PLAY ON WITHOUT THE RUSSIANS

The Globe and Mail (Canada)
August 1, 2007 Wednesday

Serbia is stalling and a unilateral declaration of independence is
not in the cards, leaving just one clear option

ROBERT AUSTIN, Teaches history and politics of southeastern Europe
at the Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto.

Kosovo’s fast track to independence from Serbia has stalled
considerably in recent weeks, due to Russian opposition on the United
Nations Security Council. Kosovo’s key supporters in Europe and the
United States have made it clear that Kosovo will eventually get its
independence and are calling for the Albanians to be patient. There
is even a call for more negotiations between Serbs and Albanians.

What happens now? And, given that previous negotiations yielded no
compromises, what is the point of more talks?

Kosovo’s Albanian leaders are hinting that if things don’t start moving
again, they will have no other choice but a unilateral declaration
of independence. Agim Ceku, the Prime Minister, has even stated that
the date will be Nov. 28, unless things are resolved earlier.

Kosovo officials, who had thought everything would be completed by
the end of May, have modified Mr. Ceku’s comments, saying they would
not do anything without explicit approval from Europe and the United
States. But at this point, the credibility of the entire government
is in doubt – having made some serious promises, they have to deliver
something. The population is restive and there are fears that more
delays mean more violence.

The Security Council is attempting a resolution that adopts a proposal
drafted by former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, providing
for a monitored form of independence in Kosovo. The European Union
and United States have been steadfast in support of Mr. Ahtisaari’s
plan. However, Russia has said it is unwilling to back a solution
that is unacceptable to the Serb leadership in Belgrade.

Moreover, there is a fear of precedents: If Kosovo gets its
independence, Russian President Vladimir Putin asks, what about the
Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh or the Abkhaz in Georgia?

The list of unresolved ethnic conflicts is long and it’s not just
the Russians thinking about precedents. Mr. Putin has succeeded
not only in defending Serb control but in articulating the fears of
many states that dread the long-term implications of independence for
Kosovo. European leaders have been, until now, politely reminding the
Russians that Kosovo is ultimately a European problem, not a Russian
one, and that it is Europeans who will pay the price of any further
instability. Russia no doubt likes the fact that Kosovo poses such
problems for Europe, so they always prefer the status quo.

Let’s first be clear about the future for Kosovo. Mr. Ahtisaari’s
proposal would not make Kosovo totally independent. It would allow
Kosovo to join international institutions and could open the way for
a UN seat. However, it also allows for the continuation of Kosovo’s
status as a protectorate.

>From the 1999 NATO intervention until now, the province has been under
the UN’s not-so-perfect tutelage. The proposal would simply shift the
protectorate to the (hopefully more rigorous) European Union. Kosovo
would be run by an "international civilian representative" appointed
by the EU, which would hold ultimate authority. Security would
still be covered by NATO. The mission would be open-ended and open
to interpretation.

This would hardly be an independent state. The powers backing the
proposal hope that, over time, Kosovo’s independence will become
more palatable in Serbia. Mr. Ahtisaari’s proposal is an exercise in
postponement, in the hope that EU integration will eventually make
the Kosovo problem obsolete.

Belgrade’s position, which maintains that Serbia is willing to offer
its province of Kosovo "more than autonomy but less than independence,"
is untenable. In essence, Belgrade’s policy is grounded simply in one
thing: The Serbs want Kosovo, just not the Albanians who live there.

The negotiations that preceded Mr. Ahtisaari’s final proposal made
clear that the Albanians were negotiating, while the Serbs were not.

With Moscow’s help, Belgrade wants to indefinitely postpone a
solution. The Serbian parliament has announced that it will take
measures against any country that recognizes Kosovo.

While losing a significant portion of territory would be an extremely
bitter pill for Serbia to swallow, the proposal permits the minority
Serb community remaining in Kosovo maximum authority, by way of all
kinds of qualified majority voting and other policies. Serbia itself
would retain a not insignificant role inside Kosovo. In short, never
before has so much been done by a majority (the Albanians) toward a
minority (the Serbs). The document desperately tries to maintain the
fiction that Kosovo is an ethnically diverse place. It’s not. More
than 90 per cent of the population is ethnically Albanian.

A unilateral declaration of independence is not in anyone’s best
interest, even Kosovo’s. It could cause a split among EU member states
and it will certainly raise tensions within the Balkans.

It’s clear that only the Ahtisaari proposal offers a clear way ahead
for the last big problem in the Balkans. This means that Europe and
the United States must be prepared to move ahead without the Russians.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress