The danger of another Balkans war
James Forsyth 11:45am
Andrew Rawnsley has an important piece in the Observer this morning about how conflict could again break out in the Balkans. The issue this time is the final status of Kosovo. The Americans favour independence for Kosovo, the Russians oppose it and the EU is mostly for it but with conditions.
As Rawnsley explains, “Time is now very short. The mandate for the EU's peacekeeping force in Bosnia expires this week and it is contested whether it can legally continue if the Russians wield their veto. There is a 10 December deadline for agreement in Kosovo. It is almost universally expected there won't be any agreement. Then the really scary stuff threatens to start happening.
Such a series of events would, almost inevitably, drag the region into war. Resolving a conflict now would be far harder than it was in the 1990s; the Russians are far more obstructionist, the American military more over-stretched and European publics even more wary of committing troops to war.
The Kosovans are talking about making a unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia. That could set off an explosive chain reaction throughout the western Balkans as the Serb minority in Kosovo revolts and the government in Belgrade backs a breakaway by the Serbs in Bosnia.”
It was always thought that offering Serbia EU membership would be enough to persuade it to accept Kosovo’s independence. But with the prospects for further EU expansion looking pretty grim, this solution isn’t really on the table any more. Creative diplomacy will be needed to break this log-jam.
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Comments
Max Kaye
November 18th, 2007 4:08pmA breakaway Kosovo will - sooner or later -agitate for union with Albania. Serbia and Serbes in Kosovo (who have become even more of a minority as ethnic cleansing works both ways) will not be best pleased. The resulting conflict - for there will be conflict - will be a magnet for assorted jihadis (like those settled in Bosnia who must now be bored with the tedium of normal life). Then, as Andrew Rawnsley says, the 'really scary stuff' will happen. The EU has made a dire mistake in lending support to the notion of an independent Kosovo. (The Americans too, but they are far enough away not to suffer from the direct fallout).
I blame the late Robin Cook for starting it all by encouraging the Albanians (in and out of Kosovo) with his insistence on calling the Serb's 'Holiest of Holies' 'Kosova'.
John
November 18th, 2007 4:52pmMax Kaye is right. The West was duped into supporting Albanians in Kosovo. Whatever happens, the UK's policy must be to avoid taking in more Albabian gangsters.
B.A.
November 18th, 2007 6:22pmWhen will the U.K. and in particular, it's government LEARN from the past. We are but a small island, we don't have the resouces and, never really have. To go, sticking our noses, into other countries affairs. our military are already suffering from being overstretched, underpaid and generally, treated disgustingly......as usual. No Prime minister, you cannot raise our taxes yet again, not to put our hard earned money, into your WAR CHEST............PULL OUT...............KEEP OUT..............STAY OUT
Tanuki
November 18th, 2007 9:03pmI consider NATO/the UK's involvement in support of Serbian albanians as our big policy-mistake of the last decade: why our politicians were so blind and crazy as to do this still utterly baffles me. Do we *really* want another emergent mohammedan pseudostate within Europe's boundaries? There is no more a 'state' of kosovo as there is a 'state' of Bradford.
wonderfulforhisage
November 18th, 2007 10:03pmSounds like a job for SuperTone - if he's not too busy entertaining the non hunting neighbours that is.
David Lindsay
November 19th, 2007 10:20amIf Russia vetoes UN recognition of any ludicrous claim by Kosovo to be an independent state, and promises to aid any Serbian military campaign against it, then will “the West” push the matter? I doubt it. They are hardly going to risk World War Three for a collection of black-shirted Wahhabi and heroin-trafficking pimps. Are they? After all, if they did, then the precedent would be set: once the neocons’ own economic policies had produced Muslim majorities in, say, the former Metropolitan County of West Yorkshire, or great swathes of France, then will those areas also be entitled to independence? If not, why not?
steve
November 19th, 2007 11:56amWell I suppose that if the people of West Yorkshire were to vote clearly and unambigously for independence, then I for one would say "fair enough, off you go" This is an interesting question though, as where would you draw the line for wannabe seccessionists? presumably somewhere between West Yorkshire, and the "Independent republic of my house" there is a line of rationality, that you would be foolhardy to cross
David Lindsay
November 19th, 2007 1:46pmI bet you wouldn't say that if it were actually going to happen, Steve. And you certainly wouldn't if you or your relatives were living there and didn't want it.
EmitFlesti
November 19th, 2007 10:15pmKososvo is the heartland of Serbia, the key to it's self-understanding for over 600 years since the defeat at Kosovo Polje at the hands of the Turks in 1389, and the site of it's most sacred Orthodox shrines (many of which have been destroyed in the KLA's ethnic-cleansing campaign). The US and the EU made a big mistake supporting the KLA, a Muslim terrorist organisation in the first place. Instead of helping to build a Muslim terrorist state in the heart of Europe, we should have been helping the Serbs maintain their country intact. As usual, however, the West's mandarins prefer cultural and political suicide to standing up against Mulsim terror. What a disgrace. I can only hope the Serbs, with their Russian allies, will prove victorious in the next war that is surely soon to break out, and put to rest this talk of Kosovo being an independent state. Kosovo is Serbia!. The US and EU deserve nothing less than to have egg smeared all over thier face for their disastrous decades long policy in Kosovo. Clinton and all the other NATO leaders and generals should have been brought up on war crimes chrges, in addition to being punished for violating the NATO charter - a defensive pact that gives no authorisation for an aggressive offensive war.
steve
November 20th, 2007 10:54amDavid - Bet I would! What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, and if we are OK about other countries breaking up and in some cases (East Timor, Kosovo)being more than OK, then we should be sanguine if it ever happens here. I suppose in the case of West Yorkshire its a remote possibility, But if Scotland, Wales, NI voted for independence, that's fine by me, just about the only bit of England proper I can imagine going is Cornwall, and should that vote ever happen, once again thats OK by me, mind you I still have doubts as to whether the Independent Republic of My House has the right to seccede, much as though the idea has appeal to someone of a libertarian stripe like myself