BUSH’S NEXT BLIND LEAP?
By Charles Tannock

The Japan Times
September 24, 2007, Monday

Russia and the Kosovo card

TBILISI – Look before you leap is as sound a principle in foreign
policy as it is in life. Yet, once again, the Bush administration is
preparing to leap into the unknown.

Even though lack of foresight is universally viewed as a leading cause
of its Iraq debacle, the United States (with British backing probable)
is now preparing to recognize Kosovo’s independence unilaterally –
irrespective of the consequences for Europe and the world.

Kosovo has been administered since 1999 by a United Nations mission
guarded by NATO troops, although it remains formally a part of
Serbia. But, with Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian majority demanding its
own state, and with Russia refusing to recognize U.N. mediator Martti
Ahtisaari’s plan for conditional independence, the U.S. is preparing
to go it alone.

Instead of thinking what Ahtisaari deemed unthinkable, a partition
of Kosovo with a small part of the north going to Serbia and the rest
linked to the Kosovars ethnic brethren in Albania or a separate state,
the U.S. plans to act without the U.N.’s blessing, arguing that only
an independent Kosovo will bring stability to the Western Balkans.

That argument is debatable – and the record of the Kosovar government
suggests that it is wrong. But the U.S. position is unambiguously
misguided in not foreseeing that the "Kosovo precedent" will incite
instability and potentially even violence elsewhere.

Why the rush to give Kosovo independence? Many serious disputes have
gone unresolved for decades.

The Kashmir question has lingered since 1947, the Turkish occupation
of Northern Cyprus since 1974, and Israel’s occupation of the West
Bank from 1967. Yet no one is suggesting that unilateral solutions
be imposed in these potential flash points.

Nevertheless, the U.S. – and most European Union members – argue that
Kosovo’s situation is sui generis and will set no legally binding
international precedent. But Russia sees things very differently.

Indeed, it may seek to use this precedent to re-establish its
authority over the nations and territories that were once part of
the Soviet Union.

Spain and Cyprus, with their worries over secessionist-minded regions,
are worried by any possible precedent. Romania fears the fallout from
Kosovo’s unilaterally gaining independence on neighboring Moldova. The
worry is that Russia will unilaterally recognize the breakaway Moldovan
territory of Transdnistria, which Russian troops and criminal gangs
have been propping up for 16 years.

Ukraine – the great prize in Russia’s bid to recapture its former
sphere of influence – is also deeply anxious. It fears that Russia
will encourage separatist tendencies in Crimea, where the ethnic
Russian population forms a majority. (Crimea was ceded to Ukraine by
Nikita Khrushchev only in 1954).

Russia may decide to abuse the Kosovo precedent further to divide
Ukraine’s population between Russian speakers and Ukrainian speakers.

But the biggest risks posed by unilateral recognition of Kosovo’s
independence are in the South Caucasus, a region that abuts the
tinderbox of today’s Middle East. Here, there is a real danger that
Russia may recognize breakaway regions in the South Caucasus, –
and back them more strongly than it does now.

Even before Vladimir Putin became Russia’s president, the Kremlin was
making mischief in Georgia, issuing Russian passports to citizens
of Abkhazia (the largest breakaway region) and pouring money into
its economy. Russia’s supposed "peacekeeping troops" in Abkhazia and
South Ossetia, Georgia’s other secession-minded region, have in fact
protected their rebel governments. Russia has also been enforcing
a complete trade embargo on Georgia in the hope of weakening the
resolve of its pro-Western president, Mikhail Saakashvili.

Should Russia recognize Abkhazia’s independence, Saakashvili might be
tempted to respond militarily to prevent his country from unraveling.

Renewed conflict in Abkhazia would not only bring the risk of open
warfare with Russia, but strain relations with Armenia, as there
are near to 50,000 Armenians in Abkhazia who support the breakaway
government.

Another risk in the South Caucasus is that Russia (with Armenian
support) will recognize Nagorno-Karabakh’s self-proclaimed independence
from Azerbaijan. Nagorno-Karabakh, historically Armenian, endured
a secessionist war between 1988 and 1994, with 30,000 killed and
14 percent of Azerbaijan’s territory occupied by Russian-backed
Armenian forces.

Since then, oil has fueled an Azeri military buildup. So the government
in Baku is far more prepared to respond to renewed warfare than it was
in the 1990s. Moreover, it has neighboring Turkey on its side. Turkey
is already enforcing a punitive economic embargo on Armenia, including
closure of its border.

Military projections by the U.S. have repeatedly suggested that
Azerbaijan would lose such a battle, even with newly purchased
equipment and Turkish military support. Armenian forces are well dug in
and have received a significant boost from Russia’s diversion of heavy
weaponry to Armenia from some recently closed Georgian military bases.

Iran also must be factored into this equation, as it is becoming a
strategic investor by building an oil refinery just across its border
in Armenia, partly as a security measure in case of a U.S. attack
and partly to relieve its gasoline shortages. Moreover, Iran remains
eager to contain Azerbaijani revanchist claims over the large Azeri
minority in northern Iran.

The conflicts in Transdnistria and the South Caucasus are usually
called "frozen conflicts," because not much has happened since they
began in the early 1990s. Any unilateral move to give Kosovo its
independence is likely to unfreeze them – fast and bloodily. And such
potential bloodshed on Russia’s border may give Putin the pretext he
may desire to extend his rule beyond its constitutionally mandated
end next March.

Charles Tannock is a member of the European Parliament, where he is
spokesman on foreign affairs for the British Conservative Party.

Copyright Project Syndicate 2007 ()