KOSOVO-KARABAKH – STRATEGIC FORK: VIKTOR YAKUBYAN
Regnum, Russia
Nov 13 2006
Continuing the discussion about the role of the "Kosovo precedent" in
the resolution of the conflicts in the territory of the former USSR,
REGNUM publishes the article of the expert on the South Caucasus
Viktor Yakubyan.
Time precedent
Vladimir Putin: "The decisions on Kosovo should be of universal
nature. This is an extremely important question for us – not
only because we advocate the observance of the principles of
the international law but also because we have purely practical
interests… Not all the post-Soviet conflicts are yet resolved. We
can’t use different principles every time."
It seems that the most symptomatic peculiarity of the "Kosovo
precedent" is a kind of "casus tempi" – the case of the time it is
developing in. This casus can be compared with the English Future In
the Past, when the event has not yet taken place but its precedent
is already being actively discussed. Despite this peculiarity, the
"Kosovo precedent" is a product of the Russian politics, and so,
it can be compared with the interests of other conflicting parties
only in the context of the Russian interest.
A precedent that has not yet taken place is ambiguous. The side
offering it for a global political discussion must be sure that it will
not be the loser in whatever outcome this precedent may bring to. And,
vice versa, the sides who are involuntarily involved in this "casus"
have the right to choose between two or more scenarios of action. At
the same time, those sides must be ready for new pressures in case of
a negative outcome for ones and a positive outcome for the others. In
such a case – just as always – the primary task of each of them will
be the ability to assert their own positions irrespective of the
presence or absence of a precedent. To reiterate, the side offering
the "potential precedent" – in this particular case, Russia – must
ensure that this precedent works out in any case.
Obviously, there are four groups of players in the "Kosovo precedent"
game:
1. The author of the "casus" – Russia.
2. The authors of the Balkan repartition and the opponents of the
Russian initiative – the US and the EU.
3. De facto independent: Kosovo, Abkhasia, Transdniestria,
Nagorno-Karabakh and South Ossetia.
4. De facto non-integral: Serbia, Georgia, Moldova and Azerbaijan.
If for the third group the "Kosovo precedent" is acceptable only if
Kosovo is fully recognized, for the fourth group it is acceptable if
Kosovo is annexed to Serbia and subdued to Belgrade. If for the second
group it is absolutely unacceptable because it is the initiative of
Moscow, for the Russian side it is acceptable in any case as it is
a very strong lever for Russia to restore its political weight over
a vast geo-political area.
It should be noted that they in Moscow seem to perfectly realize
that none of the conditions allowing one or another group to smoothly
push its "precedent" through will be ensured – especially after the
referendum in Serbia, when the Serbs have put in their Constitution
a point saying that Kosovo is integral part of Serbia. The western
diplomacy cannot avoid the "potential precedent" as, initially, it
was exactly the West who undertook to resolve the Kosovo problem. And
this very resolution (whatever it is) will become a precedent – i.e.
they in the West will create the precedent themselves, like it or not.
It seems they like it, but, naturally, they want to turn it exclusively
into their own advantage. In the international law there have always
been problems with normative standards – for, as the fable says "the
stronger always blames the weaker," and no law can change this. In the
last 15 years the international law has turned from "precedental" into
"situational" i.e. precedents are interpreted exclusively depending
on who the specific situation in the specific conflicting region
benefits. And there were plenty of such precedents throughout the
last Balkan crisis (by the way, it is not over yet).
In this particular case, the situation is not yet clear, and there
is still a certain uncertainty about the "frozen conflicts" in the
post-Soviet area. That’s probably why we can be sure that neither the
unrecognized republics of the third group nor the non-integral states
of the fourth group have special illusions about the "precedent."
Thus, the "Kosovo precedent," as it is, is especially important now
that it has not yet been played, i.e. until the situation is finalized.
Possible scenarios for Kosovo
The US and the EU planned 2006 to be decisive for the Kosovo status.
No need to prove that the interests of the Kosovan Albanians and
Serbs have been and are the least the Americans are interested in.
What they really want is to maximally correctly stop the bloody Balkan
epic by parceling Yugoslavia out into as few multi-cultural units
as possible. And exactly at the end of this project, when Kosovo was
had been brought very close to independence, Russia appeared with a
generally inconvenient argument. Before that, the process of Kosovo’s
self-determination had been artificially sped up from the formula
"first the standards then the status" to the formula "the standards
at the same time with the status."
As of now there is no specific formula for Kosovo’s future status. In
his report the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy Kai Eide says:
"There will not be any good moment for addressing Kosovo’s future
status. It will continue to be a highly sensitive political issue.
Nevertheless, an overall assessment leads to the conclusion that
the time has come to commence this process." Eide means that at the
initial stage Kosovo should be given "conditional independence," which
will develop into full one in the course of the region’s integration
into the EU.
The Contact Group’s Nov 2005 Guiding Principles for a Settlement of
the Status of Kosovo say that Kosovo should not be partitioned or
annexed to any other country or part of a country and that the sides
should not return to the situation before Mar 1999. At the same time,
the principles do not rule out the existence of two Albanian states.
Serbia strongly objects to the prospect of Kosovo’s independence,
and the new Serbian Constitution clearly shows that. At the same time,
it is obvious that very few people in Belgrade believe that they will
be able to get Kosovo back.
The former employee of the US Department of State and Senate Jim
Jatras says that the talks between the Serbian and Kosovan leaders
will not lead to agreement as the Serbs refuse to accept Kosovo’s
independence, while the Albanians keep saying that independence is
the only acceptable way for them. When the talks come to a final
deadlock, the only possible way for the international community will
be to try to impose a ready-made settlement on Serbia, most probably,
a Contact Group recommendation, which will be finalized into a UN SC
resolution and will replace the existing resolution 1244, saying that
Kosovo is part of Serbia. Jatras notes that Russia has the right to
say a strong "no" to the new resolution and even to put a veto on it,
but he is inclined to believe that Russia will not break the West’s
agenda on Kosovo and will prefer to turn this situation into profit
in its neighboring regions. Here, too, Russia will try to avoid
unnecessary problems with the Bush administration.
Meanwhile, after the results of the referendum in Serbia, EU
spokeswoman Krisztina Nagy said that the future of Kosovo depends not
on the results of the constitutional referendum in Serbia but on the
results of the relevant UN-sponsored talks. She said that the status
of Kosovo has nothing to do with the referendum in Serbia. She noted
that the Albanians have not taken part in the voting and its results
are contrary to the Kosovo settlement talks.
Thus, this is a classic stalemate or status quo, and its breach
will result in the final exodus of Serbs from Kosovo and political
destabilization in Serbia, where quite weak authorities have shouldered
quite a heavy "constitutional" responsibility for a problem they don’t
even control. De jure independence of Kosovo will inevitably result in
a new wave of ethnic clashes, particularly, in Vojvodina, where there
are many Hungarians, and southern Serbia, with a big Albanian minority.
Reverting to the opinion that Russia can put an end to Kosovo’s
independence by saying that it will veto any resolution on this issue,
I would like to note that it will hardly benefit Moscow to show such
a stance at such a critical moment. Veto is the last argument Russia
ought to use, while the principle of "potential precedent" gives Moscow
a wide room for maneuver. It seems that, under such circumstances,
the West has nothing left but to freeze the Kosovo process for better
times for fear that it may become the author of de facto precedent.
No coincidence that the US State Department is painstakingly copying
the passages about Kosovo’s independence from the reports and
recommendations of the International Crisis Group and similar NGOs.
Jatras says that those organizations have played a decisive role in the
"colored" revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine (not mentioning Serbia)
and still hope to "democratize" Russia.
It should be noted that the US has got into quite an absurd
situation. On the one hand, they fear that an excessive delay in the
Kosovo process will lead to the loss of control over the situation –
when the Albanians will stop playing "democracy" and will continue
the process according to their own scenario. On the other hand, they
are witnessing a steadily growing radicalism in Serbia. For the US,
any "Kosovo precedent" is important in terms of its relations with
the Muslim world of the "Big Middle East."
Kosovo parallels
Arkady Ghoukassyan: "If the world community is ready to recognize
the independence of Montenegro and Kosovo, I think it will be very
hard for them to explain why they don’t recognize Nagorno-Karabakh…"
There is a great deal of logic in what the president of the
unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic says. However, experience
shows that not every logic evolves into a relevant process. In fact,
even after the recognition of Kosovo, the world community may give no
explanation to Nagorno-Karabakh, but Russia has a good ground to demand
one. Moscow will get a chance to demand resolution of the conflicts
that are dangerous for its citizens and will do it according to the
generally applied scheme – by recognizing a de facto independent
state entity.
The foot-dragging of the Kosovo settlement until the resolution of
the post-Soviet conflicts is quite unpromising but most probable
scenario. In this case, the protracted status quo will lead to the
legislative consolidation of Kosovo’s de facto independence.
Particularly, the Kosovo government institutions, who are sanctioned
by the UN and OSCE and internationally recognized as an "interim"
administration, will be given the status of "permanent" authorities.
And it will become much harder to abolish those authorities than to
recognize them de jure.
The subordination of Kosovo to Serbia is an almost impracticable
scenario, which, if put into practice, will also become a precedent –
a precedent that will show that the western diplomacy has failed in
the Balkans, that the whole Balkan process was in vain and thousands
of innocent people have died for nothing.
No direct parallels are admissible between Kosovo and
Nagorno-Karabakh. In fact, there are no direct parallels as such. At
the same time, there are hundreds of tiny threads that sew these two
processes together. Kosovo is not a guiding star for Nagorno-Karabakh
as Nagorno-Karabakh’s de facto independence is not the result of NATO
carpet bombings but of a national-liberation war.
In fact, the "Kosovo precedent" is a classic "strategic fork" provoked
between the Balkans and the CIS and fraught with two scenarios.
The first scenario is the obvious precedent or de jure recognition
of Kosovo’s independence. This precedent will immediately bring the
post-Soviet conflicts to a new level. Grown from nothing by the
US and international organizations, the "Kosovan statehood" will
become an ace in the hands of self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh,
Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Transdniestria. The latter believe –
and not without reason – that their state-building achievements,
not mentioning their legal grounds, are much more substantial. The
formation of the unrecognized post-Soviet republics is the result of
the centrifugal processes following the USSR collapse. And so, this
process seems quite logical as, initially, there were absolutely no
guarantees that the Soviet empire would fall into exactly 15 pieces.
Likewise, there was no limit for the quantity of post-Yugoslav states.
The second scenario is the non-obvious precedent or delayed Kosovo
status, which, as we have already said, will be gradually crystallizing
into existing status quo. The long-term transitional status and broad
powers and legalized administrative institutions in Kosovo will, in the
long run, lead to the formation of Kosovan state, i.e. to the birth
of the selfsame obvious precedent. In this case, the unrecognized
post-Soviet states will witness the practical legalization of the
status quo that has been present in Kosovo since 1999, and this
practice will be automatically applied to even longer status quos
in Nagorno-Karabakh (1994), Abkhazia (1994), South Ossetia (1991)
and Transdniestria (1992).
The selfsame Nagorno-Karabakh will not hesitate to use both the
obvious "Kosovo precedent" – if Kosovo is proclaimed independent –
and the non-obvious "Kosovo precedent" – if the long-term status
quo is legalized. This has no connection with the quantity of oil
produced in Azerbaijan. In fact, this has connection with the global
experience of ethnic conflict resolution, when there is no precedent
of forcible subordination of de facto independent units of former
metropolises, while there are de jure recognized East Timor, Eritrea,
Montenegro, de facto recognized Kosovo and de facto independent
Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Transdniestria. The latter do need
beneficial precedents. However, the problem as such is not so much
about the events in the Balkans but about the survival of Armenians
in Nagorno-Karabakh, Ossetians in South Ossetia and Abkhazians in
Abkhazia.
NATO in the Balkans and the chronicle of the birth of a precedent: Note
The NATO military campaign against Yugoslavia lasted from Mar 24 to
June 10 1999 (79 days). On Mar 24 1999 NATO Secretary General Javier
Solana declared that NATO was starting an operation Allied Force in
order to protect the moral values of Europe of XXI. NATO’s proclaimed
goal was to prevent a humanitarian disaster following the genocidal
policy of the Yugoslavian authorities against ethnic Albanians.
19 NATO member-states from Europe and North America took part in the
operation. The core of the Allied Force was naval and air forces
of the US, the UK, France and Germany. Belgium, Hungary, Denmark,
Spain, Italy, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and Turkey
provided their troops and territories. Neutral Albania, Bulgaria,
FYR Macedonia and Romania provided air spaces and territories.
The air forces consisted of almost 400 planes, the naval forces –
of US and NATO combat ships, deployed in the Adriatic Sea, and the
NATO permanent contingent in the Mediterranean. Some 14,000 bombs
(a total of 23,000 bombs and missiles) with a total weight of 27,000
tons were dropped during the 79 days of the operation. The US alone
dropped over 1,000 cluster bombs. A total of 2,300 bombing-missile
attacks were made on 995 facilities. Over 1,000 bombers took part in
the most intensive bombardment on May 20-21 night. On the last days,
the NATO air forces made as many as 1,000-1,200 sorties a day.
The death toll ranges from 1,200, according to the UN, to over 1,300
(400 children), according to the Yugoslav side. 6,000 people were
wounded. 250,000-300,000 Serbs fled from Kosovo together with over
700,000 refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina. The purely military
effect was insignificant. Despite the NATO reports that they had
destroyed lots of military facilities, it later turned out that the
aggressors brewed up just a few tanks and infantry vehicles.
The economic damage caused to Yugoslavia by the NATO operation
made up $100bln. The NATO troops destroyed almost 90 historical and
cultural monuments, over 300 schools, universities and libraries,
over 20 hospitals, almost 40,000 apartment houses, some 80 bridges.
They damaged radio and TV, the oil refinery in Panchevo, an
agricultural aircraft plant, fertilizer factories, camps of refugees
from Bosnia and Herzegovina, almost 200 medical facilities. Over
2.5 million people were left without jobs. There are still plenty
of unexploded cluster bombs in Kosovo and the Adriatic Sea. WHO
reports that 150 Kosovans were blown up in the first month after
the operation. UN experts report real ecological disasters in some
regions of Yugoslavia.
On July 10 1999 the NATO Secretary General ordered to stop the
bombings and to start deploying NATO peacekeepers in Kosovo. The
UN SC resolution 1244 of June 10 1999 empowered the UN mission to
execute civil administration in Kosovo. The same resolution approved
the deployment of NATO KFOR peacekeeping force.
On Sept 3 1999 the UN Mission in Kosovo abolished the currency law of
Yugoslavia and established customs control with FYR Macedonia. On Sept
20 the Kosovo Liberal Army was reorganized into a Kosovo Protection
Corps comprising 5,000 people, of whom 200 had the right to carry
arms. Serbs withdrew from the Kosovo interim council. On Oct 19 the
UN Mission and the KFOR dismissed the proposals of the Kosovan Serbs
to form their own cantons and to have their own protection corps. An
Interim Administration Mission was formed in Kosovo on Dec 15. The
local Serbs refused to take part in it. On Jan 12 2000 the mission was
enlarged from 14 to 35 members. The first 167 of total 400 judges were
appointed on Jan 24 2000. This marked the beginning of the formation of
the Kosovan judiciary system in line with the Criminal Code of Serbia
of 1989. On Mar 9 2000 the UN Mission started issuing passports to
Kosovo citizens. On Apr 14 the OSCE Mission formed a central electoral
commission for ensuring the conduct and control of elections.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
