CRETE: THREE DAYS FOR THE BALKANS

AIM Tirana, 11 November, 1997

The Balkan leaders have promised on the island of Crete that they would respect the ten principles of the Helsinki Charter which seems to have been at least slightly violated by all of them, maybe even just before they set out to Crete. In the final declaration of this Summit of the countries of south-east Europe, they say that they will "reaffirm their devotion to giving up application of violence, to unchanged borders, respect of human rights and freedoms, as well as freedom of creed, expression, equality and right to self-determination...".

At the ceremony yet unseen in the region, eight representatives of the states and governments signed a joint declaration and decided to meet again next year in Turkey in order to discuss implementation of this declaration and ten principles from Helsinki, of course.

Yugoslavia, Macedonia, Turkey, Bosnia, Bulgaria, have continuously violated at least half of the ten fundamental principles of Helsinki and all at the expense of the citizens of other nationalities. Albania has often pursued its strong Albanian "tradition" and broke the principles of the Helsinki Charter at the expense of its own citizens of Albanian nationality. Nevertheless, in order to reach a compromise about the language of the joint declaration, political directors of eight foreign ministries in the Balkans were forced to sacrifice two pleasant nights at the coast of the Aegean Sea, while their bosses preferred to complete their debates much earlier, in their bilateral meetings.

In the beginning, the declaration was almost solely technical in nature, to such an extent that the impression was that the Balkan states had decided to heal the open wounds with money. A large number of the by now already started but not yet completed projects, were waiting in a row but were deleted in further elaboration. Not even in the latest version was it possible to reach an agreement about the address of the Balkan Secretariat. Greece proposed that the Secretariat be located in Athens, as the only country of the European Union in the region. In the meantime, Turkey was firmly persistent in its intention to prevent this from happening, so in the conclusion, the decision about the Balkan Secretariat and its creation was left for a later date, for a new meeting on a lower level. But, this was not the only caprice of the Balkan leaders.

Milosevic who did not see fit to mitigate his criticism against the NATO regardless of the presence of two members of the Alliance at the table, proposed and succeeded to have a whole paragraph devoted on the NATO in the declaration deleted. The Yugoslav president demanded military cooperation between the countries of the Balkans declaring that they were capable of resolving their problems by themselves. With some difficulty, Albania managed to introduce into the text of the declaration what Fatos Nano called the "interethnic dialogue" or in other words a promise in writing that a dialogue would be opened between entities in former Yugoslavia. Theoretically, the Albanian prime minister may accuse Milosevic next year in Turkey of the failure to implement the declaration, if the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina does not begin by that time.

However, at the bilateral meeting, Nano did not bother much about the term "interethnic", but demanded from Milosevic to meet Ibrahim Rugova by all means. Milosevic gave no promises, although there was plenty of time for that. Instead of the planned 45 minutes, the tete-a-tete lasted for an hour and a half, which was assessed by foreign minister Milutinovic as a good sign. While waiting in the corridor in front of the room where Nano and Milosevic talked, the two foreign ministers, Yugoslav and Albanian, talked almost in the same tones like the two behind closed doors. With one exception: their gestures and mimicking showed that the just initiated talks would be very difficult.

Quite flushed, Milosevic said that the first meeting on the high level was positive, because there had been no meeting ever since the meeting Hoxha-Tito in 1947, but he made it clear that it was too early to change the opinion. To be specific, Yugoslav president did not even mention the Agreement on Education, but asked whether after the meeting with Nano he would stifle the students' protests in Pristina again, he answered that Kosovo was the internal issue of Serbia, moreover the 55-year old communist who talked to Fatos Nano in English, said that Albania should keep in mind the Serb-Montenegrin minority in the north of Albania. Nano said that this was the opinion of the other party and admitted that apart from the possibility of further contacts, he had failed to persuade Milosevic into anything more, but contrary to him, that he had called for democratization of both societies as the only possibility for respect for ethnic communities. As it was possible to learn after the meeting, Fatos Nano appealed on Milosevic to sit down and talk with representatives of Kosovo, but also that there was no chance to achieve this before completion of the presidential elections in Serbia. The other planned difficult meeting, the one between Nano and Gligorov was, however, quite different. President of Macedonia was forced to wait in his hotel room for the end of the meeting between the Albanians and the Serbs. Nevertheless, he proved to be very patient and said that this was the first time he heard from an Albanian leader that he demanded the university in Tetovo. "Never has Sali Berisha demanded from me education for the Albanians at the University,", said Gligorov to Nano.

However, the meeting Simitis - Jilmaz cast a shadow on the other bilateral meetings. Two days prior to it, contrary to Nano and Milosevic, Simitis and Jilmaz refused to shake hands, provoking loud shouts of numerous photographers, who might have come to Crete only to immortalize that handshake. It occurred after all, but the day after. Despite the fact that this meeting on the high level after ten years did take place, Turkey and Greece seem to be still very far away from any solution for Cyprus. A few days before the Crete summit, Cretan air force planes flew over the Greek island of Rhodes, but be what may, Jilmaz did not see fit to give any explanation for it. Numerous security officers guarded the Turkish prime minister from the Greek police even, which had engaged ten times more men for the summit, while the two oversized delegations divided their hotel just as they had divided Cyprus.

On the other hand, the other bilateral meetings were not more relaxed either, especially those between Macedonia and Greece and Macedonia and Bulgaria. Referring to the conflict with Greece about the name of his state, Gligorov said that each nation was entitled to call itself whatever it pleased and added that he had no intention to give up the name Macedonia since as far as he could remember that is how even his grandfather had called that part of the Balkans.

The summit on Crete, where it was certainly possible to note the tendency to sit down and talk, apart from numerous limitations had something specific. There were no Western-European or American moderators. It seemed that the Greeks were especially proud of having succeeded to gather representatives of eight Balkan countries with no help from the West. In the attempt to become the locomotive of the Balkans, Greece several times stressed the "independence of the summit" from the other Western allies. Perhaps the other Balkan leaders could also be observed through that prism, like Milosevic who declared himself in favour of the Balkan for the people from the Balkans. According to him, the Europeans have often caused tragedies in the Balkans by stirring up wars and conflicts. On the other side, Fatos Nano stuck to the other line that the Balkans need to cooperate with the EU and the USA, and moreover, that the western models in establishing institutions should be applied. Nano even went as far as demanding a Balkan Schengen, although Crete had not offered much hope for the feasibility of such a concept. Fatos Nano also said that if there was a wish to develop the Balkans, it was necessary to use, among other, resources of the West, although at that very same table Milosevic said that Yugoslavia was ready for a customs union of the European type, but failed to say with what states.

The expressed obstinacy, mostly in bilateral meetings were in fact smoothed down at the round table. Greece, Yugoslavia, Macedonia, Turkey and Albania, of course, used the summit more as an opportunity for bilateral talks and demanded strongly that the summit become an institution and be held every six months. But, the whole series of elections awaiting the Balkans, as well as the decision to continue the initiated negotiations including the Albanian-Serb ones, seem to have postponed the next summit for October 1998.

Next year, however, even if the planned bilateral meetings take place, it is quite uncertain whether the same heads of states or governments will be present at the summit. In view of the changes in Montenegro, perhaps Djukanovic will come to Antalia as the head of one of the federal states, and it is not impossible that side by side with him, the ultra-nationalist Seselj will sit at the round table.

In that case, it will be very difficult for the leaders of the Balkan states to find the second half of Simitis' sentence uttered at the opening of the Summit. "We are coming from joint past". Just like in Crete, it will be very difficult to give the answer to the question whether they will have a joint future, though. The people in the Balkans would in fact wish for their future not to resemble the past and that is why it is often necessary to invite a few Americans or Europeans to sit down at the table with them. It sometimes happens that they come with simple answers, but more frequently, answers are complex - like in Bosnia, or even worse, in Kosovo.

AIM TIRANA

Ben BLUSHI