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Let’s be practical

As I thought I might be giving a talk this week about the Balkans, I prepared the following text, which I would not want to see go unused. So here are my latest, but not very new, thoughts about the Balkans:

The Balkans are a region that produces more history than it can consume but also generates less future than its people would like.

There are two places that still merit attention in Washington. One is Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the state created at Dayton in 1995 is facing a serious partition challenge from Republika Srpska, its Serb-dominated half. The other is Kosovo, where a similar challenge arises from Serbia’s desire to hold on to the northern 11% of the country.

These are the last territorial issues in the Balkans, a region once wracked by ethnic claims. Either one might, if mishandled, generate instability and ethnic conflict, vitiating 15 years of progress. Not only Bosnia and Kosovo might be affected, but also Macedonia and Serbia, which has Muslim and Albanian-majority areas that will want whatever the Serbs get in Bosnia or Kosovo. We need to ensure that Pandora’s box remains closed.

That reassurance can no longer come only from the United States. Today, the European Union holds most of the leverage in the Balkans. The prospect of EU membership—now ensured for Croatia and not too far off for Montenegro—has become a major incentive for Balkan reform, where otherwise there is an inclination towards ethno-territorial breakdown.

We need the Europeans to secure stability in the Balkans, but they also need us. American-led interventions ended the Bosnian war as well as Yugoslav repression in Kosovo. Nowhere are Americans more appreciated than among Bosnian Muslims and Kosovars.

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Let’s start with Bosnia. In the first 10 years after the Dayton agreements were signed, it made good progress with a lot of international tutelage. But Bosnia has stalled for the past five years, since rejection in 2006 of the April package of constitutional amendments. They failed to reach a two-thirds majority in the Bosnian parliament by just two votes. It was a setback from which Bosnia has still not recovered.

Since then, Milorad Dodik, now president of the Serb-controlled 49% of Bosnia, has set course to make his Serb entity as autonomous as possible, denying the validity of decisions by the internationally designated High Representative and challenging the authority of Sarajevo-based governing institutions and courts. His stated goal is independence for Republika Srpska, even if he has often stepped back from irreversible steps in that direction.  It is not an accident that Dodik has also been predicting that EU membership for Bosnia is 50 years in the future.

We need to recognize that Dodik is serious. His strategy is to maximize the separation of Republika Srpska from the Bosnian state so that he can, if political conditions ever permit, achieve independence in the future. This is essentially the same strategy that was pursued successfully by Milo Djukanovic in Montenegro, which became independent in 2006.

There is, however, a big difference between Montenegro and Republika Srpska, whose population today is overwhelmingly Serb because of an aggressive ethnic cleansing campaign during the Bosnian war. Montenegro gained the support of all but its Serb minority for independence and conducted a referendum under strict supervision of the international community. Dodik has no intention of allowing the return to Republika Srpska of its pre-war Muslim plurality. To the contrary, the RS is unwelcoming to Croat and Muslim returnees and maintains an atmosphere hostile to non-Serbs in its schools, press, governing institutions and social life. Ratko Mladic, now on trial in The Hague for genocide and crimes against humanity, is still a hero in Republika Srpska, which is funding his defense.

There is another difference in Bosnia:  secession of Republika Srpska would lead quickly to secession of at least some Croat-majority areas of Bosnia, leaving in central Bosnia the “green garden”:  a non-viable, rump Islamic state.  Neither Zagreb nor Belgrade would want to see the green garden planted in their midst, and it is hard to picture the Americans or Europeans liking the idea either.  Avoiding this outcome was a major motive for the Americans in supporting a united Bosnia in the 1990s; it is no less important in 2011.

If ever there is a referendum in Bosnia, it should be conducted in the entire country on a serious proposition:  do you want to live in a Bosnia that can qualify to become a member of the European Union?  I have no doubt at all that such a proposition would pass with a strong majority and silence most talk of secession.

The European Union approach to this problem has been accommodation. Dodik this spring scheduled a contentious referendum on the Bosnian court system and the High Representative that would have set a precedent for an independence referendum. The High Representative was prepared to annul the legal arrangements for the voting, something he can do as the referendum violated the Dayton agreements. Instead, the European Union, without telling the Americans, arranged to accommodate Dodik’s demand for discussions on the Bosnian court system, without consulting the Bosnian government.

I have rarely seen American diplomats more outraged, though they have largely kept their fury out of the public eye. Blind-siding the Americans—actually it is usually called sand-bagging in the bureaucratic world—no doubt gave Dodik a great deal of satisfaction, as it meant that the European Union came to him and met his demand for discussion of institutions belonging to the Bosnian state, without representatives of that state present.

So what we are seeing in Bosnia is obvious deterioration of the international consensus on how to handle Dodik’s determined and consistent efforts to gain the kind of autonomy that will make independence some day in the future possible.

Kosovo

I am pleased that we are not seeing the same thing in dealing with Kosovo, where the EU has been leading a dialogue effort between Belgrade and Pristina intended to resolve practical problems that would improve life for both Serbs and Albanians. Robert Cooper, who has led this effort on behalf of Brussels, has kept the Americans at the table and in the loop.

The dialogue has now produced its first modest results: agreements on mutual recognition of documents and license plates as well as provision by Serbia to Kosovo of copies of official records taken at the end of the NATO/Yugoslavia war. Other more far-reaching agreements are thought to be imminent. This illustrates clearly what can be achieved when the Americans and Europeans act together.

There is still, however, a long way to go. Belgrade has said it will never recognize an independent Kosovo, which is not a problem so long as it eventually lifts the Russian veto on its membership in the UN General Assembly. This it will have to do before Serbia can enter the EU, which will not want to accept a new Cyprus-like divided member. In fact, Serbia is under pressure to specify sooner rather than later on what territory it intends to apply EU laws and regulations—the acquis communitaire. It hopes to hold on to at least the part of Kosovo north of the Ibar river, which is contiguous with Serbia and is still governed by Belgrade. If it specifies all or part of Kosovo, Serbia won’t be taken seriously as a candidate for EU membership–it would be best if the EU can be convinced not to allow it candidacy status until it settles the issue of the north with Pristina.

The Serbian political leadership, even its more forward-looking and pro-European president Boris Tadic, has painted itself into a corner on Kosovo issues. Belgrade refuses to meet with Pristina officials who are clearly identified as such.  It needs to find its own way out of this cul-de-sac. I would suggest it work along this path: recognition not of Kosovo’s independence, but of the legitimacy of the Kosovo’s democratic institutions, with whose representatives it has already reached limited agreements.

Pristina could help this process if President Atifete Jahjaga would invite Tadic to visit Kosovo’s capital and pay a courtesy call. If he refuses, he embarrasses himself: why wouldn’t he call on the democratically legitimized president of a territory he claims is part of Serbia? If he accepts, we get past a silly hurdle that the Serbs have erected for themselves.

The American role

What is the American role in all of this? We need to do what we can to complete the state-building process in Bosnia and Kosovo so that American troops and civilians can turn their attention to more pressing matters.

Here are my relatively few recommendations for what the United States should still do in the Balkans:

1. Working with the EU, get Serbia to tell RS it will never be independent or part of Serbia and that Dodik needs to turn his attention to strengthening the Bosnian state so that it can become an EU member.

2. Urge Pristina to invite Tadic to visit.

3. In a joint statement with the EU, declare that Kosovo and Bosnia will not be divided and can only hope to enter the EU as states within their well-established borders.

Even the five members of the EU that have not recognized Kosovo’s sovereignty can, I believe, acknowledge that its independence will not be reversed and that partition of either Bosnia or Kosovo is a bad idea. If we expect Belgrade to be practical, we should expect ourselves to be practical as well.

Here’s an idea for Bosnia

Balkans fans will know that Brčko, a northeast Bosnian town, became the knot that couldn’t be untied at Dayton and was therefore referred for arbitration thereafter.  The result was an unusual decision in favor of a “condominium”–Brčko became legally part of both the Federation and Republika Srpska and de facto distinct from both, under international (American) supervision. Adam Moore of UCLA has written an interesting paper on the post-war evolution of Brčko, which has become a rare but fraying exemplar of reintegration in Bosnia:  Why Brčko became one of the only success stories in Bosnia.

Those who worry about war in Bosnia worry about Brčko.  It is vital to Republika Srpska (RS), since it sits in a narrow corridor that joins the eastern wing along the Drina with its western wing south of the Sava.  If ever there is a war in Bosnia again, whoever gets Brčko wins:  the RS needs it to survive intact, the Federation needs it to make RS independence impossible.

So protecting Brčko and preventing it from being “taken” by either the RS or the Federation should be a priority for the international community.  The European force (EUFOR) in Bosnia has limited resources (1600 people “in theater,” whatever that means).  Its mission is

…to provide a military presence in order to contribute to the safe and secure environment, deny conditions for a resumption of violence, manage any residual aspect of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in BiH (also known as Dayton/Paris Agreement).

It could pre-emptively begin to concentrate itself in Brčko (in addition to its near-Sarajevo headquarters), thereby providing a serious impediment to RS’s independence ambitions as well as to any pre-emptive move by the Bosniaks to prevent secession. Doing this would help to preserve the still integrated Brčko district and prevent it from fraying further.

A European move to strengthen its heretofore modest liaison and observation team in Brčko would demonstrate to all concerned–including the Americans–that EUFOR is serious and knows where Bosnia’s vulnerabilities lie.

Pandora’s box should stay closed

Thursday I offered a few pleasant surprises from my visit to Kosovo, but with no firm conclusions on the vital issue of whether rule of law could or would prevail there. Today the other shoe drops: I have to offer a pessimistic view on where current political trends are leading. Ironic though it may be as Albania struggles with its own problems, the idea of greater Albania is gaining in Kosovo, largely due to failures in international policy.

Kosovo, now nominally independent for more than three years, lives with multiple limitations on its sovereignty: NATO (rather than its own security forces) guarantees its defense, the EU monitors its justice system and provides prosecutors and judges in cases of interethnic and organized crime, its budget is monitored by the International Monetary Fund, and its monetary policy is determined by the European Central Bank (since it uses the euro, not its own currency). In addition, there are of course any number of additional restrictions and conditions that donors impose on specific development and governance projects.

Few chafe much at these restrictions, though the prime minister did recently fulfill a campaign promise to raise public sector salaries in defiance of the IMF, precipitating a withdrawal of IMF budget support that will require his government either to cut back or fill the gap. “Self-Determination,” an opposition political party led by firebrand Albin Kurti, has gained something under 13% of the voting public with cries of resistance to limitations on sovereignty. For the moment he is a relatively small factor in the parliamentary equation, but with obvious potential for growth.

Belgrade’s control of northern Kosovo (three and a half municipalities north of the Ibar river) is rousing more serious problems. As demonstrated in a recent report from the Coordinator’s Office for Strategy Regarding the North of Kosovo (I’ve posted it here), Serbia has established a full array of its institutions in the north, with the obvious intention of holding on to the territory it controls there in any negotiated settlement of Kosovo’s status.

For Brussels and Washington, the talks begun late last year between Pristina and Belgrade on “practical” problems are not supposed to touch on the status issue, which the United States and 22 out of 27 members of the EU regard as settled. But few in Pristina (or I suspect Belgrade) think either Brussels or Washington shows anything like the fortitude needed to undo Belgrade’s growing domination of the north.

There are a number of practical ways in which the current division of Kosovo might be softened, and it is my understanding that these are being discussed in the EU-sponsored talks between Pristina and Belgrade. If agreement can be reached on electricity supplies and telecommunications services in the north, it could help to reintegrate the Belgrade-controlled territory with the rest of Kosovo. Agreement on mutual recognition of documents, on recognition of Kosovo’s customs bureaucracy and on export of Kosovo made goods to Serbia would also help a good deal.

But I understand that Belgrade has asked for a postponement in the next session of the talks, when a number of these agreements were expected to be reached. We can hope that this is related to the Dutch parliament’s decision to postpone approval of an EU agreement with Serbia, pending certification of Belgrade’s full cooperation with the Hague Tribunal (Ratko Mladic is in The Hague, but he was one of two outstanding indictees).

That may not be the only reason for postponement. Belgrade may be having trouble accepting the already negotiated agreements because its political level has decided that the technical agreements make Serbia’s intention of dividing Kosovo more difficult. Belgrade yesterday indicated willingness to unilaterally accept Kosovo documents for travel in Serbia, which would be an important symbolic step, but one that has little relevance to the question of partition.

Judging from my discussions in Pristina last week, there is no question but that if Belgrade presses to divide Kosovo it will open a Pandora’s box of ethno-territorial issues, starting in the Albanian-majority areas of southern Serbia, extending to the Serb-majority areas of Bosnia and ending in the Muslim-populated areas of Serbia itself. Thursday Muslims of Bosnia and Sandjak (a region lying partly in Serbia and partly in Montenegro) established a “Bosniak Academy of Arts and Sciences,” no problem in of itself but a sign of growing ethnic nationalist sentiment.

Kosovars are showing a marked increase in interest in greater Albania, an historical ambition that was abandoned during the past decade in an implicit bargain with the international community: Kosovo gets independence and Albanians forget about all trying to live in one country, since eventually the borders that divide them will come down once the Balkans countries all enter the EU.

Why anyone would want to be part of an Albania that can’t even run a decent municipal election, and in which the chief political protagonists compete to see who can be more offensive and unreasonable, I don’t know. Kosovo seems to me to have a relatively good deal as an independent state under international tutelage, except in one important area: access to Europe.

Kosovars, unlike most other Balkan citizens, don’t have visa-free access to Europe’s “Schengen” area. This, and a “contractual” relationship with the EU (meaning one in which the EU can sign agreements with Kosovo, despite the five non-recognizing states), were supposed to come with completion of the first phase of the Belgrade/Pristina dialogue. If Belgrade is going to block completion of the first phase, it only seems right to me that Brussels should go ahead with its commitments to Pristina, provided Kosovo is prepared to maintain its commitments to the already negotiated agreements.

I also don’t know why anyone in Serbia would want the north: its Trepca mine likely isn’t worth much and requires facilities in the south, less than half the Serb population of Kosovo lives there, and all the important Serb monuments, churches and monasteries are farther south. And if Trepca is the issue, as one of the commenters on a previous post claims, some sort of division of the spoils from the mine can likely be negotiated.

There is little accounting for nationalist aspirations in the Balkans. Best to keep Pandora’s box firmly closed. That will require a willingness on the part of the Washington and Brussels to confront Belgrade’s territorial ambitions in northern Kosovo, relegating them to the oblivion in which they belong. The time is coming to end Belgrade’s hopes for partition of Kosovo, and to recognize that Serbs, too, will one day see the borders between them fall as the Balkans countries enter the EU.