Ethnic Albanians in the Serbian province of Kosovo want
independence, but even the Europeans don’t believe they’ve earned
it. Javier Solana, the European Union’s foreign policy head, has
returned from Kosovo’s capital of Pristina criticizing the
Albanians’ refusal to move forward on democratization and minority
rights.
Six years ago President Bill Clinton and NATO launched an
unprovoked war against Yugoslavia, which had attacked neither the
U.S. nor any American ally. The “liberated” Yugoslav (now Serbian)
province of Kosovo remains in limbo.
The status quo satisfies no one, especially the ethnic Albanians
who dominate Kosovo. Nicholas Burns, Undersecretary of State for
Political Affairs, recently told Congress: “The status quo of
Kosovo’s undefined status is no longer sustainable, desirable, or
acceptable.”
So U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan has appointed a special
envoy, Kai Eide, Norway’s ambassador to NATO, to assess the
province’s compliance with democratic and human rights standards,
with an eye to starting international negotiations on Kosovo’s
final status in the fall. But the process is dependent on Kosovo’s
good behavior, which Solana found lacking.
The fact that Kosovo remains an issue demonstrates the Clinton
administration’s hubris and surreal view of the Balkan combatants
in 1999. The belief that it could impose a mutually acceptable
arrangement, one that enshrined minority rights within a
multi-ethnic framework, always was a fantasy.
The hatreds on the ground were too strong. America’s
intervention — taking the world’s greatest military alliance into
war against a destitute state suffering through a series of civil
wars — irrevocably changed the geopolitical environment.
Stopping the bitter guerrilla conflict was an obvious benefit,
but little good has occurred since the bloodletting ended.
America’s allies, the Albanian majority, conducted ethnic cleansing
on a grand scale, kicking out most Serbs, Jews, Roma, and
non-Albanian Muslims.
U.N. rule has done little to prevent endemic violence, crime,
and instability, including brutal anti-Serb riots last year. Rep.
Chris Smith (R-NJ) says simply: “the human rights situation in
Kosovo is still not a good one, particularly for minority
communities who live in enclaves and for the displaced.”
At a congressional hearing in May, Charles English of the State
Department reported, “Discrimination remains a serious problem.
Access to public services is uneven. Incidents of harassment still
occur. Freedom of movement is limited. And too many minorities
still feel unsafe in Kosovo.”
At the same time, the local population is dissatisfied with its
indeterminate status: still formally part of Serbia, officially
ruled by Western occupiers, with effective local control but no
final resolution in sight.
Now, at least, the U.N., with prodding by the Bush
administration, is attempting to move forward. There is likely to
be some assessment whether Kosovo is meeting a number of democratic
“standards” along with the creation of some forum for discussing
the province’s ultimate status.
ALL THAT CAN BE SAID is, the sooner the better. The current
situation benefits no one. Most obviously it is a source of discord
and instability in Kosovo.
The prospect of an international fight over Kosovo also provokes
nationalist antagonism in Serbia, where political parties hostile
to the West have done well of late. Other nations, too, worry:
almost all of Serbia’s neighbors harbor ethnic Albanian populations
and worry about the impact of border changes. Unfortunately, it
will be easier to start the process than to deliver a good
result.
The only hope for finding some solution is to abandon the
illusions that long have tainted American policy in the Balkans.
First, consent of all of the parties is impossible. There is no
agreement that will satisfy everyone. After seeing other parts of
the former Yugoslavia secede, why would Albanian Kosovars accept
less than independence? But why would Serbia accept dismemberment
at the hands of numerous countries — America, Britain, and Turkey,
to start — that have historically suppressed their own
secessionist movements?
Why would an artificial neighboring state like Bosnia back the
partition of Kosovo between competing ethnic groups, creating a
principle that could be applied to it? Why would Greece, Macedonia,
or Montenegro support an Albanian minority of another nation in
winning independence? Why should the nation of Albania forswear the
possibility of union with Kosovo and creation of a greater
Albania?
Western nations also should abandon the embarrassingly naive
illusion that they can forcibly engineer a federal state that
protects minority rights. The bitter serial break-up of Yugoslavia
should have ended this fantasy.
If that wasn’t a large enough dose of reality, then any belief
in a multi-ethnic Kosovo should have disappeared when ethnic
Albanians kicked out a quarter million of their neighbors after
NATO intervened on their behalf. Whatever final delusions might
have remained should have disappeared in last year’s spurt of
anti-Serb violence by ethnic Albanians.
Understandably, no Albanian Kosovar cares to trust his future to
Serb governance. But no Serb, Jew, Roma, or anyone else would want
to trust his future to ethnic Albanian governance, irrespective of
the promises made by whomever.
It also is important to abandon expectation of a “just”
settlement. Since the West cheerfully backed creation of a series
of new states out of Yugoslavia, there’s no intrinsic reason to say
no to Kosovo.
At the same time, the NATO countries denied Serbs the right to
secede from the new nations of Bosnia and Croatia. So what
principle justifies giving the Albanians more rights than were
accorded the Serbs? On the other hand, if Albanians have a right to
secede from Serbia, there’s no logical reason to deny Serbs the
right to secede from Kosovo.
IN SHORT, THERE ARE NO generally applicable principles here. The
U.S. and its European allies support the sovereignty of nation
states in the face of ethnic pressures — except when they support
groups that wish to secede and establish ethnically-based
states.
In the case of the Balkans, the only principle that seemed to
apply was that everyone got to secede from Serb-dominated
territories and Serbs were never allowed to secede from territories
dominated by other groups. This might be consistent policy, but it
should not be confused with a principled moral stand.
None of the proposed solutions is pretty. Independence would be
in keeping with the wishes of Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian majority,
but would leave the few remaining Serbs vulnerable, inflame
nationalism in Serbia, unsettle neighboring states, and create a
statelet likely to become the regional font of crime, instability,
and perhaps even terrorism.
Leaving Kosovo with Serbia, whatever the form of autonomy, would
satisfy Serbia and other nations with sizable ethnic Albanian
populations, but has no support among Kosovo’s Albanians. Serbian
brutality during the guerrilla conflict and six years of de facto
autonomy after allied intervention have eliminated this as a
realistic option.
Moreover, this approach would place Serbia’s democratic future
in doubt, creating a hostile voting bloc accounting for roughly 20
percent of the population. (With a youthful population, ethnic
Albanians could constitute 30 percent of army recruits.) Finally,
this “solution” would be inherently unstable, creating a sense of
unfinished business, seeming ethnic Albanians to be a mere way
station on the way to independence.
Independence with partition — really big partition minus little
partition — would come closer to satisfying ethnic Albanians, by
giving them a country, and Serbs, by leaving most of them in
Serbia. Such a system would be difficult to negotiate with
Albanians, leave some Albanians in Serb territory, and would
unnerve surrounding nations by encouraging further partitions.
Nevertheless, it would come closest to reflecting the desires of
residents and applying just principles. Separation would be the
means to discourage future conflict. Certainly it should not be
ruled out by the West, as the Bush administration has attempted to
do, effectively prejudging any “negotiations.”
ALTHOUGH CLINTON ADMINISTRATION officials who did so much to
unnecessarily entangle America in the Balkans have demanded
continued U.S. “leadership,” solving the region’s problems always
should have been Europe’s rather than America’s problem.
Unfortunately, the U.S. now bears significant responsibility for
the outcome due to its foolish intervention in 1999. But Europe
retains both a greater interest in Kosovo’s final status and
ability to influence Balkan governments than does America.
Thus, Washington should baptize the beginning of an
international process for resolving Kosovo’s status and then step
back, withdrawing its last 1800 troops from the region. Europe then
could wield its various tools of influence — a willingness to
maintain military garrisons, the prospect of joining the European
Union, and the offer of economic opportunities and aid. If the
Europeans choose a different strategy than preferred by Washington,
so be it. And if a continuing troop presence is necessary, as many
analysts argue, it should be provided by Europe.
The Kosovo war is over, but the peaceful resolution has barely
begun. In the West’s search for a solution, no one should unduly
worry about respecting international juridical principles or
seeking regional consensus. NATO abandoned any pretense of
principle when it launched its unprovoked war against Serbia.
The allies should indicate that precedent is irrelevant. Every
case, whether Kosovo or Bosnia or Croatia or Macedonia, is unique.
International solutions will depend on particular circumstances and
won’t be determined by any other settlement.
There are lessons to be learned. The U.S., with or without NATO,
should say never again. Never again will Washington substitute
ideological fantasies for practical realities when implementing its
foreign policy. Never again will Washington intervene in a distant
civil war of no geopolitical concern to America. Never again will
America attack another nation that poses no threat to the U.S. The
world is filled with tragedy, and the Balkans — let alone Iraq —
demonstrates how difficult it is for outsiders to resolve ancient
and intractable conflicts.
Who can and should govern Kosovo, and can they do it fairly and
effectively? No one really knows. But it’s time to give the local
inhabitants a chance to try… And to let them deal with the
consequences if they fail.
