation is not. Pristina’s move late last month to seize control of the two border posts with Serbia has inspired widespread support among Albanians in Kosovo, without triggering the inter-ethnic strife south of the Ibar River that some might have feared. But it did trigger Serb roadblocks and violence in the north that killed a Kosovo police officer and destroyed one of the border posts.
KFOR, the NATO force that deployed in Kosovo after the war with Serbia in 1999, has now taken charge of the border. Most imports from Serbia are blocked (humanitarian assistance and goods for the Serbiann Orthodox Church can pass). Belgrade and Pristina are to meet September 5 to try to find a way forward by September 15, when the agreement for KFOR control of the border gates expires.
What might be the solution? It really all depends on what is decided about the status of northern Kosovo, which has remained under Belgrade’s control since the war. Belgrade wants to keep it that way. Pristina wants to take control of what it regards as its sovereign border, with the Serb communities of the north enjoy the wide measure of autonomy allowed to them in the Ahtisaari plan, an international community product that Belgrade never accepted.
The three dimensions on which this game will be played include a) the situation on the ground in the north, b) Belgrade’s efforts to gain candidacy status for the EU as well as a date for the beginning of negotiations, and c) Pristina’s efforts to make its governance acceptable to the Serbs of the north.
The situation in the north
Belgrade will try to get back to the status quo ante, in which it controlled the border posts and refused to allow collection of Kosovo customs duties on the products crossing there. It woud also prevent Kosovo products from entering Serbia with a stamp and documentation reading “Kosovo customs.” This practice in the past deprived Pristina not only of an important export market but also of what it figures as $30-40 million euros per year of customs duties. It also fed a substantial operation smuggling untaxed products to the area south of the Ibar.
Pristina will try to prevent return to the previous situation and to ensure that its police and customs officers control the northern border, with the eventual goal of retintegrating the north with the rest of Kosovo under the Ahtisaari plan.
Belgrade’s EU ambitions
With elections likely early next year, Belgrade is looking this fall for the European Union to grant it status as a candidate for membership and a date for the beginning of negotiations. The issue is what it will have to do to achieve these substantial goals. It has already met the EU requirement to arrest the remaining war criminals. Now several European states appear to be insisting that it also agree to give up its territorial ambitions in northern Kosovo and agree to reintegration in accordance with the Ahtisaari plan, perhaps elaborated further.
German Foreign Minister Westerwelle appears to have said this in a visit to Pristina this week. The question is whether Chancellor Merkel will repeat the hard line in Belgrade when she visits August 24.
Pristina’s efforts
It is not going to be possible to force Pristina’s governance on the Serbs, who believe they have good reason to fear retaliation. The Ahtisaari plan would provide the northern municipalities with wide autonomy, but that is not in itself going to compensate for the loss of tens of millions of euros as well as a general lack of confidence, amounting to fear and loathing.
The Pristina authorities have tried to signal their willingness to provide substantial resources to the north and claim that Serb communities in the rest of Kosovo get far more per person from the government purse than Albanian majority communities do. They are going to have to make more efforts in this direction than they have made so far if they hope to convince anyone who lives in northern Kosovo.
What the situation requires is a goal and a plan. In my view, the goal should be reintegration of the north with the rest of Kosovo. With that kind of clarity, the international community successfully reintegrated Eastern Slavonia (a Serb-majority area) in Croatia and Brcko (a town contested by Muslims and Serbs in Bosnia). The plan needs to be worked out jointly between Pristina and Belgrade, with help from their European friends (and the occasional push from the Americans). Such a reintegration plan does not require Serbia to accept Kosovo’s independence–only its territorial integrity, which in any event is implicit in UN Security Council 1244, to which Belgrade appeals regularly.
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