Tag: Democracy and Rule of Law
Now criminals use intelligence agencies
Vreme, a Belgrade weekly, has given permission for me to republish this recent interview with Saša Janković. The interviewer was Nedim Sejdimovic. Included at the end are two questions and answers not published in Vreme.
Saša Janković was the first Ombudsman of Serbia, a man who, along with his team, established and developed the institution of the Protector of Citizens from 2007 to 2017. Soon after its establishment, it became the most important state control mechanism, representing citizens’ interests and enjoying their unequivocal trust. Following a call from a part of the public (100 public figures) to run as a candidate in the 2017 presidential elections, Saša Janković resigned from his position as Ombudsman and went head-to-head against Aleksandar Vučić. In the elections, he garnered nearly 600,000 votes in a perfectly unfair battle. After the elections, he founded the Free Citizens’ Movement and became its first president. However, in December of the following year, he resigned and announced that he would no longer pursue a political career.
Janković is a lawyer by profession, with a post-graduate specialization in national and global security from the Faculty of Political Sciences in Belgrade. He currently works as an international consultant for human rights and oversight in the security sector.
“VREME”: Aleksandar Vulin, head of BIA (the Serbian civilian Security-Intelligence Agency), has found himself on the U.S. government’s blacklist, among other things, due to “involvement in transnational organized crime, illegal operations related to narcotics, and abuse of public office.” How did this man end up at the helm of the secret service?
SAŠA JANKOVIĆ: Vulin was appointed to all positions, including the head of BIA, due to his loyalty to Aleksandar Vučić, without whom he would have remained a minor political figure. Not to be misunderstood, loyalty is an important trait in politics. Without it, at the first crisis, everything falls apart and everyone goes home “the smartest,” but as losers. I know how I fared in politics because I did not pay attention to the loyalty of my associates, taking it for granted. However, loyalty alone is not a sufficient qualification for leading a ministry or a secret service. It does not justify steering Serbia towards an increasingly dangerous foreign policy course, nor pursuing a violent domestic policy. Both are causing this country, its institutions, and its citizens to burst at the seams, although, Vučić and Vulin would disagree. Anyways, the responsibility for appointing Vulin to that position lies with Vučić, not with Vulin himself.
Q: Apart from loyalty, what else can be said about Vulin’s role in Vučić’s government?
A: Despite all the mockery directed towards Vučić from the opposition, his government is well-organized. Vulin’s role in it is to be a prominent pro-Russian and anti-Western figure, and he plays his part in a flamboyant but wholehearted manner. He won’t betray when things get tough. There are also members of the government whose task is to maintain good relations with the West. Vucic strategically presents either group to the audience that matters to him at the moment. Having these different groups allows him to politically maneuver, choose, and shift focus to conduct some sort of policy. What kind of policy that is, is another matter. In my opinion, it is wrong and harmful in so many ways.
Q: You said that the decision of the US government was not random and was not made hastily. Does that mean that the US has strong and unambiguous evidence against Vulin? And could our government request to see that evidence for potential actions? If not Vučić’s government, could the next government request to see that evidence? And should we expect that some other official from our country might end up on that blacklist?
A: If Vulin remains in his position, which I doubt will be for long, the list of individuals under US sanctions may continue to grow. I don’t believe the US has anything major about Vulin that is not already known in Serbian institutions. The explanation provided by the US did not surprise anyone, and I don’t think any formal proof will, or should be sent to Serbia. However, it is possible that some information may be leaked to the media, similar to the leak of the “Sky” phone conversations. The current government is more concerned about this type of pressure than with any formal evidence and how it would (not) be used by the domestic justice system. It is unfortunate that foreign powers hold the key to this pressure and can choose when and how to apply it in their own interest. What makes it worse is that there is material available for such pressure.
Q: What does the decision of the US government mean for Serbia in political and security terms? And how do you comment on Vučić’s reaction to the news about Vulin being sanctioned?
A: With this decision, the USA is sending a message to Serbia that Belgrade has not taken its previous warnings about the consequences of abandoning the European path and turning towards Russia seriously. I believe that Ambassador Christopher Hill wants Vučić to understand that the number of people in Washington with zero tolerance for Serbia on these issues is increasing. Politics, security, and economy are intertwined, especially given the situation in Ukraine, and the US administration’s decision has implications for Serbia in all three spheres. It portrays Serbia as a country plagued by crime, corruption, and Russian influence, and could lead to further deterioration of relations with Western countries on all levels and in all issues.
Vučić’s initial public reaction was expected – he responded sharply to America in front of his followers. However, it remains to be seen what will happen in the coming months – I believe that Vulin will be “promoted” to a next position. It is noteworthy that there are no reciprocal measures against American agencies and their leaders, only a sharp retort from Vučić. But this is not about how he handles this situation publicly, this is about the situation should never have happened in the first place: Vulin should never have been appointed to that position, and if he was, he should have been removed before public sanctions were imposed. Because, these sanctions have been unofficially in effect for some time.
Q: Why is security cooperation with America exactly important for Serbia?
A: The lack of security cooperation with America would not only affect relations with the US, but also with the majority of Western countries. This would hinder access to intelligence information, resources, and support in the fight against terrorism, organized crime, and other threats. Ironically, some members of our security community may welcome this, as cooperation with the West directly harms their interests. However, no country, including Serbia, is strong enough to navigate the world in isolation in terms of security, economy, and politics. We would have to turn completely towards the East, which in the world as it is today, means a conflict with the West. We have already experienced such a conflict in our recent history and know the outcome of that wartime adventure.
The truth is also that aligning with America and the West today still means conflict, but with the opposite side or sides. So which option is better for Serbia if we have to choose between the two? Where can we better pursue our interests, especially given that our neighboring countries have already made their decisions towards NATO and the EU? I would prefer if we were a militarily neutral country, as we were at some point in the past. However, then we should not have asked for, nor accepted financial and political support from the West for decades, nor, to that matter, deified Putin in the pro-governmental media.
Not to mention that we now don’t fulfil most of the international criteria for military neutrality. For that, we should have been leading a moderate foreign policy, in everything. But let me ask: from a historical and human perspective, what do we really want? Do we want to align ourselves with how Russia’s responded to NATO’s expansion – by occupying and destroying a sovereign country? Are we prepared that some overwhelming military power does the same to us if we decide to join an adversary (to them) military-political complex – be it Russian or some other towards the East? It is easy to die bravely; living with a wrong choice is what is difficult.
However, I am not a pessimist. I don’t believe that by imposing sanctions against Vulin, the USA and the West truly intend to sever security cooperation with Serbia. On the contrary, they want to draw certain red lines to enable our cooperation to continue and develop. Our security/intelligence agencies have reduced international cooperation to its lowest level in recent history, except with Russian and maybe Hungarian counterparts. But I don’t believe this is sustainable.
Q: How accurate are the claims we hear – that U.S. and Western agencies have numerous pieces of evidence about the ties between the Serbian government’s top officials and organized crime, and that they use it as a certain means of blackmail? Is there any truth to this, or are these just “gossip from the neighborhood”?
A: As previously mentioned, it is publicly known that the decrypted conversations from the “Sky” phones originate from abroad. This means that someone, possibly in Paris or another location, is choosing what to officially disclose and what to retain and use according to their needs and interests.
Q: So, Western agencies influence internal political processes through the media?
A: Let’s not be hypocritical; of course, foreign agencies will use their resources and material to further their national interests. There are numerous cases linking crime, such as corruption and arms smuggling, to people in power, and any of these could become the next big headline. Media and journalists cannot be blamed for doing their job; their role is to publish news, and they should continue to do so as long as it is truthful. The way to reduce external influence is not by concealing crime, but by rooting it out, especially among high-ranking state officials. Furthermore, the distinction between good and bad cannot be based on the principle of “if we do it, it’s good, and if they do it, it’s bad.”
Q: As the Protector of Citizens, you performed oversight of the work of security services. What were your experiences during that period? And what processes occurred after the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) came to power?
A: At the beginning, on behalf of the international community, I participated in the organizational reform of our intelligence agencies. Then, as the Protector of Citizens I oversaw their activities, ensuring they respected human rights and adhered to democratic standards. I worked with heads of the agencies, including Stojanović, Kovač, Cvetković, Anočić, Miličević and Živaljević, Vukadinović, Bulatović, Rodić, Aleksandar Đorđević, Milić, Nikolić, Tomčić, and others. I recall working also with some lesser-known but very important professionals, such as Jandrić, Dragičević, Teodorović, Banković, Delić, Panić, and Stojić.
During this time, journalists like the late Dejan Anastasijević were well-informed about intelligence and security matters. In 2006, he wrote an article titled “Is BIA going to outlive Serbia?” in which he predicted the Agency’s recruitment slogan, “countries change, the Service remains,” and the perverted philosophy behind it. I recall debating with director Rodić about his plan to open an Academy within the BIA for high-school graduates. I expressed my concern that molding such young individuals might be suitable for military or police profiles, but not for intelligence or counterintelligence officers, especially civilian ones.
At the time, my advice was not heeded, but I was at least not considered an enemy of the state because of it. In 2007, I insisted that the Service for Research and Documentation and the Security Service of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs must be deprived of their legal status as national security/intelligence services. Many did not understand my reasoning, but when the change was made, none of those services called me a traitor.
Things gradually changed with the rise of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) to power. The first law that the SNS amended immediately after assuming the power in 2012 was the Law on the Fundamental Organization of Security Services. The amendment enabled Aleksandar Vučić to become the operational coordinator of secret services. That’s when he and I had our first conversation – I argued that this was the beginning of the systematic politicization of services that were required by the Constitution and laws to be politically neutral.
To be fair, even before SNS took power, the same provision on selection criteria for the secret services operational coordinator was tampered with politically. The working group that drafted this landmark law in 2007 required that the coordinator be a non-political person. However, this was changed before the adoption of the law in the cabinets of then-President Boris Tadić and then-Prime Minister Koštunica.
An additional curiosity – the composition of the National Security Council was also changed at that time, and Serbia got its first NSC in modern history without a Minister of Foreign Affairs as a member. Due to personal and party disputes, the architecture of the security sector has been distorted. Today, this distortion has reached extremes, with a disregard for all rules and an establishment of subservience and sycophancy as the only criteria.
Q: To what extent is Predrag Petrović from the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy right when he says that the secret services in Serbia have returned to the 1990s?
A: I see the situation differently, although there are some similarities to the 1990s. Back then, secret services used criminals for their operations, whereas today, I see criminals using the services for their dirty work. The boundary between them has been erased. In the 1990s, the services were not pursuing their own agendas, but those defined by the state. Many things were wrongly defined, but it was done within state institutions. During that time, the services engaged in “business” on state orders, circumventing international sanctions and securing essential goods. To fund such operations, they were also involved in smuggling high-profit goods like cigarettes. However, when sanctions ended, the channels remained, and some individuals from the services gradually transitioned into “private business.”
Today, I fail to see how activities facilitated by the services, like the “Jovanjica” affair, have any connection to the so-called “state reasons.” I see no justification for them or their link to national interests, even if misunderstood. They lack legal basis and decisions from state organs, even formally. There is no documentation, not even “on-the-white” notes (in the services’ jargon, these are documents without letterheads and signatures); things simply happen in silence. Some individuals enrich themselves by using the services as their private resource, sharing a portion of the spoils with the party, and that’s it.
In the 1990s, the hierarchy was clear: at the top was the state, followed by the services, then business, and finally, crime. Even when destructive and insane acts were committed, like the assassination of Stambolić or the attempted assassination of Drašković, it was clear who was in charge and where each entity stood.
Today, it is impossible to distinguish them. If someone is literally mincing humans in a house under surveillance by a service, is there any difference between the monster and the operative? Who is really in charge? The boundary between politics, services, business (money), media and crime has been eliminated, creating today’s vulgar and violent reality. To explain the difference compared to the 1990s more vividly: no, I do not believe that Jovica Stanišić and Aleksandar Vulin, just like Aleksandar Tijanić and Željko Mitrović, are the same, even though all of them are harmful to Serbia.
Q: Were you surprised by the “Jovanjica” affair and the fact that top intelligence agency officials were directly involved in it?
A: Honestly, I didn’t think they would be so audacious. Now, one of the members of the services, a colonel in the Military Intelligence Agency, fled through Slovenia to the US, where he was granted asylum, and it’s not difficult to figure out how. At that time, Vulin was the Minister of Defense and politically responsible for the work of both military intelligence agencies. I believe he knew everything about the hooligans, Jovanjica, the Belivuk clan, the transmission of raw intelligence to Russia, and many other things.
Q: In your opinion, are there professionals within the agencies who could resist or attempt to resist party abuse? How much have they been “tamed” in the meantime?
A: We have reached a point where we are delighted when someone does something normal. In the past decade, people with integrity were thoroughly purged from the services. Those who now make decisions have no doubt – they are there precisely to safeguard the party’s power and ensure that certain tasks are accomplished while others are not. There are, of course, some who would like to work differently, but they do not have the authority to decide. Some are passive because they don’t see a clear alternative or they don’t want to suffer for the sake of an internet “like”. However, let’s not deceive ourselves; the majority now do as they are told, waiting for privileged apartments and pay raises.
Q: Regarding the narrative of all-powerful secret services in Serbia, which supposedly have enormous, decisive influence on the political, social, and even cultural life – to what extent is it a myth, and how much truth is there in it?
A: Although some in the services believe they are more important and long-lasting than the state, even boasting about it on TV, I don’t believe they really make crucial political decisions. However, they are among the strongest tools for implementing these decisions, even when they are unlawful and unethical, especially in such cases. It is true that they manipulate this confused society by discrediting or favoring individuals, and anyone who thinks they can always avoid their machinations is mistaken.
But they are not all-powerful. It is a sad and deplorable job for a secret service agent to engage in discrediting, intimidating, and plotting within the country, especially when they shy away from strategic intelligence work and real security challenges. Just look at the topics that security agencies worldwide deal with, while ours attend the founding event of an infantile youth nationalist NGO!
Q: Let’s recall the time when you were Vučić’s opponent in the presidential elections. There was a fierce, unprecedented campaign against you. Pro-regime media, among other things, published that you were a collaborator with the BIA. To what extent and in what ways are secret services involved in the campaign against you and against Vučić’s opponents in general?
A: The practice of working against so-called “internal enemies,” though under different names, has been reintroduced on a large scale within all three major secret services. Any influential political dissenter of the current government qualifies for an “enemy.” The novelty is that the military services, which previously maintained some distance from civilians, are now competing shoulder to shoulder with their civilian colleagues to prove loyalty by “covering” political leaders and activists.
I won’t be a hypocrite and deny that even in the most democratic countries, services responsible for national security keep an eye on politicians who make critical decisions for the state or might soon find themselves in such situations. However, the aim of such monitoring must be solely to uncover any illegal influence, dictated by foreign or criminal factors, on their decisions and activities. Or a risk for it. If this is not the case, even if their political views and actions are diametrically opposed to the state policy, whatever the operatives discover about politicians must not be circulated around, but destroyed.
To guarantee this, the services must be under strict institutional control by parliament (for political neutrality), the judiciary (to ensure respect for the law), the Ombudsman, and other independent state oversight bodies (to uphold human rights and democratic principles). In the past, I engaged in lengthy and serious discussions with the leadership of the services on the modalities of this system of checks and balances. And there was serious oversight of their work, making Serbia an example of progress in good practices in this regard.
The problem now is not that I am no longer involved; the problem is that nobody is – there is no longer any institutional control over the work of secret services! Public oversight by media or similar means can never replace institutional control in terms of depth of knowledge, scope, and effects.
Now, you didn’t want it, but you brought me back to those difficult times, and reintroduced something from their dirty kitchen into the legitimate public discourse. So, you just confirmed my words that it is impossible to altogether avoid the consequences of their intrigues. I know exactly who devised that discredit, we met and talked several times in my life.
Actually their “kompromat” speaks volumes about the state of secret services: firstly – to discredit someone, you have to connect the target with something very bad; however, for them the “bad” is neither drugs nor arms trafficking (those are apparently recommendations to become the service’s director!). No, for them, the “bad” is – the secret service itself! So, these people know how much their own service, which should be elite and respected, is in fact shameful, and they cast that shame to disgrace someone else with it!
Secondly – they know that nobody will think that the alleged work with the service was about uncovering the intentions of foreign states and services, identifying networks of foreign agents and the traitors they recruited, producing intelligence to facilitate national interests and protect national security, or intercepting terrorist activities, although all of these are tasks of the service. Instead, they expect the public to associate it exclusively with snitching on friends, political plotting, and other morally and legally prohibited actions. What does this actually say about this Service?
Thirdly – anyone with even a bit of brains, who has ever genuinely worked or considered secretly working for BIA, if they believed what was propagated about me, would believe that they too can be betrayed tomorrow. Such a recruitment strategy is scandalous, not to mention that disclosure of identities of covert operatives and assets would constitute a severe criminal offense, as their identities are highly classified. However, the person who devised this discrediting action knew that they would never go to court for it because they did not truly reveal a collaborator’s identity – as I was never one. But someday, that person could, and should, appear before the lustration commission.
Lastly, an ambassador of a Western country told me at that time: “In my country, we secretly honor people who do what they claimed you did. In your country, they seem to warn them not to try to help their nation under any circumstances. Strange.” Not just “strange,” but I must wonder if accidental!
In the end, all of this reminds me of another situation: when in 2016, I underwent and passed the security vetting for the second time to access the top-secret information, including details of ongoing operations, and, ironically, the names of secret assets, the then director of BIA, Đorđević, said something like, “My people say they can’t catch you, identify for which foreign service are you working for, but they’re sure you do because otherwise you wouldn’t know so much or have advanced so far.” I told him to dismiss them all, because they obviously view me from the perspective of their own ambitions. He signed that there were no obstacles to issuing my security certificate, but he didn’t dismiss them. Now, those people reign supreme in BIA.
Two questions and answers were not published in Vreme:
Q: Although I deliberately avoided conventional political questions, I cannot help but ask you in the end: do current events indicate that the ruling party SNS is really falling apart?
A: I am not concerned about the state of SNS, but about the state of my country. If something is falling apart, it’s the institutions of my state. If something is at risk, it’s its citizens whom the leaders of SNS treat as enemies of the state. If something is declining, it’s our self-respect. The greatest internal risk to the national security of Serbia is the conflict of the ruling party, that is the state leadership, with the citizens; it is the division of Serbia into members of SNS and others, and it is the fusion of security services, criminal elements, and politics.
Q: Is there a possibility of more serious internal turmoil, what is your assessment?
A: I wish for my country to be stable, for political life to proceed freely, for the government to change through free elections (if they are not free – then they are not really elections), and for citizens and their state not to be in conflict. It is up to those in power to ensure that, but they are not doing so. I am concerned that some new tragedy or incident might spark further protests, leading to even more protesters venting their legitimate revolt on the streets, throwing the government out, creating a power vacuum that could be filled by anyone, regardless of their legitimacy, as long as they have support from one side or the other.
PS: They wouldn’t be needing to do things like this if they were really turning West:
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Security trumps democracy in the Middle East
Prime Minister Netanyahu is proceeding with his takeover of Israel’s judiciary branch. This is despite objections from massive protests as well as the US government. The State Department has nevertheless announced that US security assistance to Israel will continue. It is “ironclad.”
No surprise
This should surprise no one. The only real leverage the US has is security cooperation. But President Biden, like his predecessors, has deemed it vital to the US, not only to Israel. If you believe that, you don’t want to use it as leverage. Besides, how long would it take for domestic politics to overcome a decision to interrupt security cooperation with Israel?
Israel faces no immediate threat from its Arab neighbors. The Iranian threat is real, but that is another reason the Americans won’t want to interrupt security cooperation. It would significantly relieve pressure on Tehran. The rhythm of US-Israel cooperation for a possible attack on Iranian nuclear facilities accelerated noticeably last year. The US wants to maintain military pressure on Iran, not relieve it.
Consequences
What the Americans don’t do has consequences. Netanyahu’s coup against the judiciary is going to make it easier for his right-wing ultra-nationalist coalition partners to pursue their goals. They seek permanent Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank and Jerusalem. With the Supreme Court now limited in when it can intervene, legislation that de facto accomplishes that end is not only possible but likely. That will deal the death blow to the already moribund two-state solution.
The Palestinian Authority may cry foul but will remain quiescent. Palestinians will not. Israel is already facing an armed rebellion on the West Bank, where this year more than 160 Palestinians have been killed. It could face attacks from Gaza and perhaps Lebanon, but none of that will change the strategic picture. Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem will be relegated to third class non-citizenship in a one state reality. Palestinians inside Israel proper already are relegated to second class citizenship.
The Saudi reaction
Netanyahu hopes the Saudis will ignore the Palestinian reality and make their peace with Israel, as the Emirates, Bahrain, and Morocco have already done. He could be right. Mohammed bin Salman may tell the world that the Palestinians are the central issue for the Arab world, but four years ago he told American Jewish leaders that the Palestinians need to take what they can get and make their peace with Israel.
This is where the US does have some cards, but it is unlikely to play them. Netanyahu, hoping for an agreement with Saudi Arabia, is pressuring Washington to give MbS what he wants: a civilian nuclear deal and a security guarantee. Biden understandably hesitates about both. US law requires the Administration to get an agreement that its civilian nuclear technology would not be used for enrichment or reprocessing. That the Saudis aren’t likely to accept. Congress would be unlikely to approve a security guarantee. In any event, the Saudis won’t be anxious to give a rabidly nationalist Netanyahu government the satisfaction of a peace agreement. So that seems a bridge too far under current circumstances.
Security suffices
I was asked on Al Hurra last night whether security was a sufficient basis for US relations with Israel. The answer is yes. It has been the basis for American relations with other Middle Eastern countries for decades. Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, and Turkey know they have to listen to American lectures on democracy and human rights. But they also know those values will not interfere with security cooperation.
Where the Israeli departure from democracy will have a real impact is on American Jews, who are devotees of individual rights. A poll recently found “about three-quarters of Americans, including 80% of Democrats and 64% of Republicans, would choose a democratic Israel that’s no longer Jewish, over a Jewish Israel without full citizenship and equality for non-Jews living under its authority.” But that won’t matter, because Christian evangelical support for Israel will more than compensate for any loss among America’s Jewish population. Security trumps democracy in the Middle East.
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The West needs to rebalance Balkans policy towards tough love
The US Congress has now conducted hearings on the Balkans in both the Senate and House. Members from both sides of the aisle evinced discomfort with Biden Administration policy. It has leaned heavily towards appeasement of Belgrade and has failed to react strongly to secessionist moves in Bosnia. What is the alternative?
The US is oblivious to the obvious
Administration officials are fond of reiterating the laudable 1990s strategic objective: Europe “whole and free.” They are oblivious to the obvious. It is not happening anytime soon. President Putin has forced the drawing of a new line in Europe. The Russian-dominated parts Europe will remain for now on the Eastern side of the line. This includes Russia and Belarus as well as parts of Georgia (Abkhazia, South Ossetia) and Moldova (Transnistria). The remaining questions are about Ukraine and the Balkans. Will the line go through them, or will they join the West?
In Ukraine, conventional warfare will answer the question. In the Balkans, it is already decided. For the foreseeable future, there is no serious prospect that Serbia or Republika Srpska (the Serb-dominated part of Bosnia and Herzegovina) will join the West.
Bosnia and Herzegovina
For the RS, that is obvious. Its president, Milorad Dodik, is a wholly-owned Russian proxy. He is doing his best to end any accountability to the Sarajevo “state” government. The RS parliament has already passed legislation denying the validity of Constitution Court decisions. It is only a matter of time before it passes legislation claiming state property, which the RS needs as collateral for its international loans. The international community’s High Representative will presumably annul all secessionist legislation from now on, but how he will enforce his decisions is not clear.
Dodik may not proceed all the way to declaring independence, as even Serbia would be reluctant to recognize the RS. But whether he does or not, RS will remain attached to the East so long as he is in power. The only hope for getting rid of him is to bankrupt the entity and bail it out with Western financing, conditional on his resignation and an end to secessionist ambitions. It is not yet clear whether Washington and Brussels have the stomach for that.
Serbia
Serbia is different. President Vucic is hedging between East and West. He plays Washington and Brussels off against Moscow and Beijing, hoping to get all he can from all four. Belgrade has a policy of military neutrality, for example, and conducts exercises with both NATO and Russia. Serbia buys weapons from both East and West. It ships weaponry to both Russia and Ukraine. Belgrade has refused to align with EU sanctions against Russia, but it votes against Russia on some General Assembly resolutions denouncing Russian aggression.
This Yugoslav-style “non-aligned” foreign policy is linked with ethnic nationalist domestic politics and ambitions for regional hegemony. Judging from ongoing anti-Vucic demonstrations, there are a lot of Serbs who aren’t happy with the current regime, which they view as violent, corrupt, and repressive. But the only viable electoral opposition to Vucic stems from his Serbian nationalist right. He has all but obliterated the liberal democratic opposition, which was weak to begin with. He controls most of the popular media and judicial system in addition to the executive. The Serbian security services and their allies in the Serbian Orthodox Church are wedded to Moscow.
In the region, Vucic aims to create the “Serbian world,” analogous to Putin’s “Russian world,” an idea that supported the invasion of Ukraine. In its weakest form, the goal is Belgrade political control over the Serb populations in neighboring states. Belgrade has already achieved that in Montenegro and Kosovo. In Bosnia, only Dodik, whose interests are not congruent, stands in the way. In its stronger form, the Serbian world entails annexation of territory Serbs occupy in neighboring countries and creation of Greater Serbia.
Rebalance the policy
Belgrade has not moved one inch closer to the West in the six years of Vucic’s presidency, despite consuming a truckload of diplomatic carrots. Strengthening of his links to Beijing has more than compensated for any weakening of his links to Moscow. The RS has spent 17 years moving towards secession. It is not going to reverse course without vigorous pushback. This situation requires a more realistic Western policy in the Balkans.
We need to lower expectations and raise incentives. Dodik’s RS and Vucic’s Serbia are not going to voluntarily embrace the West. The US, UK, and EU will need to starve the RS of all Western funds in order to end Dodik’s secessionist ambitions. They will also need to end Serbia’s immunity from Washington and Brussels criticism. Washington recently sanctioned Aleksandar Vulin, Director of Belgrade’s Security Intelligence Agency, for corruption, drug and arms trafficking, and supporting Russia’s malign influence. That was a step in the right direction. The EU should do likewise. A public demand for Vulin’s removal as well as for the arrest and extradition to Kosovo of the thugs who attacked NATO peacekeepers in May would be another.
Possible benefits
Rebalancing toward Serbia and the RS would have the great virtue of testing not only their intentions, but also Moscow’s and Beijing’s. Moscow under current conditions is not going to want to increase funding to the RS. China hopes to use Serbia as an entry point to Europe. Beijing might think twice about investing in a Serbia that is on the outs with the EU. We could well be happily surprised if China and Russia decide to cut their losses and leave Serbia and the RS on the Western side of the new division of Europe. If they don’t, we will at least have saddled them with significant burdens.
Rebalancing could also help to revive the moribund dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina. Washington and Brussels have focused their pressure on Pristina, which has no hedging option and has traditionally bandwagoned with the West. There is a long history of Pristina responding better to carrots than sticks. Even longer is the history of Belgrade responding better to sticks than carrots. If Vucic saw Washington and Brussels coming after him with a stick rather than carrots, he would be inclined to hedge more in their direction. Tough love would bring better results than appeasement.
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Stevenson’s army, July 21
Several items caught my eye this week. More to come later.
– NYT had a big story — a welcome change from the usual campaign horse race stories — on Trump plans for a stronger, more assertive presidency.
– New Yorker had good interview with a law professor on how it might work.
– WSJ sees a visceral clash among Americans in the 2024 elections. Too much hate and fear.
– Anne Applebaum wonders whether Tennessee is still a democracy.
-New Yorker tells how the House Administration committee is the “traffic cop”
– House & Senate appropriators differ on foreign aid including Taiwan.
– National Security Archive has documents on the president’s nuclear “football”
– RollCall explains the administration’s new cybersecurity strategy. Here’s the document.
– SIGAT summarizes its reports on Afghanistan in reply to Senators.
– CRS has new report on covert actions and congressional notifications.
-AEI’s Kori Schake comments on NATO summit
And since ChatGBT seems capable of passing Harvard courses, I’m sticking with my oral exams.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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What the State Department forgot to say
This morning’s Chollet and Escobar pas de deux at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee demonstrated that the Senators who attended really know something about the Balkans. The questioning was pertinent and at times incisive. The responses were less so.
Of course the State Department Counselor and the Deputy Assistant Secretary with responsibility for the Balkans know what to say. They are for EU membership, democracy, sovereignty and territorial integrity. They are against Russian malfeasance, Chinese financing, corruption, and ethnonationalism.
It’s what they don’t say
It’s what they don’t say that really counts, starting from the premise: “Europe whole and free.” This 90s US foreign policy slogan is inapplicable today and for the forseeable future. Europe is not going to be whole and free any time soon. We’ll have to accept a line somewhere. That’s what the war in Ukraine is about: will Kyiv be on the Western side of the line, or will all or part of Ukraine be forced into a subserviant relationship with Russia?
While the Americans are trying to attract it with all the carrots they can think of, Belgrade has chosen definitively in recent years to move towards Moscow and Beijing. There is no sign of anything but rhetorical interest in EU membership. Progress in the EU accession process has ground to a halt. The political system in Serbia has veered towards autocracy. President Vucic and his minions, who include virtually the entire media landscape in Serbia, mouth ambitions to retake Kosovo (or part of it) and use the worst ethnic slurs available against Albanians. There really is nothing comparable happening in Kosovo.
As for the Belgrade/Pristina dialogue, Escobar claimed the February and March agreements on normalization are legally binding and being implemented, but when confronted with examples of President Vucic’s refusal to implement specific provisions he and Chollet retreated to bothsiderism. That was also their response on corruption in Belgrade as well. “We find it everywhere in the Balkans.” In recent memory, I can’t name a US official who has referred explicitly to the many and gross manifestations of organized crime and corruption in Serbia.
Chollet and Escobar were enthusiastic about the proposed Association of Serb Majority Municipalities (ASMM), claiming it would enable Serbs to integrate more into Kosovo and would have to be consistent with the Kosovo constitution. They ignored the Serb proposal for the ASMM, which is unequivocally intended to create an autonomous Serb entity, like Bosnia’s Republika Srpska, inside Kosovo, complete with executive powers. They were also enthusiastic for Serbia’s Open Balkans initiative, provided that it treats all the countries participating equally. They forgot to mention that Kosovo has not even been invited to Open Balkans because Belgrade doesn’t want to address it properly in the invitation.
Poor Bosnia
Bosnia suffered the worst from State Department amnesia. Yes, the officials said, the Bosnia constitution would need changes, in accordance with decisions by the EU and the Venice Commission. They forgot to mention that one of those decisions, by the European Court of Human Rights, was taken 14 years ago. The US gave up long ago on pressing for its implementation.
They liked the decisions of the HiRep that enabled formation of the government in the Bosnian Federation, but forgot to mention that one of them changed the way votes were counted after they were cast. The other was taken to iron out problems the first had created. The net result was to ensure that two ethnonationalist parties could rule in the Federation. Only one ethnonationalist party was dissastified with these decisions, Escobar claimed. He forgot to mention that that party and other dissenters just might represent more than a majority of the voters. Never mind the disgraceful act of changing the way votes are counted after they are cast.
The rest
I trust Macedonians won’t be too pleased to hear from Escobar that in order to join the EU they will have to change their constitution to mention their Bulgarian minority, which he failed to say numbers a few thousand (certainly less than 1% of the population). Nor will the Albanians in Serbia be pleased to hear that their numbers–almost certainly equal to or greater than the number of Serbs in northern Kosovo (and far more than the Bulgarians in Macedonia)–don’t merit mention of an Association of Albanian Majority Municipalities inside Serbia. Never mind Albanian seats in the Serbian parliament, to match the guaranteed Serb seats in the Kosovo parliament.
Escobar will be winging off to Podgorica for the Montenegrin presidential inauguration Saturday. No one bothered to mention that we owe the oderly and so far nonviolent change of power there to its current President, Milo Djukanovic, whom American and European diplomats have spent years deploring for alleged (but still unproven) corruption. The new President, Jakov Milatović, avows a pro-European stance but has more than warm relations with President Vucic in Belgrade. A lot will depend on June 11 parliamentary elections. I hope they are conducted as freely and fairly as those under Djukanovic.
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Justice can’t substitute for politics
Anwar Albuni, Director of the Syria Center for Legal Studies and Research in Berlin, gave an overview today at the Middle East Institute of prosecutions in Europe for serious crimes over the past 12 years of revolution, repression, and civil war in Syria. These include at least 60 indictees for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including Bashar al Assad if I understood correctly, as well as many others for money laundering.
Justice as a substitute for political progress
Albuni’s view is that these prosecutions worry the Syrian leadership and send a powerful message to human rights abusers worldwide. He hopes that in the absence of any progress in the constitutional talks in Geneva, the prosecutions in Europe and one potential prosecution in Chicago will exclude abusers from the political process and prevent diplomatic normalization with the Syrian regime. The Russians and Chinese are blocking any action in the UN Security Council. But he hopes the General Assembly may create a special court, at least to prosecute use of chemical weapons.
The diplomatic normalization the Arab countries are pursuing with Syria should be, he thought, expected. The Gulf in particular wants no democracies in the region. Its monarchies even supported extremists in Syria in order to prevent a real democracy from emerging there. An audience member noted that Turkiye today is on a similar wavelength and is preventing Syrian witnesses from leaving Turkiye to testify in European courts.
Hope is not a policy
I might be inclined to hope Albuni is correct. But I don’t see much evidence for his perspective. There are certainly instances where indictments have given pause to abusers, but Syria isn’t likely to be one of them. Twelve years of civil war with only a few dozen lower-level convictions is not going to stop Bashar al Assad from his homicidal ways any more the International Criminal Court indictment will stop Vladimir Putin from kidnapping Ukrainian children.
Human rights abuses are not incidental for Assad and Putin. They are part of the war-fighting strategy and well-documented, including by an organization on whose board I sit. Bashar used chemical weapons because he found them effective. Like barrel bombs, they are cheap and indiscrimately deadly. If you are trying to terrify a civilian population, that is what you want.
Assad won’t soften
So it is unlikely that justice will do for Syria what politics has failed to do so far. Getting some of the worst abusers out of the picture and sending a message to the rest is a good idea but will just as likely stiffen Assad’s resolve as weaken it. Assad knows that softness will get him nowhere. The prosecutions may make some of his cronies think twice, but like Putin’s they can easily find a window to fall out of.
Syria’s Arab neighbors are likely to continue diplomatic normalization, in exchange for Assad’s fake promises of cracking down on the drug trade his regime now uses in lieu of taxes. The Americans show no interest in normalizing but are turning a blind eye. They are convinced that the Arab neighbors will do it even if Washington objects. The constitutional committee is likely to remain stalemated, because Assad thinks he has won the war. He has nothing to gain from the political process. Justice, justice you shall pursue, but don’t expect it to solve political problems.
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