Tag: European Union
Normalization
Two recent meetings between prime ministers of Serbia and Kosovo have opened a political-level dialogue aimed at “normalization.” What does that mean?
We know it does not mean what is really needed: mutual recognition and exchange of ambassadors. That is the “normal” relationship between sovereign states. Virtually all the problems between Kosovo and Serbia would be easier to solve if they accepted each other as such. But neither Belgrade nor Pristina would recognize the other tomorrow, Belgrade because it objects to what it terms Kosovo’s “unilaterally declared” (but in fact thoroughly coordinated) independence and Kosovo because Belgrade has designs on its territory, in particular the Serb-controlled north.
Diplomats deal with issues like this by starting a process, in this case a sui generis one called “normalization.” But it is not obvious what that really means. Where does it begin? What stages does it proceed through? How does it end? Here is my personal idea of what normalization might entail:
1. Belgrade and Pristina should resolve left-over issues from the war they fought in the late 1990s. Foremost among these is missing people. Neither side has given a full account of what it knows about people who were killed during and after the war. The latest figure I’ve seen is 1775 people unaccounted for. This is far too many 13 years later.
But there are other issues as well, including the difficult question of pensions Belgrade cut off in 1999, when the United Nations took over administration of Kosovo. The European Court of Human Rights has now ordered Serbia to pay these pensions, with interest. The total owed could be substantial. There are other property issues as well: state property and privately owned property for which owners have not received proper compensation.
2. Pristina and Belgrade should implement the agreements they have already reached. The most important of these is supposed to be implemented next month, with the start of “integrated border management” procedures on the boundary/border between Kosovo and Serbia, in accordance with EU standards. This is an important step, both because it will cut down on smuggling and because it will require serious cooperation between Kosovar and Serbian officials. Also largely unimplemented is the agreement for Belgrade to provide Pristina with copies of property (cadastral) records, taken from Kosovo at the end of the war to reinforce Belgrade’s claim to be the sovereign power even though its officials are no longer present on most of its territory.
If further agreements are reached on electricity and telecommunications, as is rumored, they should be implemented without the lengthy delays that characterized the earlier agreements. Normal relations means quick and cooperative implementation.
3. With the prime ministers meeting, it is time for others to meet as well. The political-level dialogue reached an agreement in principle to extend the Albania/Kosovo highway completed this year to its intended terminus near Nis. This won’t happen without Transport Ministers, Environment Ministers and Interior Ministers concerting their efforts to make it a reality. The road has tremendous potential to increase commerce and provide Serbia with an additional and possibly preferable outlet to the sea (the road to Thessaloniki is longer and lower quality).
With European integration the common goal of the two countries, there is every reason for the people responsible for preparing for EU accession to meet and compare notes. And there is good reason for ordinary citizens to meet and discuss mutual interests: commerce, professional cooperation, anti-corruption efforts, health and environmental standards–there is no lack of grist for the mill. The best way to ensure this kind of dialogue would be liaison offices in each others’ capitals. I am hearing that the plan is liaison offices in Brussels. That would at best be a step in the right direction, but insufficient to ensure the kind of continuous communication needed.
4. Belgrade should end its diplomatic campaign against Kosovo. Serbia has conducted a concerted campaign to prevent Kosovo from entering international organizations and block other states from recognizing it. This is unseemly at best, self-defeating at worst. More or less half the UN General Assembly now recognizes Kosovo. More will gradually do so. The five non-recognizers in the European Union are beginning to understand that non-recognition encourages partition proposals that are anathema to them. Some are accepting Kosovo passports and developing strong bilateral relations with Pristina. Serbia lost its battle Friday to prevent Kosovo entry into the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. Does it really want to lose many more battles, or would it be preferable to accept the inevitable?
Still, the Serbian campaign, which Belgrade has conducted with unwarranted intelligence and vigor, has prevented Kosovo from participating in the Olympics (one of its athletes also had an Albanian passport and joined its team), the Fédération Internationale de Football Association and the Eurovision Song Contest. This is inat, which is best defined by a joke all Balkans ethnicities tell about others. A farmer, offered three wishes by a genie, says his first is that his neighbor’s cow should die. “What good will that do you,” the genie asks? None, the farmer says, but it will make my neighbor really unhappy. Kosovo’s participation in international fora of all sorts should be an important part of normalization. It cannot be constructed on a foundation of inat, which has a way of becoming mutual.
5. Northern Kosovo needs to be reintegrated with the rest. At the end of the NATO/Yugoslavia war of 1999, Serbian security forces were supposed to be removed from all of Kosovo. They remained in the territory north of the Ibar river, where the population is majority Serb. It is difficult to say who really controls that territory now: certainly not Pristina or the internationals, but even the Serbian police and secret services are not in full control of an area that is tainted with smuggling and organized crime (with the police and secret services implicated but not necessarily in full control).
Belgrade and Pristina will need to cooperate intensively on reintegrating this territory back into Kosovo, with a large measure of self-governance provided by the internationally sanctioned Ahtisaari plan. This will involve some movement of former non-Serb residents of the north back to their homes. Some Serbs will be unlikely to want to stay in the north, even under the Ahtisaari plan provisions. Where they go and how they are accommodated are important issues on which Belgrade’s cooperation will be vital. Whatever happens with the north will be taken as a precedent for Serbs south of the Ibar and for Albanians in the Presevo area of southern Serbia. It will take wisdom and care to ensure that the reintegration conditions do not destabilize these areas.
6. Defense ministers and chiefs of staff should meet to consider how they can maintain the kind of transparency and mutual confidence that will ensure peace and stability. NATO-led (KFOR) forces have protected Kosovo since the 1999 war. It is unlikely they will still stick around in another five years. Both the U.S. and Europe want to move their troops to higher priorities. Kosovo will begin to arm its still largely unarmed “security forces” beginning in July.
Neither Kosovo nor Serbia should want to get into an arms race, which would be costly to their budgets and destabilizing to the neighborhood. But no democratically elected politician can hope to stay in office if he or she is unable to defend the population and territorial integrity of the state. If an arms race is to be avoided, Belgrade and Pristina have to give each other mutual assurances. The EU has asked that Serbia accept Kosovo’s territorial integrity. If Belgrade fails to do that, Pristina will have to find ways to protect itself from the threat of a Serbian armored incursion. NATO may also need to provide guarantees.
Bottom line: This is already a big agenda, and I’m sure I’ve missed some things. It would all be far easier if recognition and exchange of ambassadors came first. I trust that will become apparent as Pristina and Belgrade make their way through it. But if they prefer to do it ass backwards, “normalizing” a relationship between two capitals that do not accept each others’ sovereign authority, so be it. There is a lot of hard work ahead.
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Serbia and Kosovo have a unique opportunity
In less than a month, Serbian prime minister Ivica Dačić and his Kosovo counterpart Hashim Thaci have met twice in Brussels. The meetings are mediated by Baroness Catherine Ashton, the High Representative of the EU for foreign affairs and security policy. According to Dačić, the dialogue has been constructive. The two sides have agreed to put Integrated Border Management (IBM) of two disputed checkpoints into effect by December 10. Even the possibility of Serbia and Kosovo jointly constructing a highway connecting Priština and Niš, a town in southeastern Serbia, has been discussed.
The ongoing round of talks between Belgrade and Priština was preceded by a few weeks of aggressive, at moments even anti-European, rhetoric on the part of Dačić and Serbian president Tomislav Nikolić, leading a number of domestic observers to assume that the new Serbian government was about to renounce the process of European integration. Now that the negotiations have resumed, the contentious statements apparently served as a tactic to pacify hardline nationalists before taking bolder steps towards normalization of the relationship with Kosovo.
This time there is more reason for optimism. The elevation of the negotiations to a higher political level raises hope that more concrete results will be achieved. Besides, without tangible improvement in its relations with Kosovo, Serbia will no doubt fail to get a date for accession talks with EU. And without the date, the government in Belgrade cannot count on money from European pre-accession funds, which it badly needs in order to put its struggling economy and public finances in order. Russia might provide a temporary lifeline, but that by no means would suffice.
It is too early to speculate on how far is Serbia prepared to go in these negotiations, except that it will not officially recognize Kosovo’s independence. But beyond the formal recognition, there is plenty of room for Belgrade to operate within. Dačić’s government is at the beginning of its term, which is an opportune moment to take on most challenging issues. As proven nationalists, Dačić and his coalition partners from the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) are generally in a more favorable position to make substantial concessions to Priština than former president Boris Tadić was. A relatively weak opposition in parliament could also prove beneficial to the government.
Even more encouraging is the impression that Dačić has finally abandoned his idea of ethnic-based territorial partition of Kosovo. Instead, Belgrade will likely try to secure special autonomy for the Serb-dominated area north of the Ibar river, which basically comes down to some sort of “Ahtisaari plus.” Such a solution is far from ideal, not least because it would disfavor other Kosovo Serbs. But in situations like this, no solution is ideal. For that matter, Priština would do a great job if it managed to improve the safety of local Serbs from enclaves. It would help Kosovo not only refute Serbia’s accusations of deliberately failing to protect the Serb minority, but also earn credibility among countries that have not yet recognized its statehood, including the five EU members. A long history of inter-ethnic violence certainly makes things difficult for Kosovo authorities, but not impossible, provided that independent professional institutions, as well as instruments of civilian control, are strengthened.
Serbia, for its part, needs to dismantle parallel Serb institutions in four municipalities of northern Kosovo, as a sine qua non for the beginning of accession talks with EU. It will be anything but easy to do. To what extent hese parallel institutions’ activities are actually under control of the Serbian government is unclear. Theoretically, Belgrade might consider a total cutoff of financial support to the disobedient Serb leaders, but there is a danger that such an effort would be blocked by more nationalist elements within the ruling coalition. Serbia’s efforts to rein in the north could be further undermined by intra-governmental competition between Dačić and his first deputy Aleksandar Vučić for control over the security sector, which already, earlier than was expected, seems to be under way.
Meanwhile, public sentiment in Serbia has significantly changed regarding Kosovo, at least in one respect. Today, unlike a few years ago, most of the population does not count the former province even among top five political priorities. But while a majority of the Serbian people admit that Kosovo is a de facto independent state, they nonetheless insist that the government should never recognize it. A recent opinon poll, conducted by Ipsos Strategic Marketing and B92, has shown that two thirds of those surveyed would choose Kosovo over Serbia’s EU membership in a potential referendum. This attitude is obviously a result of defiance rather than rationality. Even if Serbia withdrew from European integration, Kosovo would still remain its neighbor.
Most important for Dačić’s government is that whatever it eventually decides to do about Kosovo, including even formal recognition, is unlikely to spark major protest. Oddly, people in Serbia have become largely indifferent to their government’s Kosovo policy. While obstacles to the establishment of neighborly relations still exist, they are getting both fewer and smaller going forward. After years of seemingly insolvable dispute, Serbia and Kosovo have a unique opportunity to make a huge step forward. It is now up to the two governments to do the right thing for the sake of their people’s brighter future.
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Balkan lessons
I spoke at a European Council on Foreign Relations/Ministry of Foreign Affairs conference last week here in Pristina, Kosovo about lessons learned in the Balkans interventions. Bosnia and Kosovo were by no means model efforts, and the first lesson of intervention is that context matters. It would be a mistake to think what worked and did not would necessarily be the same in, say Syria, as in the Balkans.
But I do think there are some things worth thinking about when contemplating intervention in other parts of the world. There are three at the top of my list:
1. Act together. When the United States and Europe, which are the major players in Balkans interventions, act together, things often go better. Note that this is not a matter of shared values, which is what diplomats often emphasize, but rather common enterprise.
Europe and the U.S. in fact do not always share values that are relevant to the Balkans. Europe believes in group (minority) rights that do not exist in the U.S. and are in fact antithetical to American (and French) thinking. But this did not prevent the U.S. and Europe from cooperating in implementation of the Dayton agreements (based on group rights principles). There was also good cooperation in negotiating the Ohrid agreement that saved Macedonia from an interethnic war in 2001. Most recently, the joint trip of Lady Ashton and Secretary of State Clinton to the Balkans sent strong messages to Bosnia, Serbia and Kosovo.
2. Do the right things. It is not enough to act together with other major intervenors. You also have to be doing the right things.
The U.S. and Europe acted together to allow Greece to block Macedonia’s entry into NATO, which is a bad thing to have done together. Likewise, the EU and the U.S. ganged up together to push badly formulated amendments to the Bosnian constitution (the Butmir process, as it was known) in 2009. By the same token, if the five EU countries that have not recognized Kosovo would do so, thus joining the 22 that have (as well as the U.S.), it would make an enormous difference to eliminating the remaining risks to peace and stability in the Balkans. The EU’s recent “progress report” on Bosnia’s accession prospects aligns the Union more closely with the U.S. view that the central government in Bosnia is not strong enough to implement the obligations of EU membership. That could change the calculus of Bosnian politicians in important ways.
3. Use all the instruments, civilian and military. If you are going to bother intervening, it would seem natural to use all the instruments of national power pointing in the same directions, but that is in fact the exception rather than the rule.
This is where Dick Holbrooke made his real contribution in the Balkans, because he gained control of all the levers of American power and pointed them in the same direction. The EU is particularly inept at this: witness the distribution of its troops in militarily meaningless small units all over Bosnia, and the lackadaisical use of its massive rule of law mission in northern Kosovo, with European troops more interested preventing trouble than in clamping down on organized crime there. Admittedly, getting 27 countries to agree to use civilian and military instruments with vigor to achieve clear and compelling goals is not easy. But it is what is needed if Europe is to pretend to be a serious international intervenor in the future. It isn’t easy to get the State Department and the Defense Department to point in the same direction at the same time either.
These to me are useful lessons for future international intervention, if there is to be any. Both Europe and the U.S. are trying assiduously to avoid it if possible. But every president of the United States since the fall of the Berlin wall has tried to avoid state-building missions. Each has found he cannot without leaving behind a mess that is inimical to American interests. I have no reason to believe the pattern will change, so a few lessons are in order.
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No patriot
I enjoyed a pleasant Sunday afternoon walk through Pristina yesterday. Its alleys are crowded. But it also boasts vistas. Variety is one of the things that makes a place interesting. And with variety comes the unexpected, both good and bad.
Normally I wouldn’t comment on what amounts to an individual criminal act. The bad is inevitable. But the wounding Saturday evening of a Serb traveling south of the Ibar river just a few miles from where I am spending a couple of days merits a blog post, because it has broader significance.
The country I am enjoying on my third visit this year is a peaceful one that has established institutions rating a positive EU report suggesting it is ready to negotiate a Stabilization and Association Agreement. This is a big deal, not only for the benefits that will accrue to Kosovo once the agreement is signed but also for the seal of approval “contractual relations” (i.e. signing an agreement) with the EU will give to Pristina’s still young institutions, which are now more or less at the half-way point of recognition as sovereign by other UN member states.
The safety of Serbs is one of the key ingredients in determining EU attitudes on contractual relations. Brussels wants to know that the Pristina institutions are committed to protecting everyone who lives in or visits the territory under their control, without regard to ethnicity.
Of course 100% security is not possible, and I’ll admit that I am a bit surprised that a former Serb police chief felt free to travel after dark in Kosovo. And there is of course no knowing the ethnicity of his attacker, who was reportedly masked. We’ll have to await the results of the police investigation.
But that is just the point. There should be a serious police investigation and some results, which are far too infrequent in such cases in Kosovo. Too many crimes against Serbs and other minorities go unsolved.
Whoever perpetrated the attack Saturday evening is putting at risk Kosovo’s claim to be ready to negotiate an important first step in its eventual accession to the EU. I don’t know the person’s identity or ethnicity, but this much I do know: he is no Kosovo patriot.
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Pas de deux
After twenty years and more of objecting to Macedonia calling itself Macedonia and months of avoiding direct contact, even in the presence of the UN mediator, the Greek Foreign Minister sent a friendly message to his counterpart in Skopje at the beginning of October suggesting a memorandum of understanding “outlining the basic parameters of a possible mutually acceptable solution” including “the general principles governing good neighbourly relations.” A month later the Macedonian Foreign Minister responded in an equally friendly tone. What’s going on here? Are we really making progress on this silly but so far insoluble problem?
I doubt it. There are clear hints in the letters exchanged that no agreement is likely any time soon. The Greek letter and MOU fail to mention the Interim Accord of 1995, which the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December 2011 found Greece had violated. It requires Greece not to block Macedonia’s membership in international, multilateral and regional organizations under the name “Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.”
Athens instead proposes a new MOU that includes the following language:
the name agreed upon [in the future] will be used by all erga omnes and for all purposes.
This means Macedonia would have to change its name throughout its constitution as well as in all its official correspondence, documents and buildings, a condition that Athens knows is unacceptable to Skopje. While one of my Greek readers has suggested that this is negotiable, there is no sign of that in the Athens letter or text.
The response from Skopje is likewise friendly but no more forthcoming. It brushes off the Greek proposal with mention of the Interim Accord, which it clearly prefers to the proposed MOU, and the ICJ decision, which went entirely in Skopje’s favor.
So what’s going on here, if not a move towards resolution of this dreadful dispute? It seems to me likely that both sides are trying to avoid responsibility for what happens in December, when the European Council will meet and likely decide not to offer Skopje a date for the start of EU accession talks, because of a Greek veto. Athens wants to be able to say that it offered a way out that Skopje rejected. Skopje wants to be able to say that it responded positively to the Greek initiative without result.
This is diplomatic ballet, likely coached by high-priced consultants on both sides. It would be fun to watch, if it hadn’t already gone on far too long.
Greece is in blatant violation of an ICJ decision. It is a testimony to European fecklessness that 26 EU members don’t dare tell Athens it needs to back down and settle for a definitive solution farther down the pike, when Macedonia is at the threshold of EU membership. Macedonian politicians of all stripes acknowledge that will be necessary.
Washington deserves no more credit than the 26. It allowed Greece to block NATO membership for Macedonia at the Chicago summit in May, while Macedonian soldiers were guarding NATO headquarters in Kabul.
Those seeking equity must do equity. The music and the pas de deux should stop. In the absence of a resolution of the name issue, Skopje should get a date to start EU accession talks and it should enter NATO as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, as the Interim Accord requires, at the next NATO summit in 2014. Athens’ greatest leverage will come when Skopje is ready for accession. That is the time to settle the name issue.
Of course if Athens and Skopje decide they can settle the issue now, that’s all right too. I’ll be glad if they prove me wrong, but I doubt that is what is in the cards.
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Balkans progress, at risk of slowing
My blogging hiatus since Wednesday morning was not planned. But I flew Wednesday overnight to Pristina, where I found myself Thursday afternoon and Friday in a conference where the internet connection did not work. This turned out to be fortunate, as unbeknownst to me the conference was mostly off the record. My intended live blogging would have violated the rules. But I’ll try here to convey some of the gist of the public opening as well as the session on “a post-American Europe?,” respecting Chatham House rules.
The Foreign Ministry/European Council on Foreign Relations event aimed to showcase Kosovo’s success and demonstrate that its experience and interests extend well beyond its narrow borders. My notes on the President’s and Foreign Minister’s presentations–which were on the record–disappeared into the ether, but they were at pains to underline that Kosovo has completed its period of supervised independence, welcomed the recent visit of Secretary of State Clinton and European Union High Representative Ashton and is now engaged seriously in a political-level dialogue with Belgrade, which was renewed earlier in the week in a meeting between the Serbian and Kosovo prime ministers.
The Europeans and Americans present welcomed these developments, naturally. No one dissented from the view that Europe and America need to act together in the Balkans. The hypotheses of a post-American Europe and a post-European America were both roundly denounced. The EU, because it is not united on issues like recognition of Kosovo and the Macedonia “name” question, cannot handle the Balkans alone. The U.S. should not expect to be able to turn its attention entirely to Asia. It has an indispensable role in southeast Europe.
The common American and European objective is EU membership for all the Balkan states, and NATO membership for those who want it. This will require not just dialogue but “normalization” of good neighborly relations between Pristina and Belgrade. The Ashton/Clinton visit was a symbol of joint understanding and common objectives: integration of the Balkans into the Euro-Atlantic community, support for the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina, no change of borders in the Balkans. There is even reason to hope that the five non-recognizers of Kosovo are rethinking and might change their minds.
Europe is going through a difficult economic patch, but longer-term optimism is justified. Neither the euro nor EU is going away. U.S./European trade and investment is gigantic (55% of U.S. foreign investment is in Europe). The security relationship is vital. The U.S. is far from forgetting about the Balkans, because it needs them integrated into a stronger Europe that can partner with Washington in other parts of the world.
The 2014 NATO Summit will include enlargement, with Macedonia (if it can get past its problems with Greece) and Montenegro the prime candidates. Others will join later. Only Serbia has doubts, but Belgrade may well come on board once it sees all its neighbors in the Alliance. A Serbian alliance with Russia is not a serious alternative. The future of the Balkans lies in what it can contribute to resolving global issues, which can best be done through the EU and NATO.
The Macedonia “name” issue, on which Athens and Skopje have recently exchanged notes, will be resolved, but it is not clear when. Giving Macedonia a date at the EU Summit in December for opening negotiations for EU membership would help. All Macedonian politicians acknowledge that the issue has to be fully resolved before Skopje’s entry into the EU. The states in the Balkans need to take more responsibility for solving their own problems. Otherwise they risk facing not only enlargement fatigue but also Balkans fatigue.
Some would like to see the EU open accession negotiations with all the remaining Balkans non-members of the EU in 1914, marking the 100th anniversary of World War I. Others rejected this idea, underlining that the accession process is merit-based and clear criteria have to be met. The EU is now front-loading rule of law and governance issues (including corruption and organized crime), to avoid the problems it faced after accession of Bulgaria and Romania.
The tedious merit-based EU process creates a credibility gap: people in the Balkans are finding the prospect of membership too distant to create meaningful incentives for reform. The EU needs to find ways of providing intermediate incentives, as well as ways of keeping the U.S. engaged. Otherwise, the Balkans may slide back into their usual pathologies: ethnic nationalism, state control of the economy, organized crime and political stagnation.
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