http://en.fondsk.ru/article.php?id=910
Strategic Cultural Foundation (Russia)
August 17, 2007
Russia’s Response to Kosovo Independence
Pyotr Iskenderov
The first Balkan visit of the “Three”, a group of
international middlemen, ended quite like it could
have been predicted.
Aleksandr Botzan-Kharchenko, a special envoy of the
Russian foreign minister for the Balkans, Frank
Wisner, a special envoy of the White House for the
problems of the Kosovo settlement, and Wolfgang
Ischinger, a German diplomat representing the EU, were
accorded the highest-level reception in Belgrade and
Prisitina.
They had talks with the leaders of Serbia and Kosovo,
presidents Boris Tadic and Fatmirko Seidiu, prime
ministers Voislav Kostunica and Agim Ceku. Much was
said about the difficulty and responsibility of the
diplomatic mission. But again no concrete results were
reported.
The gap between the positions of Belgrade and the
Albanian separatists in Kosovo did not become
narrower.
The other way about, the unwillingness of the
Albanians to agree to any concessions or compromise
became even clearer. As Mssrs. Seidu and Ceku quite
arrogantly stated, neither the issue of independence
of the province nor its – even hypothetical -
breakdown into the Serbian and Albanian parts that
Herr Ischinger made a slip of as a version, could be
on the agenda on negotiations with authorities in
Belgrade.
And Veton Surroi, the leader of the “Ora” faction of
the Kosovo Assembly and, incidentally, a member of the
Kosovo delegation at the planned negotiations, went as
far as say that the 120 days the world community has
given Pristina to continue negotiations could be put
to better use to attend to more important things, like
preparing the province for getting its independence,
working out its Constitution and adopting other laws,
approving Kosovo’s state symbols, its flag and anthem.
Given that their supporters in the West have for more
than eight years been hammering into the heads of the
Albanian separatists the idea that Kosovo should no
longer be a part of Serbia, it would have been hard to
imagine that the results of the visits would be
different.
In the end, the intention to unilaterally proclaim the
province independent has changed nothing in the
situation. Are there not enough other self-proclaimed
entities? What really counts is the response of the
international community to the hint Herr Ischinger
dropped and the nature of the conclusion to be made of
it in the world’s capitals, including Moscow.
The course of the development of the situation is such
that by the year-end Kosovo can be acknowledged
independent by not just a single country (as was the
case with Turkey acknowledging the Turkish Republic of
North Cyprus) or a little more than twenty nations
(the case of Taiwan), but by rather several dozens of
the world’s biggest states, including the United
States, Great Britain, France, the Netherlands and
Belgium.
This would radically change the very essence of the
problem of the non-acknowledged states, opening new
vistas for different versions and scenarios.
And the current supporters of the idea of Kosovo’s
independence could find themselves in a situation
whereby simultaneously with the clearly pro-Western
state, Eurasia can witness the emergence of other
full-fledged subjects that would never feel
sympathetic about either the United States, NATO or
the European Union.
It is not accidental that the western diplomats who
refer to Kosovo as “the unique case” that has nothing
to do with either the Transdniester Republic,
Abkhazia, South Ossetia or Nagorno Karabakh, are
trying to avoid detailed subject-matter discussions of
the “uniqueness” of the Kosovo situation.
The author of this article has had enough reasons to
conclude this, talking both officially and in private
with officials at the EU and NATO headquarters, as
well as with people at the UN Mission for Kosovo’s
temporary administration.
As a rule, Western officials tend to reduce the
problem to declarations of the complexity of the
historical roots of the Kosovo problem and the
impossibility for Serbs and Albanians to live side by
side in a state they share.
The conventionality of such formulations is seen with
the naked eye.
The deep historical roots are typical of all the
ethnic problems of the Balkan states including Bosnia,
Macedonia, Montenegro and Albania.
Should they be solved by way of separation of certain
territories, the Balkans would turn into an image of
Germany of the days of the feudal suzerainty.
After all is said and done, relations between Greeks
and Albanians on the eve of World War I were much
worse than those of Serbs and Kosovars, however much
the official Tirana that suggests that Serbia discard
Kosovo does not look prepared to give its territory to
adjacent Greece.
And in terms of fierceness, the ethnic civil war in
Bosnia and Herzegovina was never like any conflict in
the former Yugoslavia. Nevertheless the West did not
acknowledge the right of independence of any of the
self-proclaimed formations in that land, be it the
Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosna, or West Bosnia
(Tzazin Kraina) or the Republic of Serbia.
But whenever a western vis-a-vis hears anything about
the doubts of the “unique character” of the Kosovo
conflict we express in this article as well as
information about the anti-Abkhazian and anti-Ossetian
ethnic mopping-up operations the regular Georgian army
was involved in in the 1990s, they immediately get
bored and do their best to quit the conversation.
Only a few recall the role of the UN civil
administration in Kosovo.
According to some officials at the NATO headquarters
in Brussels (who insisted on hiding behind the screen
of anonymity as people unauthorized to comment on the
future status of the province), “the uniqueness” of
the Kosovo case boils down to the fact that unlike the
situation with the post-Soviet space, the UN mission
is there.
But then similar missions were in their time enacted
in Namibia and East Timor, and both territories later
turned from UN mandate territories into sovereign
states.
The transformation of the status of Namibia and East
Timor as UN wards was very real.
But not all the truth was told.
The international representation there was introduced
in the conditions of the factual occupation by the
neighbouring countries, correspondingly South Africa
and Indonesia.
The Kosovo case is totally different.
The UN mission was installed in a sovereign state, the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY).
Yugoslavia exists no longer, but it its place at the
United Nations automatically became Serbia’s.
In other words, the goal of the international presence
was not putting an end to occupation but rendering
assistance to the normalisation of the situation in
the province, which according to Resolution 1244 dated
June 10, 1999 of the UN Security Council was
recognized as a part of the FRY.
Therefore, the UN mandate does not give anyone the
right to change Kosovo’s international legal status.
As soon as the West acknowledges Kosovo’s independence
proclaimed by the Albanian separatists, the problem
would automatically move onto a principally new plane.
The destiny of all the self-proclaimed states in the
contemporary world will be an issue on the
international agenda.
Should the United States and the EU decide to
unilaterally acknowledge Pristina, they would deprive
themselves of the right to have a say in the
settlement of the conflicts in the Transdniester
Republic, Abkhazia and South Ossetia as unbiased
middlemen.
That would give Russia the aces unbeatable by either
Javier Solana, or Condoleezza Rice, or Gordon Brown
who are so fond of delivering lectures on objectivity
and legality to Russia.
It is clear that the Albanian leaders in Kosovo think
nothing of such complicated geopolitical scenarios.
They are in a rush to legalise the black criminal
“hole” in the middle of the Balkans, laundering their
profits from drug trafficking, prostitution and trade
in “live commodities”, gaining as well a direct access
to IMF and World Bank funds.
But it appears that the West has so far failed to
calculate the strategic aftermath of its present-day
alliance with persons like Seidiu and Ceku.
The United States, NATO and EU are gradually stepping
into a trap, the keys to which will be Russia’s.
It was not Moscow that launched the mechanism of
reviewing the principles of the present-day world
order. But it can and should speak its mind in the new
situation. Not only Serbs are awaiting it. Other
nations that are tired of the impunity and hypocrisy
of the Western Pharisees are also in that number.
If for the sake of its Albanian wards the West is
ready to endanger all the world order, why should
Moscow not summon courage to protect the nations that
do not think they can do without Russia?
While Veton Surroi and his like-minded Albanian
associates instead of negotiating are openly sneering
at the international middlemen, composing the anthem
and sewing the flag of an independent Kosovo, it is
time for the Russian diplomacy to come up with its
response, the acknowledgement of independence of key
Russia’s allies in the post-Soviet space.
Source: R. Rozoff via Stop NATO - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stopnato
Strategic Cultural Foundation (Russia)
August 17, 2007
Russia’s Response to Kosovo Independence
Pyotr Iskenderov
The first Balkan visit of the “Three”, a group of
international middlemen, ended quite like it could
have been predicted.
Aleksandr Botzan-Kharchenko, a special envoy of the
Russian foreign minister for the Balkans, Frank
Wisner, a special envoy of the White House for the
problems of the Kosovo settlement, and Wolfgang
Ischinger, a German diplomat representing the EU, were
accorded the highest-level reception in Belgrade and
Prisitina.
They had talks with the leaders of Serbia and Kosovo,
presidents Boris Tadic and Fatmirko Seidiu, prime
ministers Voislav Kostunica and Agim Ceku. Much was
said about the difficulty and responsibility of the
diplomatic mission. But again no concrete results were
reported.
The gap between the positions of Belgrade and the
Albanian separatists in Kosovo did not become
narrower.
The other way about, the unwillingness of the
Albanians to agree to any concessions or compromise
became even clearer. As Mssrs. Seidu and Ceku quite
arrogantly stated, neither the issue of independence
of the province nor its – even hypothetical -
breakdown into the Serbian and Albanian parts that
Herr Ischinger made a slip of as a version, could be
on the agenda on negotiations with authorities in
Belgrade.
And Veton Surroi, the leader of the “Ora” faction of
the Kosovo Assembly and, incidentally, a member of the
Kosovo delegation at the planned negotiations, went as
far as say that the 120 days the world community has
given Pristina to continue negotiations could be put
to better use to attend to more important things, like
preparing the province for getting its independence,
working out its Constitution and adopting other laws,
approving Kosovo’s state symbols, its flag and anthem.
Given that their supporters in the West have for more
than eight years been hammering into the heads of the
Albanian separatists the idea that Kosovo should no
longer be a part of Serbia, it would have been hard to
imagine that the results of the visits would be
different.
In the end, the intention to unilaterally proclaim the
province independent has changed nothing in the
situation. Are there not enough other self-proclaimed
entities? What really counts is the response of the
international community to the hint Herr Ischinger
dropped and the nature of the conclusion to be made of
it in the world’s capitals, including Moscow.
The course of the development of the situation is such
that by the year-end Kosovo can be acknowledged
independent by not just a single country (as was the
case with Turkey acknowledging the Turkish Republic of
North Cyprus) or a little more than twenty nations
(the case of Taiwan), but by rather several dozens of
the world’s biggest states, including the United
States, Great Britain, France, the Netherlands and
Belgium.
This would radically change the very essence of the
problem of the non-acknowledged states, opening new
vistas for different versions and scenarios.
And the current supporters of the idea of Kosovo’s
independence could find themselves in a situation
whereby simultaneously with the clearly pro-Western
state, Eurasia can witness the emergence of other
full-fledged subjects that would never feel
sympathetic about either the United States, NATO or
the European Union.
It is not accidental that the western diplomats who
refer to Kosovo as “the unique case” that has nothing
to do with either the Transdniester Republic,
Abkhazia, South Ossetia or Nagorno Karabakh, are
trying to avoid detailed subject-matter discussions of
the “uniqueness” of the Kosovo situation.
The author of this article has had enough reasons to
conclude this, talking both officially and in private
with officials at the EU and NATO headquarters, as
well as with people at the UN Mission for Kosovo’s
temporary administration.
As a rule, Western officials tend to reduce the
problem to declarations of the complexity of the
historical roots of the Kosovo problem and the
impossibility for Serbs and Albanians to live side by
side in a state they share.
The conventionality of such formulations is seen with
the naked eye.
The deep historical roots are typical of all the
ethnic problems of the Balkan states including Bosnia,
Macedonia, Montenegro and Albania.
Should they be solved by way of separation of certain
territories, the Balkans would turn into an image of
Germany of the days of the feudal suzerainty.
After all is said and done, relations between Greeks
and Albanians on the eve of World War I were much
worse than those of Serbs and Kosovars, however much
the official Tirana that suggests that Serbia discard
Kosovo does not look prepared to give its territory to
adjacent Greece.
And in terms of fierceness, the ethnic civil war in
Bosnia and Herzegovina was never like any conflict in
the former Yugoslavia. Nevertheless the West did not
acknowledge the right of independence of any of the
self-proclaimed formations in that land, be it the
Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosna, or West Bosnia
(Tzazin Kraina) or the Republic of Serbia.
But whenever a western vis-a-vis hears anything about
the doubts of the “unique character” of the Kosovo
conflict we express in this article as well as
information about the anti-Abkhazian and anti-Ossetian
ethnic mopping-up operations the regular Georgian army
was involved in in the 1990s, they immediately get
bored and do their best to quit the conversation.
Only a few recall the role of the UN civil
administration in Kosovo.
According to some officials at the NATO headquarters
in Brussels (who insisted on hiding behind the screen
of anonymity as people unauthorized to comment on the
future status of the province), “the uniqueness” of
the Kosovo case boils down to the fact that unlike the
situation with the post-Soviet space, the UN mission
is there.
But then similar missions were in their time enacted
in Namibia and East Timor, and both territories later
turned from UN mandate territories into sovereign
states.
The transformation of the status of Namibia and East
Timor as UN wards was very real.
But not all the truth was told.
The international representation there was introduced
in the conditions of the factual occupation by the
neighbouring countries, correspondingly South Africa
and Indonesia.
The Kosovo case is totally different.
The UN mission was installed in a sovereign state, the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY).
Yugoslavia exists no longer, but it its place at the
United Nations automatically became Serbia’s.
In other words, the goal of the international presence
was not putting an end to occupation but rendering
assistance to the normalisation of the situation in
the province, which according to Resolution 1244 dated
June 10, 1999 of the UN Security Council was
recognized as a part of the FRY.
Therefore, the UN mandate does not give anyone the
right to change Kosovo’s international legal status.
As soon as the West acknowledges Kosovo’s independence
proclaimed by the Albanian separatists, the problem
would automatically move onto a principally new plane.
The destiny of all the self-proclaimed states in the
contemporary world will be an issue on the
international agenda.
Should the United States and the EU decide to
unilaterally acknowledge Pristina, they would deprive
themselves of the right to have a say in the
settlement of the conflicts in the Transdniester
Republic, Abkhazia and South Ossetia as unbiased
middlemen.
That would give Russia the aces unbeatable by either
Javier Solana, or Condoleezza Rice, or Gordon Brown
who are so fond of delivering lectures on objectivity
and legality to Russia.
It is clear that the Albanian leaders in Kosovo think
nothing of such complicated geopolitical scenarios.
They are in a rush to legalise the black criminal
“hole” in the middle of the Balkans, laundering their
profits from drug trafficking, prostitution and trade
in “live commodities”, gaining as well a direct access
to IMF and World Bank funds.
But it appears that the West has so far failed to
calculate the strategic aftermath of its present-day
alliance with persons like Seidiu and Ceku.
The United States, NATO and EU are gradually stepping
into a trap, the keys to which will be Russia’s.
It was not Moscow that launched the mechanism of
reviewing the principles of the present-day world
order. But it can and should speak its mind in the new
situation. Not only Serbs are awaiting it. Other
nations that are tired of the impunity and hypocrisy
of the Western Pharisees are also in that number.
If for the sake of its Albanian wards the West is
ready to endanger all the world order, why should
Moscow not summon courage to protect the nations that
do not think they can do without Russia?
While Veton Surroi and his like-minded Albanian
associates instead of negotiating are openly sneering
at the international middlemen, composing the anthem
and sewing the flag of an independent Kosovo, it is
time for the Russian diplomacy to come up with its
response, the acknowledgement of independence of key
Russia’s allies in the post-Soviet space.
Source: R. Rozoff via Stop NATO - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stopnato