LOCAL PRESS

Djuric: Belgrade wants implementation of agreed in Brussels (RTS/Tanjug)

The Head of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija Marko Djuric met today with UNMIK Head Zahir Tanin. They discussed the political and security situation in Kosovo and Metohija and the perspectives of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue. Djuric stressed that Belgrade wished full implementation of agreements reached in Brussels, primarily those referring to the Community of Serb Municipalities, which, according to him, needs to be formed without any delays.

Djuric conveyed to Tanin the concern of the Serbian government over the series of statements of Albanian political representatives that has deepened the atmosphere of distrust in Serb-Albanian and made a dangerous step towards destabilization of the region. The Head of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija thanked the UNMIK Head for UNMIK’s consistent status neutrality and work on protecting the position of the Serb people in Kosovo and Metohija, underlining the importance of protecting property rights of the Serbs in the province in order to foster the return of displaced persons and guarantee the survival of those who presently live there. They also discussed at the meeting the necessity to treat the property of the Republic of Serbia, as well as legal and physical property in Kosovo and Metohija, in accordance with international legal standards.

Vucic, Eichhorst expect dialogue with Pristina to resume soon (Beta)

Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic and European External Action Service (EEAS) Director for Western Europe, the Western Balkans and Turkey Angelina Eichhorst said on May 5 they expected talks between Belgrade and Pristina to continue soon, as the only way to address open issues. At a meeting in Belgrade with the EEAS official, Vucic said that Serbia was committed to mutually acceptable solutions in the dialog, while fully protecting Serbia’s national interests, the Serbian cabinet said. Vucic underlined that the Community of Serb

Municipalities had to be established based on the Brussels agreement, implying Serbia’s role in the process. The two officials expressed concerns over the situation in the Western Balkans, the cabinet said in a press release. Vucic underlined Serbia’s commitment to the policy of regional stability and cooperation, as one of the Serbian government’s foreign-policy priorities.

Eichhorst also met with Serbian justice and defense ministers Nela Kuburovic and Zoran Djordjevic. She said at a meeting with Minister Kuburovic that Brussels was continuing to give its clear political support to Serbia on its way to the EU. The EU official said that the measures named in the action plans for negotiating Chapters 23 and 24 were very important, especially those related to the independence of courts, and a more active role of the civilian sector in all areas. Eichorst and Serbian Defense Minister Zoran Djordjevic met in Belgrade to discuss the role of Serbian troops in EU peacekeeping missions, and the current security situation in the region.

Drecun: Tachi unofficially offering Belgrade exchange of territories (Radio Belgrade)

Kosovo President Hashim Tachi is unofficially offering Belgrade an exchange of territories, stated Chairman of the parliamentary Committee for Kosovo and Metohija Milovan Drecun, in a statement on Sunday. “Tachi is trying to offer us to discuss the exchange of northern Kosovo for the south of central Serbia… I’m not talking off the top of my head, he is actually trying to slip this idea to us. These ideas come from America…,” said Drecun for Radio Belgrade. He added that it is certain that there will be a new redrawing of the borders in the Balkans and that such information comes from many sides, i.e. that “the terrain is being tested.” Drecun added that a type of national awakening can be seen also within the European Union and that the proof are the frequent attempts by certain provinces and regions to gain independence. However, he said that he does not know to what extent it is possible to implement plans for the creation of single-nation states, because the risk is high. Drecun told Radio Belgrade that he has not seen any official and checked information about this from state organs. “Until that happens, this is unchecked information, but I’m not ruling out the possibility that it really happened,” said Drecun. According to him, it is a fact that arms have been going in various directions illegally from Kosovo for many years, while some of them remained in the province, in the possession of radical Islamists. He also considers information about 800 armed KLA veterans entering Macedonia from Kosovo to be among the unofficial findings.

Vulin leaves Mauthausen in protest over Kosovo delegation presence (Novosti)

Serbian Labor Minister Aleksandar Vulin left commemoration of the 72nd anniversary of the liberation of the Mauthausen Nazi concentration camp, in Austria, in protest over the presence of the Kosovo delegation at the event on Sunday. Official representatives of many countries were presents at the commemoration, in order to pay their respects to the victims of the Nazi terror, but Vulin objected the presence of the Kosovo delegation and he said that Serbia would not silently watch while the flag of the “false Kosovo state” is flown. “The Kosovo flag has no place among the members of the anti-Hitler coalition, among the victor states. The Serbian state cannot allow its sovereignty and its pride to be so brutally trampled, which is why we have lodged a formal protest,” Vulin said.

Good relations with Montenegro of essential importance (RTS)

Vucic met on 6 May with the leader of the New Serbian Democracy of Montenegro Andrija Mandic. Vucic underlined that good relations and further promotion of friendship between Serbia and Montenegro are of essential importance. Andrija Mandic informed Vucic about the difficult position of the people in Montenegro and problems they face every day and told him that it would be of great importance to make that known internationally so that a solution could be found according to the highest European standards. They noted together that the aid which the Serbian government gives to the institutions of culture and the Serbian people in Montenegro develops with satisfactory dynamics.

REGIONAL PRESS

PDP representatives to launch initiative to cast vote of no confidence in RS government (Hayat)

PDP representatives announced on Sunday that they will file a motion of no confidence in the RS Government. PDP leader Branislav Borenovic said that they will launch the initiative for the removal of the RS Government due to the fact that there is no gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the RS, living standard in the RS is deteriorating, debts and deficit of the RS are huge, situation in public enterprises is bad and there is tycoonisation. Borenovic underlined that the authorities in the RS brought the RS on the verge of economic collapse, noting that the way to solve this issue is to remove the anti-people and bad government. Borenovic added that his party will ask for the removal of the RS Government, led by RS Prime Minister Zeljka Cvijanovic, noting that this is the only way to stop agony, budget anarchy and devastation of the RS. Borenovic claimed that PDP’s initiative will be supported even by some members of SNSD. According to Borenovic, PDP’s initiative for the removal of the RS Government is serious and it will be accompanied with a comprehensive analysis of the work of the RS Government, which will include a number of facts. “It will include indicators that really have to serve as good basis for MPs and the RS National Assembly (RSNA) to say enough is enough. I expect to receive support from some MPs from the ruling coalition, even from the ruling SNSD,” Borenovic underlined.

RSNA Deputy Speaker Nenad Stevandic does not believe PDP’s initiative for the removal of the RS Government will be supported. “I am all for criticizing things that are bad, but you have to have on paper what is bad and what is the alternative. The Council of Ministers (CoM) of B&H can never be an alternative to the RS Government because it is three times worse,” Stevandic underlined.

Cvijanovic: This is attempt to divert attention from PDP’s treacherous policy at B&H level (RTRS)

RS Prime Minister Zeljka Cvijanovic deems that PDP’s initiative is a shot in the dark, noting that even if the initiative is launched, the decision will be reached by the ruling coalition and not by the dysfunctional opposition bloc. Cvijanovic also stated that this motion is an attempt to divert attention from PDP’s “treacherous” policy at the level of B&H. She underlined that treacherous policy of the Alliance for Changes (SzP) implemented at level of B&H will be recorded as the most difficult period for citizens of the RS. Cvijanovic underlined that PDP is attempting to hide the fact that leader of SDA Bakir Izetbegovic “who has lost a half of a Caucus” in B&H Parliament, has been using SzP votes to adopt necessary decisions in this institution. She added that SzP would always sacrifice stability of the RS in order to save their positions at level of B&H.

SNSD launches initiative for Dzaferovic’s removal again (Srna)

SNSD Caucus in B&H House of Representatives (HoR) has launched again an initiative for removal of B&H HoR speaker Sefik Dzaferovic today. Head of SNSD Caucus Stasa Kosarac said that the reasons for this request are the same as before i.e. that Dzaferovic cannot perform this duty owing to his wartime past. He also said that SNSD Caucus understands that parliament is not a courtroom but is a high chamber where political stances are determined and decisions made.

President Ivanov receives letter from parliament speaker’s Office (MIA)

The President’s Cabinet has received Thursday a letter from the Parliament Speaker’s Office, which informs Gjorge Ivanov that the process for forming a parliamentary majority and electing a president of the highest legislative body is completed. ‘The President’s Cabinet confirms the arrival of a letter from the Parliament of the Republic of Macedonia. President Gjorge Ivanov will act in line with Macedonia’s Constitution and established practice,’ the Cabinet told MIA.

‘Parliament Speaker Talat Xhaferi has notified President Gjorge Ivanov that a parliamentary majority has been formed and a пParliament Speaker has been elected’, the Parliament Speaker’s Office said in a press release.

SDSM promises to protect unitary Macedonia, demands mandate from Ivanov (Independent.mk)

SDSM again called for a peaceful transfer of power to an SDSM-led government, saying that the party will protect the unitary character of Macedonia. President Gjorge Ivanov refused to give SDSM leader Zoran Zaev the mandate to form a Government with several ethnic Albanian parties who subscribe to the controversial Tirana platform, which Ivanov says will lead to ethnic divisions down the road. “There will be no harm to the use of the Macedonian language, or to the unitary character of the country. These are made up issues promoted by Gruevski and the VMRO­DPMNE leadership, who alone have interest to avoid change and want to avoid taking responsibility for their crimes. The whole of Macedonia eagerly awaits the new Government. The citizens are reading the program of the new Government which will reform a unitary Macedonia and bring a Euro-Atlantic perspective,” SDSM said in a press release. The party calls on President Ivanov to respect the letter sent to him by Talat Xhaferi, whom SDSM and its Albanian partners recognize as the new Speaker of the Parliament, and to make a decision on giving Zaev the mandate.

VMRO-DPMNE says SDSM already working on implementation of the Tirana platform (Republika)

VMRO-DPMME member of Parliament Dragan Danev said that the announcement of Talat Xhaferi that he will lead sessions of Parliament in Albanian would be realization of one of the items from the controversial Tirana platform. VMRO-DPMNE does not recognize Xhaferi as a new Speaker, even as he now holds the Speaker’s office and expects to be named in the Official Gazette next week. “Talat Xhaferi said that he will make the Albanian language official throughout the entire territory of Macedonia, and that the Macedonian Parliament will be the third Parliament in the Balkans where sessions are led in Albanian. According to the Ohrid Agreement, members of Parliament can speak in their native language, if it is spoken by more than 20 percent of the population, but sessions are conducted in the one official language of the country, which is the Macedonian. With his announcement, Xhaferi laughs in the face of Zoran Zaev, who insulted his own people only to have Xhaferi unlawfully elected as Speaker of the Parliament. Zaev remains silent over the previous provocation, when Xhaferi posted Albanian flags in Speaker’s office”, said Danev.

Danev called back to a previous statement by Zaev that the Macedonians need to be prepared to bend their spine, and said that that is precisely what SDSM is now doing, with regard to Macedonian national interests. Danev added that Zaev’s statements that Macedonians are the same people with the Bulgarians and the Serbs, given in two separate interviews with journalists from these respective countries, indicate that future concessions are coming.

SDSM responded to Danev’s press conference with a press release saying that the international community welcomed the election of Xhaferi as Speaker and that everything was done in accordance with the Constitution and the laws. SDSM calls on VMRO-DPMNE to be a constructive opposition to the new, SDSM led Government, and accused Danev and VMRO-DPMNE of raising tensions in the country.

VMRO-DPMNE condemns SDSM for siding with parties that negate the Macedonian identity (Republika)

VMRO-DPMNE said in a press release on Saturday that ethnic Macedonians are feeling cheated and betrayed by the SDSM party, with its attempt to form a coalition based on the Tirana platform and the recent statements by SDSM leader Zoran Zaev in which he said that the Macedonians and the Bulgarians are the same people, and later gave a similar statement to a Serbian news outlet. “Zaev apparently enjoys insulting Macedonians, declaring us to be both Bulgarians and Serbs in one day. Such anti-Macedonian would be welcomed by the likes of Bozidar Dimitrov who commended Zaev for his statement, adding that Strumica is a Bulgarian city. Zaev continues to receive praise from all who negate the Macedonian identity”, VMRO-DPMNE said it its press release. Dimitrov is a Bulgarian historian and politician, who often promotes the idea that the Macedonians national identity does not exist. The party said that the citizens want early elections, which will allow the creation of a Government that will work for economic progress, and will prevent the installing of bi-national elements which will lead to divisions of the past. “Meanwhile, Zaev and SDSM plunged Macedonia in a legal crisis, creating precedents with their unlawful vote for a Parliament Speaker, which may be used in the future to vote on bilingualism, uniforms and currency notes in two languages, apologies for genocide, and all the other elements from the Tirana platform, which was rejected by the citizens”, VMRO-DPMNE said in its press release.

VMRO-DPMNE leader Gruevski meets OSCE delegation (Republika)

VMRO-DPMNE leader Nikola Gruevski, accompanied by his closest associates Nikola Poposki, Nikola Todorov and Vlatko Gjorcev, had a meeting Thursday with a delegation of OSCE high officials. At the meeting, VMRO-DPMNE presented its stances on the current developments in Macedonia, the party said in a press release. VMRO-DPMNE condemned the acts of violating the Constitution, laws and the Rules of Procedures by SDSM and its coalition partners. ‘The illegal election of Talat Xhaferi leads to other precedents, which will mean a suspension of the legal system. It will generate greater instability and deeper political crisis,’ VMRO-DPMNE officials said. The party calls for election of a Parliament Speaker in line with the legal procedures. Those who violated the procedures will be a brought to justice, VMRO-DPMNE said, pointing out that the party would keep working for the benefit of Macedonia’s citizens.

Negotiations between Rama and Basha without agreement (ATA)

The negotiations between Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and the leader of the Democratic Party (DP) Lulzim Basha at the President’s seat have once again ended without any agreement on the table, ATA reports. After the meeting which took nearly 2 hours, Rama told the media that he had proposed to Basha three vice ministers monitored by international community. He said that the situation is the same as yesterday. Rama said that elections’ date will not be postponed because there’s only one. “Our offer will not change, for we see no glimmer of hope from the opposition to come to compromise,” Rama told a media briefing after the negotiations. “I have put forward a mechanism of guarantee within the govt. One vice prime minister will be responsible for monitoring the conduct of state during the campaign in compliance with a rule. Another vice minister put forward by DP, not a party member, along with the chief of US mission and the chief of European mission assisting the Ministry of Interior and State Police as well as an OSCE representative managing the entire process of monitoring the State Police conduct all across Albania. One vice director general and 12 vice directors in the regions are subordinate to this vice minister. The same thing will apply to education, penitentiary system as well. The DP can choose a political minister to craft a governmental project on e-counting and vote. We are ready to finance and implement it in 2019 local elections,’ Rama said. For his part, the DP head Lulzim Basha, said at the end of the meeting with Rama that there was no offer on the table. It is impossible to find a realistic solution to the crisis when the criminals vested with power continue to hold power in breach of the law. The country needs a political solution, it is what the Albanians, DP and entire world want to see.

Basha: No elections on 18 June (MIA)

Leader of opposition’s Democratic Party Lulzim Basha said late Sunday there will be no elections in Albania on June 18, MIA reports from Tirana. Basha said the opposition has never decided not to take part at the elections and will not allow them to take place without their participation, while announcing a large protest on 13 May. “The biggest ever protest in Albania will be staged on 13 May. We are open for political dialogue. If the other side accepts responsibility for the catastrophic situation in the country we are open to secure free and fair elections for Albanians through political dialogue. We are not leading this fight for ourselves but for citizens’ rights,” said Basha.

INTERNATIONAL PRESS

‘Schindler List’ For Southeast Europe: Pakistanisation As Final Solution For Balkans? – OpEd (eurasiareview, 5 May 2017, by Prof. Zlatko Hadžidedić*)

A few days ago the Observer published a column under the title Putin-Proofing the Balkans: A How-To Guide, written by John Schindler. In this article the author advocates some new geopolitical redesigns of the Balkans which are actually far from being a novelty. As a matter of fact, these ideas represent a pale copy of the ideas recently published by Foreign Affairs in the article under the title Dysfunction in the Balkans, written by Timothy Less, a former British diplomat who served as the head of the British diplomatic office in Banja Luka, the capital of the Serb entity in Bosnia-Herzegovina, as well as the political secretary of the British Embassy in Macedonia.

Less advocates a total redesign of the existing state boundaries in the Balkans: the imagined Greater Serbia should embrace the existing Serb entity in Bosnia-Herzegovina, but also the entire internationally recognized Republic of Montenegro; the Greater Croatia should embrace a future Croatian entity in Bosnia-Herzegovina; the Greater Albania should embrace both Kosovo and the western part of Macedonia.

All these territorial redesigns, says Less and Schindler agrees, would eventually bring about a lasting peace and stability in the region.

Of course, it is easy to claim that both Schindler and Less are now only freelancers whose articles have nothing to do with their former employers’ policies. However, the problem is that certain circles within the foreign policy establishment in both Great Britain and the United States, in their numerous initiatives from 1990s onwards, have repeatedly advocated the very same ideas that can be found in these two articles, such as the creation of the imagined monoethnic greater states – Greater Serbia, Greater Croatia and Greater Albania – as an alleged path towards lasting stability in the Balkans, with Bosnia’s and Macedonia’s disappearance as a collateral damage.

Of course, these ideas have always been spread below the surface of official policy, but they have never been abandoned, as the ‘coincidence’ of almost simultaneous appearance of Schindler’s and Less’s articles in the renowned mainstream magazines demonstrates.

Ostensibly, the ideas advocated by Schindler and Less are rooted in the plausible presupposition that, as long as the existing nationalist greater-state projects remain unaccomplished, the nationalist resentment will always generate ever-increasing instability.

However, the history has clearly demonstrated, both in the Balkans and other parts of the world, that such a presupposition is nothing but a simple fallacy. For, the very concept of completed ethnonational states is a concept that has always led towards perpetual instability wherever applied, because such ethnonational territories cannot be created without projection of extreme coercion and violence over particular ‘inappropriate’ populations, including the techniques which have become known as ethnic cleansing and genocide.

The logic of ‘solving national issues’ through creation of ethnically cleansed greater states has always led towards permanent instability, never towards long-term stability. Let us only remember the consequences of the German ruling oligarchy’s attempt to create such a state in the World War II. And let us only try to imagine what the world would be like if their geopolitical project was recognized and accepted in the name of ‘stability’, as now Schindler and Less propose in the case of some other geopolitical projects based on ethnic cleansing and genocide.

What is particularly interesting when it comes to ‘solving national issues’ in the Balkans is the flexibility (i.e. arbitrariness) of the proposed and realized ‘solutions’. First, the winners in the World War I, among whom the British and American officials occupied the most prominent positions, advocated the creation of the common national state of the Southern Slavs at the Peace Conference in Versailles. Then, more than seventy years later, Lord Carrington, the longest serving member of the British foreign policy establishment, chaired another international conference in The Hague where he oversaw the partition of that very state in the name of ‘solving national issues’ between ethnonational states which constituted it.

Together with the Portugese diplomat, Jose Cutileiro, Lord Carrington then also introduced the first, pre-war plan for ethnic partition of Bosnia-Herzegovina (the Carrington-Cutileiro Plan), again in the name of ‘solving national issues’ between the ethnic groups living in Bosnia-Herzegovina, which was eventually sealed, with some minor changes, at the international conference in Dayton.

And now, here is yet another plan for fragmentation of the Balkan states, again in order to ‘solve national issues’. What is needed in addition is yet another international conference to implement and verify such a plan, and thus turn the Balkans upside-down one more time. Therefore it comes as no surprise that such a conference on the Western Balkans has already been scheduled for 2018 in London.

Yet, how the proposed dismemberment of Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia, as well as the absorption of Montenegro into Greater Serbia, can be made politically acceptable to the population of the Balkans and the entire international community?

What is required to accomplish such a task is a scenario that would make an alternative to dismemberment and absorption of sovereign states even less acceptable. It is not difficult to imagine that only a war, or a threat of war, would be such an alternative. However, its feasibility is limited by the fact that no state in the Balkans has the capacities and resources – military, financial, or demographic – to wage a full-scale war, and their leaders are too aware of this to even try to actually launch it.

In such a context, the available option is to create an atmosphere that would simulate an immediate threat of war, by constantly raising nationalist tensions between, and within, the states in the region. Of course, such tensions do exist since 1990, but it would be necessary to accumulate them in a long-term campaign so as to create an illusion of imminence of regional war.

Significantly, following the appearance of Less’s article, and simultaneously with Schindler’s, the tensions within Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia have begun to rise. This growth of tensions can hardly be disregarded as accidental, given the fact that the Balkan leaders can easily be played one against another whenever they receive signals, no matter whether fake or true, that a new geopolitical reshuffle of the region is being reconsidered by major global players. Since they are already well-accustomed to raising inter-state and intra-state tensions as a means of their own political survival, it is very likely that they will be able to accumulate such tensions to such a level as to gradually generate a mirage of imminent regional war. Also, a part of the same campaign is the systematic spread of rumors, already performed all over Europe, that a war in the Balkans is inevitable and will certainly take place during 2017.

In the simulated atmosphere of inevitable war, a radical geopolitical reconfiguration of the entire Balkans, including dismemberment of the existing states proclaimed as dysfunctional and their eventual absorption into the imagined greater states, may well become politically acceptable. All that is needed is to juxtapose this ‘peaceful’ option and the fabricated projection of imminent war as the only available alternatives, and offer to implement the former at a particular international conference, such as the one scheduled for 2018 in London.

What is required for implementation of the proposed geopolitical rearrangement of the Balkans is to spread the perception that the permanent rise of political conflicts in the region inevitably leads to a renewed armed conflict. In that context, all the proposed fallacies about usefulness of geopolitical redesigns in the Balkans may easily acquire a degree of legitimacy, so as to be finally implemented and verified at the 2018 London conference on the Western Balkans.

Of course, if that happens, it can only lead to further resentment and lasting instability in the region and Eastern Europe, and that can only lead to growing instability in the entire Europe. One can only wonder, is that a desired ultimate outcome for those who promote greater state projects in the Balkans as an alleged path towards its stability?

About the author:

*Zlatko Hadžidedić is Assistant Professor at the Sarajevo School of Science and Technology, Bosnia-Herzegovina. He received his PhD from the University of Sarajevo, Faculty of Political Science, his MPhil from the London School of Economics and Political Science and MA from the Central European University, Budapest. He served as political adviser to several Bosnian ministers and political leaders. His book Forced to be Free. The Paradoxes of Liberalism and Nationalism was published in 2012 by Deutscher Wissenschafts-Verlag (DWV).