LOCAL PRESS

Vucic: Gasic cannot remain minister (B92/RTS)

“Defense Minister Bratislav Gasic cannot remain at his post over the statement that ‘he likes women journalists who easily kneel’. When I heard what happened, I was surprised and shocked. These things cannot happen to anyone or should not happen. I placed myself as a shield and I always did a good thing, I protected them from false attacks and accusations. This way I protected Serbia and the state, but I cannot find either an apology or justification for this,” said Vucic, and apologized to the B92 journalist on behalf of the entire government. He said that it is good that Gasic apologized and that this is a novelty in our political life. “But an apology is not enough. We must protect all women in Serbia, this was a bad message for all women and when I became the prime minister I said it would be a modern and decent country. This is a country where women are not insulted, where there are no machoism and sexist insults,” said Vucic.

“Gasic is my friend, the deputy president of my party, one of my most loyal friends, I have perhaps two more such ministers in the government, he is a better defense minister than
I was and ten times better than some of our predecessors,” said Vucic and voiced assurance that Gasic will understand his decision.

Djuric: Terrorist attack of Albanian extremists on Serbs (Beta)

The Head of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija Marko Djuric has condemned the attacks in Gorazdevac and assessed that at issue is a terrorist attack of Albanian extremists on the Serbs and their property. Djuric called on the Kosovo Serbs, especially those in Gorazdevac, to preserve sanity and not to respond to provocations of Albanian extremists, the Office for Kosovo and Metohija announced. The extremists shot from firearms, demolished the monument to victims of NATO bombing, fired on the house of Sasa Petrovic, set on fire the car of Srboljub Kolasinac and the newsstand of the Vuksanovic family. “This terrorist act is another reminder how the situation in which the Serbs live in our southern province is far from normal and standards that exist in societies whose ambition is to become part of the EU,” Djuric said in the statement. He assesses that an unambiguous goal of the attack is intimidation of the Serb population in Kosovo and Metohija to force them to leave and that the incident that he marked as “the crystal night in Gorazdevac” has all the characteristics of terrorism. “I am convinced that the vast majority of Kosovo Albanians do not want escalation of violence in this neighborhood, while the interim self-administration institutions in Pristina now have the opportunity to demonstrate their maturity by finding the perpetrators of these crazy terrorist acts,” said Djuric. He called on the international community to react with utmost seriousness in order to avoid further endangerment of the Serbs and disruption of fragile stability in Kosovo and Metohija. “This is a warning to everybody to see how the security situation in Kosovo and Metohija is subject to destabilization and what kind of consequences can occur with inadequate reaction to political extremism of one part of the opposition in Pristina that made all non-Albanians in our southern province a potential target,” assessed Djuric.
Nikolic on challenges on the EU path (Novosti)

Should Serbia accept the opening of Chapter 35 if the EU negotiating platform implies independence of Kosovo as it had been included in the draft?

“It is very possible that Chapter 35 will be viewed almost as a condition for any other chapter, and that all other chapters, when opened, will be compared with the principles that should be fulfilled in Chapter 35. If Chapter 35 would end with recognition of Kosovo, we could not end it. We need to negotiate on this with open eyes.”

What would you do concretely if we were to be presented with such blackmail?

“I certainly would not sign anything that is not in accordance with the Constitution, and it would be a violation of the constitution if we were to give up the jurisdiction that would create a state from the territory of Kosovo and Metohija.”

Is there any purpose in negotiating with Pristina when they are violating the agreement and refusing to establish the Community of Serb Municipalities?

“Perhaps we will have everything return to the beginning if the Western mentors force Pristina to sit at the table. Of course there is always a purpose in negotiating, because one can never reach a solution in any other way. This government will not stop negotiating with the Albanians as long as it doesn’t reach an agreement that would enable us to finally say that we have peace and safety in Kosovo and Metohija and regulated relations.”

Kosovo would like to join UN through the back door (Novosti)

Pristina is preparing to launch a serious campaign at the start of 2016 for the UN membership of the self-declared state, sources from diplomatic circles told Novosti. However, since the Russian veto, and perhaps the Chinese, stands as an insurmountable obstacle for full-fledged membership, the only way to open the door to Pristina in the UN headquarters would be candidacy for a permanent observer of a non-member state, i.e. the status that Palestine received in the UN three years ago. A non-member that is already a member of one or more specialized UN agencies can apply for this status and since Kosovo is already and member of the IMF, this condition has been fulfilled. According to Vladislav Jovanovic, former UN ambassador, the Palestinian model cannot be replicated on the Kosovo case over the valid UNSCR 1244. “The only ‘shortcut’ would be to either withdraw this resolution, or to present an amendment whereby it would ‘pull out’ the part that guarantees Serbia’s sovereignty over Kosovo and Metohija. Yet, in order for this to occur, Serbia should be offered a large compensation. For example, in the form of annexation of the Republika Srpska to Serbia or launching talks on Kosovo’s division,” opines Jovanovic. Political analyst from Pristina Fatmir Sheholi tells Novosti that Kosovo will try to receive membership next year through all mechanisms, wherever it can, but thinks that “some hallway” in the UN would be the farthest it could reach: Kosovo hasn’t done the homework. It is not easy to create a state, and as long as there is a problem with crime and corruption and a bad judicial system, even the international community will not embrace us. It is not by chance that some states that recognized Kosovo had abstained during the voting in UNESCO, so Pristina should look with the U.S. and Brussels for a concept on how to approach the UN issue. A mitigating factor for reaching the status of a non-member-state observer is that this status is based exclusively on practice, because it didn’t exist when during the writing of the UN Charter. The practice began in 1946 when the UN Secretary General accepted the appointment of the Swiss government as the permanent observer in the UN, and then this was given to Austria, Finland, and Italy.

REGIONAL PRESS

Inzko: I am ready to use the Bonn powers! (Hayat.ba)

I am ready to use the Bonn powers and I would do so in cooperation with the international community. However, conclusions by the Republika Srpska (RS) parliament on holding the referendum on the work of B&H judicial institutions are not effective yet, and we have not seen yet the decision of the Constitutional Court of B&H on declaring the January 9 as an unconstitutional Day of the RS, stated the High Representative in B&H Valentin Inzko. He said he has a feeling that the referendum on the work of the Court and Prosecutor’s Office of B&H will not be held in the RS. “I see the signals coming from Banja Luka. Conclusions by the NSRS are not effective yet, nor are they published in the “Official Gazette”. The second signal is that the Bosniak caucus, which appealed to the RS Constitutional Court that it has not been included in the commission for the implementation of the referendum, was given a right and that case will not be considered within this judicial institution. It is certain that there will be no referendum this year, maybe next year too. Only then we could consider the ways of acting,” Inzko highlighted. When it comes to the decision by the Constitutional Court B&H on January 9, reaction cannot be expected right now in that case as well, given that the mentioned decision has not been presented to the public yet. “We cannot react now, but later, in the referendum is held or if this decision is badly implemented. Now it is too early,” Inzko said. He also commented on the achieved progress of B&H on the path towards the EU, stating that the progress is evident, but that it is necessary to fulfill all prerequisites in order for B&H to submit a membership application.

Flying accusations between the SDA and SDP of interfering in to the work of B&H judiciary (Oslobodjenje)

The Party of Democratic Action (SDA) rejected the public insinuations of the SDP, which were launched with the aim of politicizing and scoring cheap political points, reads the SDA statement. The released of the statement came after the SDP accused the SDA leader Bakir Izetbegovic of interfering in to the work of the B&H judiciary. The SDA points out that there is nothing demeaning in presenting the truth. “And it is definitely true that a number of high-positioned politicians, among them some former and current members of the B&H Presidency, passed through the judicial ‘Golgotha’ and even prison and were then freed. The taxpayers’ money was wasted, peace and the honor of good people was wasted, the reputation and the authority of the judiciary itself were wasted,” reads the statement. “The SDA has never influenced the work of the judiciary, it has just supported its independence and professionalism. The SDP during their last mandate, together with the SNSD, tried to put whole B&H judiciary under their political control. The SDA strongly opposed this and was the leading political force in preventing the SDP and SNSD from realizing their agreement,” the SDA said.

Izetbegovic: We have not recognized the danger of terrorism in B&H on time (Dnevni avaz)

Member of the B&H Presidency Bakir Izetbegovic commented on the yesterday’s meeting and the joint statement of the Bosniak leaders condemning all forms of terrorism and violent extremism. “We have not taken the attacks in Bugojno for serious and we believed it cannot turn into terrorism. We admit that we have not recognized the danger of terrorism on time,” Izetbegovic pointed out. As a reminder, 37 Bosniak leaders yesterday agreed on and signed a final version of the Joint Statement condemning terrorism and violent extremism. As they highlighted, the Statement is a reflection of their feeling of responsibility towards preserving peace and co-existence in B&H. Meeting of the Bosniak leaders was organized by the Reis-ul-Ulema of the Islamic Community in B&H Husein Kavazovic and the Bosniak member of the Presidency of B&H Bakir Izetbegovic. “Institutionally, politically and morally, we must oppose to terrorism and condemn it. The aim of this meeting was to send a clear message to the citizens, which we did,” Izetbegovic stated. The Joint Statement has been worked on for two weeks and, as Izetbegovic confirmed, all those invited responded to the invitation, except for the leader of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) Nermin Niksic. The meeting was also not attended by Haris Silajdzic and Fahrudin Radoncic, but it was said that they will sign the statement afterwards.

Dodik supported the Bosniak leaders’ Joint Statement condemning terrorism (RTRS)

The RS President Milorad Dodik believes that the key of success in fight against terrorism and extremism lies on those from whose ethnic and religious groups such occurrences are coming. Dodik supported the Joint Statement by Bosniak political, religious and social representatives strongly condemning every kind of terrorism and announcing resolute opposition to radicalism, violent extremism and terrorism. “It is very clear that the Bosniaks, Muslims, in Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) are people who have nothing to do with those extreme processes, especially with extremism, but it was necessary that the political and religious leadership of Bosniaks expresses its attitude towards that in one such way. I support that,” Dodik said. He stated that he did not get to see the statement in detail, but that he agrees with the part which speaks of the need for everyone else to oppose Islamophobia, discrimination of Muslims, and their identification with terrorists. “I agree with the necessity to absolutely eliminate any kind of Islamophobia and precisely we from some other confessions and ethnic communities have sufficient understanding for the situation in general. Precisely one such statement gives greatest support to the fight against extremism and terrorism. I believe this is indeed a good path and I can only support it,” Dodik said. Commenting on the statement of the Bosniak member of the Presidency of B&H that the country will have to respond on violence with repression, Dodik said that prevention is also needed, apart from repression. “I agree with Izetbegovic that repression must be applied on these issued without hesitation. No one can be protected, not even in the conditions of awareness that those who might be identified as such can be a sort of collateral. I believe that, in any event, a rigorous action of the system of authorities and institutions, not only at preventive but also at repressive level, can be of significant help in that,” said Dodik.

Dodik to be defense witness of Ratko Mladic today (Nezavisne)

The RS President Milorad Dodik will today testify as a defense witness on the trial to the General Ratko Mladic at the Hague Tribunal. Dodik confirmed he will testify about the development of political situation regarding the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia.

“I was a delegate in the Assembly for the Socialist Federal Republic of B&H at the first multiparty elections, and later a delegate in the parliament, and my testimony will relate exclusively to the political circumstances regarding the beginning of war,” Dodik said earlier. Dodik noted that the public is already familiar with his attitudes towards the period he is to testify about. Furthermore, Dodik considers it is a duty of everyone who is invited to testify in front of the Hague Tribunal to respond to the invitation. “I believe it is a duty of everyone invited by both the defense and the prosecution to participate, because Hague has its dimension,” Dodik said. Continuation of the trial to Mladic at the Hague Tribunal is scheduled for today at 9:30 a.m.

INTERNATIONAL PRESS

Szijjártó: Serbia a better ’friend’ than Croatia (Budapest Business Journal, 7 December 2015)

Hungary has better relations with Serbia than Croatia, and its interests are to see neighboring Serbia as a strong and stable European Union country, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said in an interview with Serbian daily Politika, the online version of Világgazdaság reported yesterday.

Asked why Hungary chose to support Serbia and not Croatia in the course of disputes over the refugee crisis, Szijjártó said the Croatian prime minister had attacked Hungary in an “unacceptable and non-European way”, likening Hungary to a “fascist dictatorship”. Croatia had not been fair to Serbia either, he said. “It is now clear that if someone attacks our Serbian friends we will defend them, because that is how friendships work,” Szijjártó said. The foreign minister added that Hungary supports the acceleration of Serbia’s accession procedure to the EU. The border fence built on the Hungarian-Serbian border is not against the Serbian people and relations between their countries have never been better, Szijjártó said. There are still seven border crossing points between Hungary and Serbia and the aim is to make legal entry as easy as possible, he added.

Serbia’s delicate Russia-West balancing act (Balkan Insight, by Sasa Dragojla and Dusica Tomovic, 5 December 2015)

While Belgrade insists it will remain militarily neutral, many believe the country will eventually be forced to choose sides

Although the Serbian government claims that joining NATO is not yet an issue, the fact Montenegro was invited to join the alliance on Wednesday has focused minds on how much longer Belgrade can maintain its military neutrality and delicate balancing act between Russia and the West. When it comes to military cooperation, Belgrade rather shyly made public the number of joint activities it has carried out with NATO over the past few years. On the other hand, defence cooperation with Russia is presented as a strategic priority for Serbia.

After Montenegro, a country which was until 2006 part of a loose federation with Serbia, received its NATO invite, Belgrade was quick to yet again underline its status as a militarily neutral country. ‘NATO did not invite us to join nor have we expressed any desire to become a member. Serbia’s membership in NATO is not an issue now, but we will see whether it will be one day,” Dragan Sormaz, an MP for the ruling Serbian Progressive Party, told the Tanjug news agency on Wednesday.

Washington’s Balkan power play (politico.eu, by Jorgen Samso, 5 December 2015)

America pushes NATO and energy deals to counter Russian influence in a strategic, unsettled region.

NATO’s invitation to Montenegro this week to join the military alliance was more than a kindness to a small ex-Yugoslav republic. It was another sign of a battle for influence in the Balkans between Russia and the U.S. And America is the one on the offensive. In recent weeks high-level U.S. and NATO officials have visited the Croatian, Serb and Montenegrin capitals, seeking to revive stalled efforts to bring the region closer to the West. Montenegro’s invitation to join the trans-Atlantic alliance is part of that U.S.-led diplomatic initiative. The Kremlin called the move a “provocation.” Montenegro is the first country in seven years that will come through NATO’s “open door policy” that allows “no third country” a say over its decision, meaning Russia. Behind the scenes at the alliance, the debate was contentious, and Montenegro’s invitation far from assured.

Diplomatic struggle

Italy, the Netherlands and Germany have been reluctant to entangle NATO in any direct confrontation with Russia over Ukraine or any further enlargement of the military bloc. French President François Hollande, who along with Germany’s Angela Merkel brokered the Minsk ceasefire deal in Ukraine this year, in March said that “France’s position for the moment is to refuse any new membership” offers to NATO. “Russia is engaged in a massive effort to sway nations. To appeal to them, reach out to them, and fundamentally, tragically, sort of reigniting a new kind of East-West zero sum game that we think is dangerous and unnecessary.” — John Kerry. In a sign of Berlin’s unease, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier came up with a suggestion to revitalize the moribund NATO-Russia Council, an idea accepted by the rest of the alliance the night before Montenegro’s invitation. “I argued very much last night that we try to minimize risks and foster an exchange with Russia,” said Steinmeier. But the Obama Administration, which hadn’t tipped its hand on Montenegro until this fall, and several eastern European countries gave Montenegro the final push in recent weeks, according to diplomats at NATO. They did so for a 9-year-old Balkan nation of 620,000 with close historic ties to Moscow, a standing armed force of just 2,000 and an imperfect track record on the reform of its intelligence and military. “I would say to Russia and to any other country that worries or thinks about this: This is not focused on them specifically; it’s focused on the potential of defense against anybody or anything that is a threat,” said John Kerry, the U.S. secretary of state, at NATO headquarters Wednesday. After a meeting of NATO ambassadors in the Montenegrin capital of Podgorica in October, the U.S. pushed to bring in the country to encourage continued reform and regional stability, officials said. “The overall relations with the U.S. in the Balkans have turned more firm and the region came into focus from a wider change on the international scene,” said Igor Tabak, a Zagreb-based defense and security analyst. “The confrontation became visible in the countries where Russia and the U.S. had their interests collide, like Serbia and Montenegro.” NATO’s last two new members were Croatia and Albania, which were invited to join in 2008 and came in the following year. “Now, with Montenegro, NATO is taking the Balkans piece by piece,” said Stefano Stefanini, former NATO ambassador to Italy who took part in the 2008 enlargement negotiations. “Just imagine the Balkan region on a scale. Every time you move a weight, big or small, you shift the balance — from instability or to stability.” Washington’s attention revived last year following Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the war in eastern Ukraine. It prompted Kerry to use Cold War rhetoric in February, naming Serbia, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Montenegro as being the new front line against Russia’s growing influence in Europe. “Russia is engaged in a massive effort to sway nations,” Kerry told a U.S. Senate subcommittee. “To appeal to them, reach out to them, and fundamentally, tragically, sort of reigniting a new kind of East-West zero sum game that we think is dangerous and unnecessary.” Fast forward to earlier this week in Belgrade where Kerry met with Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vučić and praised the government’s work on normalizing relations with its breakaway province Kosovo, whose independence Serbia — along with Russia — doesn’t recognize. Vučić visited the U.S. twice this year. Two weeks ago, Jens Stoltenberg, the NATO secretary general, was in Belgrade, proclaiming a “fresh start” in relations with Serbia, which was bombed over 78 days in 1999 by the U.S. and its allies at the tail end of a civil war in Kosovo. “The aspiration of Montenegro to become a member of NATO is something that is up to Montenegro and NATO to decide,” he said. The NATO campaign in Kosovo left bitter memories in Belgrade, and Serbia is carefully trying to move forward its EU membership application while balancing between East and West and staying militarily neutral. Shortly after a visit to Washington in September Vučić was in Moscow to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. He repeated Serbia’s objection to Western sanctions against Russia over Ukraine. In October last year Serbia hosted a grand military parade in Belgrade with Putin as the guest of honor. Belgrade’s lack of interest in NATO leaves the U.S. to work on other fronts. Nursing relations with mutual state visits is one way, an active embassy another. A third way is military exercises, said Tabak, pointing out that two months ago Serbian soldiers took part in a military exercise with U.S. troops in Hungary, a NATO member. “It happens quite often, these regional military exercises with neighboring countries that are NATO members and often it’s with a U.S. component,” Tabak said. ”It’s is a way to strengthen the level of confidence and defense relations.”

A tough region

Even as NATO extends an invitation to Montenegro and the country is expected to formally join at the alliance’s Warsaw summit in July, public opinion is broadly split. On one side is the pro-NATO government led by Prime Minister Milo Djukanović, who has ruled Montenegro for a quarter century. He was once a communist, then a nationalist who believed in a Greater Serbia, and starting in the late nineties, a pro-Western proponent of Montenegro’s independence. Montenegro split from Serbia in 2006, driving the final nail into the coffin of Yugoslavia.

On the other side of the debate is the pro-Russian and Serbian opposition, which is boycotting the parliament. It staged sometimes violent protests against both Djukanović and NATO this fall.

“The geopolitical role of this region in terms of energy security is now finally being recognized” — Davor Stern, former Croatian minister of energy. The political crisis in Montenegro — as well as split support for NATO — that festered in recent months led Stoltenberg to make several visits to Podgorica to make sure conditions for joining the club were met. Diplomats say the country still has a lot of homework to do to fight corruption, which, as in many other Balkan nations, is widespread and rid the Montenegrin intelligence services of Russian influence.

NATO accession is still distant for other Western Balkan countries. The alliance is reluctant to invite members with unresolved territorial disputes, ruling out Kosovo. Bosnia-Herzegovina is struggling with a complicated ethnic-based political system created by the peace accords signed at Dayton 20 years ago, and the Serb-dominated Republika Srpska opposes NATO membership. Macedonia, largely deemed ready for an invitation, is caught in an arcane dispute with Greece, a NATO member, over its name.

Energy piece of security puzzle

Washington is defending its security interests in the Balkans on another strategic front: energy.

Zagreb recently designated a liquid natural gas (LNG) terminal on the island of Krk as critical to Croatia’s ambition to be a regional energy hub to lessen the EU’s dependence on Russian gas. The U.S. backs the Krk project as part of a gas corridor running from Azerbaijan via Turkey and Greece up through Albania, Montenegro and Croatia and further north to Europe, a route also also known as the Ionian-Adriatic Pipeline. “In the future, Croatia can become important as a gateway for energy to Europe,” said Davor Stern, an oil and gas expert and former Croatian minister of economy. Signalling the American return to the Balkans, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden visited Zagreb in late November, the highest-ranking US official to come to the region since Barrack Obama became president in 2009. The gas supply route through Croatia was raised in talks between Serbia and the U.S. in February. During a meeting in Washington, Biden suggested to Vučić that the Krk terminal could be used to supply Serbia via a pipeline through Hungary. “It shows that perhaps the geopolitical role of this region in terms of energy security is now finally being recognized,” Stern said. Serbia is dependent on Russian energy supplies, and a subsidiary of Russia’s gas giant Gazprom holds a large stake in one of Serbia’s largest oil and gas companies. There was huge disappointment in the country when the Russian South Stream gas pipeline — planned to pass through Serbia — fell through last year.