DAYTON - CRUCIAL TURNING-POINT FOR KOSOVO TOO

AIM, Prishtina, November 6, 1995

Negotiations in the American base in Dayton, Ohio, predict that a peace agreement may soon be signed and a more lasting solution for Bosnia and the Serb-Crpoat conflict may be reached. A positive outcome of the negotiations will certainly contribute to relieving of tensions and reestablishment of stability in the region, but it will not necessarily mark the end of the regional crisis. Apart from Bosnia and Eastern Slavonia, in the Balkan space there are several other potentially highly risky focuses of the crisis and new wars. They are actual time bombs which, if not dismantled soon, may lead to new problems and instability in the region with far-reaching consequences on stability and peace in Europe.

One of such time bombs is Kosovo, or the Albanian issue. The fact that Kosovo has not been included in the present phase of intensive negotiations can probably be explained with the wish of the world mediators to end the war in Bosnia as soon as possible and find a peaceful formula for Serb-Croat demarcation. Mediators in the negotiations, the Americans and other members of the Contact Group in the persent phase wish to avoid any additional complications of the already highly delicate negotiations with Milosevic. For Milosevic himself, who has been forced to make a series of big and difficult concessions as it is, opening of the issue of Kosovo at this moment would have certainly been both painful and risky.

But, on the other hand, everyone is nevertheless quite well aware that resolving of the issue of Kosovo can be postponed for ever. That is why indications have nowadays become quite frequent that, immediately after completion of the current negotiations, Kosovo and Macedonia will come on the agenda of the peace conference, in order to preventively dismantle time bombs of new war temptations.

When speaking of Kosovo, one could in fact say that it is indirectly present in the current Dayton negotiations. At the very beginning of the conference, symbolically, the Albanians in the USA organized demonstrations as a reminder of the unresolved Kosovo issue, that is, that without Kosovo, it is impossible to expect lasting peace and stability. On the other hand, in a broader context of declaration of the organizer of the negotiations in Dayton, as well as those heard in diplomatic offices of the members of the contact group, Kosovo was also directly and indirectly mentioned as a significant next step in the overall resolution of the crisis.

But, there are also indications that Kosovo could appear more directly in Dayton negotiations, both on the level of principled agreements and that of general conditioning of peace solutions, and in quite definite offers of the negotiators involved. Before Milosevic left for Ohio, news was launched from Belgrade and Kosovo political lobbies that the Serb delegation had prepared a minimalist plan for Kosovo. World diplomatic circles and articles in the press also increasingly speak of establishing a certain link between the initiative for lifting of the sanctions imposed on Serbia, i.e. the FR of Yugoslavia, and resolving of the remaining controversial issues, primarily that of Kosovo. It seems that there can be no such thing as a simple exchange Milosevic had planned, namely, that his cooperativeness in establishing peace in Bosnia and Croatia would be awarded with complete and unconditional lifting of the sanctions. Although, the head negotiator, Richard Holbrook, was in favour of such a solution, it seems that a more cautious option of selective and timed lifting of the sanctions will prevail both among the Americans and other members of the Contact Group. Three arguments are stated in favour of such precaution: first, guarantors of peace in Bosnia and Croatia wish to insure that peace contracts will be obeyed by Bosnian Serbs by means of conditional and selective lifting of the sanctions; second, UN Security Council and members of the Contact Group wish to maintain timed or alleviated sanctions as an important instrument of pressuring the already weakened Serbia in order to force out faster solutions for the remaining, potentially highly danferous centres of crisis, such as Kosovo; and finally, retaining a part of the sanctions would enable generalization of resolving of the crisis which is missing in the present negotiations, primarily by imposing on the Serbs, but indirectly on the others as well (e.g. the Croats and the Macedonians) certain symmetry in resolving related issues in the domain of human rights, status of the minorities, and territories with compact majority population of "non-state nations", such as Kosovo.

The third condition for lifting of the sanctions is especially important for Kosovo, because it enables principled linking of resolving the Serb issue in Bosnia with the Albanian issue in Serbia. This principled linking of Bosnia with Kosovo was several times summarized in the formula: what Serbia demands for the Serbs across the Drina, it should offer to the Albanians in Serbia. Although this formula has never become the official stance of any of the big powers, it was present in their reflections on variants for resolving the issue of Kosovo, and it was sometimes publicly stated as such.

Of course, 'real politik' does not like this kind of principled symmetry because in practice, it usually appears distinctly asymmetric. Nevertheless, in this actual case, things may be different. Drawing a parallel between Bosnia and Kosovo could serve as some kind of redemption to the world power-wielders for all the former impotence and failures, and even humiliation they experienced in futile efforts to resolve the Balkan crisis. Namely, by drawing this parallel, world politics could at least restore the outer looks of being principled, in other words, had it conformed to certain principles from the beginning, and not plotted with the devil and adopted the politics of 'fait accompli' and results of aggression.

To those who will condemn the current formula for resolution of the Bosnian crisis as a rotten compromise, as a reward for the Serb aggression, and what is even worse, as a silent amnesty of the crime of genocide (ethnic cleansing), the world powers will be able to respond that it was after all a policy based on consistent principles which can be generalized and applied in the entire Balkan space, and as the most immediate example Kosovo would impose itself. Namely, Serb policy is in a sharp split, in a gaping contradiction between Bosnia and Kosovo. This contradiction is especially distinctly expressed in the position of Belgrade, which on the one hand is expected to support basically secessionist demands of the Bosnian Serbs, and on the other, it decisively rejected the same demands of the Kosovo Albanians. International factors understood this discrepancy back in May 1993, and implicitly in Vance-Owen's plan and explicitly in the Washington Agreement, offered a compromising formula of unchanged borders of former Yugoslav republics, but also maximum of "autonomous" rights for the Serbs in Bosnia and Croatia, and the Albanians in Kosovo. In other words, both the Serbs in Bosnia and the Albanians in Kosovo were denied the right to direct secession, but as a compensation were offered the possibility to establish administrative units with very high autonomy and practically, elements of a state. These administrative units of the Serbs and the Albanians would be given strong international guarantees, and some offers even went as far as the possibility of establishing special, even confederate relations with mother states. When speaking of Bosnia, this is still in the game. Confederate contracts of the Federation of Boshniaks and the Croats with the Republic of Croatia, and that of the 'Republic of Srpska' with Serbia, apart from guarantees of sloser cultural and economic relations, would essentially be primarily military contracts through which the mother countries would guarantee protection to ethnic entities in Bosnia. Ibrahim Rugova had demanded the same special confederate relations with Albania as the military guarantor as a possible compromising solution for Kosovo.

It is interesting that in May 1993, just as Vance-Owen's plan and the Washington Agreement clearly formulated the framework for resolution of the Balkan crisis, Milosevic made the great shift in his policy which is finalized now in Dayton negotiations. Namely, the minute he realized that the big powers had reached a fundamental consensus not to change internal borders in former Yugoslavia and about principles for resolving the existing and possible conflicts, Milosevic was forced to abandon his aspiration to create Greater Serbia, but as a counter-measure, he immediately refused to prolong the mandate of the CSCE (now OSCE) Mission which had previously been permitted to monitor the situation of human rights in Kosovo, in Vojvodina and Sandzak. Milosevic's calculation was as follows: if the issue of the status of Bosnian Serbs had definitely become an internal issue of the former republic of Bosnia & Herzegovina according to the decision of the big forces, that is, the question of an agreement between the newly established para-state entities in this republic, then Kosovo and the other two regions in Serbia would necessarily become an internal issue of Serbia.

Although it had understood the principled symmetry of the two crises and its expressedly contradictory position, Belgrade has, nevertheless persistently tried to separate the issue of Kosovo from that of Bosnia, in order to get the highest possible state rights for the Serbs in Bosnia, and at the same time to give the Albanians in Kosovo the lowest possible status of autonomy. Milosevic also wishes to reach the solution in Bosnia with insured status for the Serbs and their state entity in Bosnia as soon as possible, while he is in favour of postponing discussions concerning the issue of Kosovo, of its resolution in a separate procedure and without present conditioning, especially without linking it to the snctions. To what extent Milosevic will succeed in his strategy will depend on further behavior of the big powers.

Their intentions were quite contradictory so far, but essentially they nevertheless expressed strategically the opposite direction of action. In the case of Bosnia, although they recognized the reality of the Serb state entity in Bosnia, the international factors are inclined towards narrowing its competences and strengthening prerogatives of the central authorities, while in the case of Kosovo, world diplomacy demands the highest possible level of autonomy which should have been similar to the status Bosnian Serbs will win. But, among world diplomats there are quite a few of those who are in favour of cynical pragmatism instead of principles. In informal talks with people from Kosovo, they often stress that maximalist demands of the Albanians are unrealistic and that it is impossible to draw a parallel with Bosnia, regardless of the level of rights the Albanians enjoyed in Tito's Yugoslavia. The most cynical ones among them even say: "It is necessary to wage war for what you demand". In other words, they believe that the Serbs in Bosnia have won the right to have their own republic by war, while the Albanians who have not waged war can count only on a somewhat lower level of autonomy. Such opinions in fact support Milosevic's policy. But also the policy of those Albanian political circles which claim that only one conclusion can be drawn from the current developments in the Balkans: all diplomatic games are a farce and obscurantism of the fundamental axiom of freedom and sovereignty: one must fight for freedom and sovereignty and they can be acquired only by enormous sacrifices and war.

Dayton and the future conferences which are announced (Paris, continuation of London...) are critical turning points of the Albanian movement, crossroads where it will have to make far-reaching choices between war and peace. But, it is perhaps unrealistic to expect rash decisions for one or the other solution, in view of the fact that a negotiating process concerning Kosovo still lies ahead. One should hope that in this process, preventive and serious diplomacy will overwhelm pragmatic diplomacy which cynically offers an alibi to violent war forms of resolving interethnic conflicts.

Shkelzen Maliqi AIM Prishtina