Transconflict Serbia | NGO Serbia and the UK

Over twenty years on from the onset of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ted Lieverman explores the progress of Sarajevo’s recovery – or not – from the almost four-year long siege.

By Ted Lieverman

Downtown Sarajevo

The corner of Ulica Koturova, Sarajevo

Cemetery for the victims of the siege of Sarajevo

Commemorating Markale Market, where 68 people were killed in 1994

Sarajevo’s contemporary skyline

Markale Market today

The Latin Bridge, am Ottoman bridge over the River Miljacka

Ted Lieverman is a freelance photographer working on issues of conflict and social justice. His photos have been published by Consortium News, Global Post, and several legal publciations. He is a photographer for Northstar Productions in Fairfax, Virginia, and an associate producer for the documentary film ‘Guazapa: Yesterday’s Enemies’.

To view more of Mr. Lieverman’s work, please click here.

‘Sarajevo – beyond the siege’ is presented as part of TransConflict’s TransCulture initiative, which showcases efforts to explore and transcend conflict in the Balkans through a variety of cultural means.

Having achieved its aim of demonstrating that the northern resistance to the imposition of Pristina institutions is a genuine popular response, and not the result of criminal coercion, it is now time to reconsider the planned 15th February referendum.

By Gerard M. Gallucci

A few weeks back, I suggested that the controversy over the “referendum” called by the northern Kosovo Serbs was much ado about nothing. The four Serb-majority municipalities – after initial resistance in the DS-controlled assembly in Leposavic – had agreed to a vote in mid-February about whether they accept or not to be ruled by Pristina. The result would be a foregone conclusion but would have no practical effect. The northern leaders were not calling for a declaration of independence or separation from anything, but simply giving the local Kosovo Serb community an opportunity to clearly go on record and refute the accusations being flung at them that resistance to Pristina and the barricades against EULEX were just the work of “criminals” and “radicals.” I suggested the vote could simply be considered a poll.

Since then the controversy has continued with much of the pressure on the northerners not to carry out their plans coming from the Serbian government itself. Belgrade has told the northerners to cancel the referendum and said that holding it goes against broader state interests. The Tadic government has also suggested that those in the north pushing the referendum are doing so for political purposes. (Three of the four northern municipalities are held by opposition parties, with Leposavic being the exception, and it is likely that some of those behind the referendum do see it as a way of scoring political points against Tadic.) The Serbian parliament will consider the issue.

Some in the north believe recent severe electricity shortages and a delay in paying local salaries are also a form of Belgrade pressure. The Serbian government may be focusing now on getting the Leposavic municipal assembly to break ranks and cancel participation in the referendum, counting on that to stop the entire plan. The mayor of Leposavic reportedly announced Monday that the referendum should be immediately postponed.

It seems that some – in Belgrade and beyond – see in the referendum planned for February an echo of the series of referendums – from Slovenia in 1990 through BiH in 1992 – that ushered in the breakup of Yugoslavia. Belgrade is also anxious to meet the EU’s conditions for candidacy before the question is again taken up in March. The Quint is demanding that the barricades come down and the “parallel institutions” in the north be abolished. They seem to be leaving it to Tadic to interpret this as a demand that the referendum not happen as well.

All of this suggests that perhaps it might be normal to reconsider holding the referendum. Although the vote is just a kind of poll, it has been elevated into an important political fact by all those arranged against it. When facts change, it is wise to reconsider options.

The referendum was originally seen as a way to make the point that the northern resistance to imposition of Pristina institutions is a genuine popular response and not the result of criminal coercion. It seems to have already accomplished that aim. Only Pieter Feith and some extreme polemicists persist in calling the northerners criminals. KFOR has stopped calling the local municipal institutions “parallel.”

A far more important question is the upcoming elections in Serbia and whether they will be held in Kosovo or not. Tadic is trapped on this question. The Quint/EU would not like to see Kosovo included and Belgrade has noted it cannot hold elections there in places where there are no Serbs. To include the north and southern enclaves is the real issue. Tadic would love to please Brussels, but his hands are tied politically and constitutionally. It might be best for everyone to focus now on finding a formula for holding local elections this year that does not foreclose options for broader compromise solutions. The UN may be able to play a key bridging role here.

One more note. As the northerners have been refusing to drop the referendum, they have also been rejecting Tadic’s four-point plan – which still has not seen the light of day – for being a simple reiteration of the Ahtisaari Plan. This may be just a bargaining ploy as I know some of those doing the “rejecting” have actually been thinking seriously of the options. Finding a way to implement the Ahtisaari Plan in the north in a way acceptable to everyone – but especially to the northerners – might not be the best of all possible worlds, but it would be far from the worst.

Gerard M. Gallucci is a retired US diplomat and UN peacekeeper. He worked as part of US efforts to resolve the conflicts in Angola, South Africa and Sudan and as Director for Inter-American Affairs at the National Security Council. He served as UN Regional Representative in Mitrovica, Kosovo from July 2005 until October 2008 and as Chief of Staff for the UN mission in East Timor from November 2008 until June 2010. Gerard is also a member of TransConflict’s Advisory Board.

To read TransConflict’s recently-released policy paper, entitled ‘The Ahtisaari Plan and North Kosovo’, please click here.

To read other articles by Gerard for TransConflict, please click here.

To learn more about both Serbia and Kosovo, please check out TransConflict’s new reading lists series by clicking here.

To keep up-to-date with the work of TransConflict, please click here. If you are interested in supporting TransConflict, please click here.

Lucas Oldwine’s short film, ‘Syntagma’, explores the protests that gripped Athens in the summer of 2011; a vociferous and cohesive response against social injustices exposed and created by the economic crisis.

Background

Economic crisis can become the real ground for a real social movement in which opinions and viewpoints are shaped. In June 2011, hundreds of thousands of people of all ages, nations and social backgrounds gathered outside the parliament of Athens to protest against social injustice. For some it was simply a new experience or trend, while for others it became the only way to express themselves and demonstrate their stance.

The Balkans Beyond Borders Film Making Workshop in Athens was taking place during that time, giving ten young participants from throughout Europe the opportunity to shoot with their camera the real crisis as it was experienced in its heart, in the capital of Greece.

“For the protestors that decided to remain in Syntagma square there was no turning back, simply because there was nothing left to go back to. They were young students that lost their vision for the future anymore, unemployed, homeless immigrants and drifters. Joined by their common hope for change, they organized a tented community in the middle of the Syntagma Square”, says Lucas Oldwine, a participant of the workshop and creator of the film.

From the issue of crisis in all its forms, this year’s Balkans Beyond Borders Short Film Festival tackles the issue of multilingualism and communication in the region and beyond. The title of the Festival is “TALK TO ME”.

“TALK TO ME” is a call-to-action for young people to engage actively. It is about communication in all its forms: either through language or other means of expression. The Balkans are known for their culture, traditions and multilingualism so show us the Balkan diversity that surrounds you in your everyday life. Grab your camera and talk to your parents, your friends, your lover, your neighbour, your enemy, talk to the Balkans and talk to the world. Multilingualism and communication are around us and beyond us. Let them inspire you.

So don’t lose time and TALK TO ME

Young artists up to the age of 30 from the Balkan region and beyond (Southeast Europe) are once again invited to create their own short film related to this year’s topic. The deadline for submissions is 1st April, and the festival will take place in Tirana in May 2012.

The main objective of the project is to motivate young people to create short films through which they reflect on their region’s past, current and future situation. The aim is to get a better grasp of how they relate to communication in general, as well as to the region’s cultural and linguistic diversity.

Language – apart from being a means of communication – can be considered a means of identification. Our mother tongue shows who we are, where we came from. It is part of our identity.

‘Syntagma’ is presented as part of TransConflict’s TransCulture initiative, which showcases efforts to explore and transcend conflict in the Balkans through a variety of cultural means.

Self-congratulatory remarks by the International Civilian Representative for Kosovo juxtaposes oddly with demonstrations on both the Serbian and Kosovar Albanian sides that underscore that the situation is anything but normal.

By David B. Kanin

The substance of Pieter Feith’s comments last week is unimportant.  The attitude they represent matters more.  Kosovo now has been promised the chance of being declared “normal” by its erstwhile international supervisors.  Speaking for the 25-nation International Steering Group (USG), Mr. Feith, the International Civilian Representative for Kosovo (ICR) said the new state has made such progress that an end of the ISG-monitored “supervised independence”(is that not an oxymoron?) should be possible by the end of 2012.  The ICR solemnly declared that this happy event will “normalize Kosovo as a normal European state.” (Agence France Press, 24 January).

In the spirit of so many previous generations of Western imperial, mandatory, or trustee officials with vice-regal powers, the ICR awarded himself and his group credit for this happy event.  “Together with my colleagues, we have given the young state of Kosovo…a start in life.  We have established the institutions and now, from the end of the year, Kosovo will be like any other European state.” (Emphasis mine)  The ICR lay before Kosovo the prospect of coming closer to the European Union if it can build on its supervisors’ gifts, develop domestic institutions and serve as a stable, reliable partner in the region.

There exists an academic literature on the topic of how West Europeans since the Enlightenment have rationalized their self-asserted hegemony by relegating the status of whatever others they claim to supervise to rungs on an invented, asserted developmental ladder well below the exalted position of the civilized supervisors.  (Larry Wolff and Marco Cipolloni are two leading contemporary thinkers in the field.)  The ICR’s condescending rhetoric falls well within the universe of this scholarship and the pattern established by representatives of the Powers since the days of the 19th Century Concert of Europe.  The Council of Europe’s latest lecture to Bosnia falls in the same category.

Kosovo, however, is something of an anomaly.  The ICR’s insistence on repeating versions of the word “normal” underscores the point that the state/province is anything but.  It is one thing when all the Great Powers agree for a while on the diplomatic status, borders, government, and other aspects of a place on which they have imposed their writ.  It is another when this is not the case.  The usual rhetorical hyperbole does not wash when it serves ironically to underscore the contingency of an untenable status quo that satisfies no contestant.

I already have posted a comment on the shoddy US-led diplomacy that created the current diplomatic situation.  In this context, the ICR’s strange self-congratulations juxtaposes oddly with demonstrations on both the Serbian and Kosovar Albanian sides that underscore that the situation is anything but normal.  Washington’s failure to engineer an internationally agreed-upon replacement to UN Security Council Resolution 1244 and decision to impose a unilaterally declared Kosovar state created a fragile, highly contested condition.  The continuing legal existence of the security annexes to 1244 gives Serbia a viable legal reed to rest on; the fact that 85 countries have recognized the state of Kosova despite 1244 puts boundaries on the reach of that resolution but does not give the new state more than partial international status.  This situation satisfies no one and so cannot constitute be a “final” status.

Therefore, neither Boris Tadic’s latest proposal, nor the Ahtisaari Plan it is drawn from, will lead to a lasting solution to the Kosova/o imbroglio.  Tadic knows this; his rhetorical posture is meant simply to attract the positive international attention he needs to gain the brass ring of EU candidate status, the key to his hope for an electoral victory this spring.  (When you read “Ahtisaari,” think “Invincible,” or “Vance-Owen.”)

The two protagonists are looking in opposite directions.  Those Serbs who cling to dreams of Kosovo gaze back to a largely invented past which involves the province as the heart of their identity.  Never mind that Serbs were on both sides in 1389, or that they have been leaving the place in large numbers at least since least the trek of the Vojvods at the end of the 17th century.  Forget that Kosovo and the modern Serbian were joined only from 1913 until 1999.  Tito’s territorial adjustments also can be conveniently forgotten.

More important, those Serbs seeking to re-impose themselves on a hugely Albanian place ignore (or excoriate) the many co-nationals living south of the Ibar who are adapting themselves to the reality of being a permanent minority in a foreign country.  It is easy for the heroes in the north to sing the old songs, throw rocks at and build roadblocks against ineffectual EU “rule of law” mavens and their KFOR protectors, and thumb their noses at a government in Belgrade they nevertheless rely on.  These public performances do nothing for the much more numerous Serbs living from day to day in Kosova.

As the ICR praised his performance, his ISG demanded that Serbia stop “interfering” and withdraw its clandestine security forces from Kosovo. (Reuters, January 24)  The ICR warned that the process of ending supervised independence should not be held hostage by the nasty things he said “continue to dominate the situation” in the north.  Good luck with that.

In contrast, the Kosovars are wrestling with a very fluid future.  Development of the nascent Kosovar state is part of the central question in the southern Balkans:  into how many states and under what political context will Albanians organize themselves?  The current status quo reflects temporal limnality – the eventual relationship among Albanians in Albania, Kosova, Macedonia, Montenegro, and the rump of Serbia remains an open question no matter Western rhetoric.  This context of contingency would not disappear even in the unlikely event that all these counties join the EU suddenly and soon.  The only constant – the communal and material heartbeat of the Balkans – is and will be the business done across the lines by patronage networks on all sides.

The recent demonstrations by Serbs living in the municipalities still making up a Serbian Kosovo and by Albin Kurti and Vetevendosja should be seen in this context.  The anger from both groups represent a combination of opportunity and fear in a situation where everyone knows someone eventually is going to force or negotiate another new “final” status.  Peoples in the Balkans have seen this before (often within a relatively short time after the supervising Power of the day has declared the extant political snapshot to be a permanent condition).  The Mayors in the north and those Kosovar Albanians desiring more than the sort-of state they now have are not marginal actors; they represent the larger knowledge that – one way or another – things are going to change.  Any citizens of the notional state of Bosnia paying attention to events farther south in the former Federation know the feeling.

While Kosovo’s Serbian mayors are attempting to restore a constructed past, Albin Kurti is a little ahead of himself.  Vetevendosje’s effort to stop – even temporarily – the import of goods from Serbia into Kosova had to fail.  It ignored both Kosova’s continued dependence on transportation routes going through the rump of Serbia and the likelihood that many Kosovars – like many in Serbia – do not wake up every day eager to fight.  Kurti overhyped his plans.  His actions were easily brushed aside.  The international overseers have no clue how to resolve Balkan disputes, but they do have the muscle to deal with direct kinetic challenges.

There will be further international lectures and local demonstrations.  States and their foreign supervisors will churn out elections and constitutions.  None will matter much.  Patronage networks (some are called “political parties”) will dole out the jobs and other forms of subsistence far more important to most peoples’ everyday lives.  The resulting inertia will reinforce cynicism in the region and frustration outside it.  The danger in this is that all of us are likely to be distracted by the minutiae this throws up and could be surprised when conditions or talented political entrepreneurs produce the next big change.

David B. Kanin is an adjunct professor of international relations at Johns Hopkins University and a former senior intelligence analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

To read other articles by David for TransConflict, please click here.

To learn more about the Balkans, please refer to TransConflict’s reading list series by clicking here.

To keep up-to-date with the work of TransConflict, please click here. If you are interested in supporting TransConflict, please click here.