LOCAL PRESS

 

Djuric: State will take Orahovac,Velika Hoca out of isolation (Tanjug)

Marko Djuric, director of the Serbian government's Office for Kosovo-Metohija (KiM), promised on Thursday that the state will assist citizens of Orahovac and Velika Hoca, the Serb enclaves in south-western KiM, and called on people of goodwill to invest efforts in the preservation of Serb enclaves in KiM.

Djuric said in Orahovac that the socio-economic situation in that town is extremely difficult, noting that citizens of Orahovac are in a kind of isolation. He underlined how important it is that people do not sell their property, but rather be committed to staying in KiM, for which they have the state's support.

“We have a big responsibility to help people, and primarily ensure that schools, healthcare and other public institutions function well, and to work together with local people on finding solutions for the issue of unemployment, as providing a perspective for young people here is a prerequisite for survival,” Djuric said.

He noted that the population of Orahovac has been shaken, so the number of citizens is on the decline, which brings the sustainability of the entire community in question as the nearest Serb community is tens of kilometers away.

“Had it not been for a school or ambulance, it would have been very difficult to stay here,” Djuric said.

“Serbia will help make this a busy town, and we are calling on all our neighbors, regardless of their nationality, to help this community of ours in Orahovac survive, as it adds to the diversity of this entire area, “ Djuric said, adding that all people of goodwill could assist in that.

While touring Velika Hoca, Djuric underlined that the Serb community is facing a major challenge relating to its stay in KiM, and added that the state of Serbia will work on solving the administrative issues with representatives of the Serb people in Velika Hoca in the weeks to come.

It is necessary to resolve the issue of placing the wine from that area on the market of central Serbia, but also to find a solution for unemployment, especially youth one, Djuric noted.

 

Government on international cooperation (Tanjug/B92)
The Serbian government adopted a few draft laws in the field of international cooperation at today's session.
The Draft Law on Ratification of the Agreement between the Government of Serbia and the Government of Slovenia on mutual protection of classified information and the Draft Law on the Confirmation of the security agreement between the Government of Serbia and the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, were adopted, according to the Government Office for Cooperation with the media.
The Draft Law on Ratification of the Agreement between the Republic of Serbia and the Czech Republic on mutual protection and exchange of classified information, as well as the Draft Law on Ratification of the Agreement between the Government of Serbia and the Government of the Republic of Azerbaijan on cooperation in the field of defense will be referred to the Serbian Assembly for consideration.

 

Concerns about the privatization process in Kosovo (Danas, by Jelena Tasic, 20 June2014)

INTERVIEW - Samuel Zbogar, Special Representative and Head of the EU Office in Kosovo

Pristina, Belgrade - European Union Special Representative and Head of the EU in Kosovo, Samuel Zbogar, in an interview for Danas, says that the recent Kosovo parliamentary elections were regular, but that Brussels cannot comment on the post-election government combinations which shook Pristina, nor hint that a Serbian List could delay the constitution of the new Kosovo parliament through an appeal on the decision of the Central Election Commission of Kosovo.

- The European Union monitored the parliamentary elections closely through the presence of observers and so we can express our satisfaction with their regularity. We follow closely the current post-election debates, but it is clear that they are entirely internal matters of Kosovo, as long as they are based on the established laws and procedures. Therefore, we cannot comment - Zbogar says.

And, does the EU Office or EULEX have the competency to influence the CEC decision which the Serbian list claims is against the Kosovo Constitution and the Law on General Elections, especially when it comes to the composition of the electoral committees and the distribution of seats?

- The Central Election Commission operates in accordance with Kosovo law and may not be subject to any influence.

EU High Representative Catherine Ashton also pledged to quickly form a new Government. Does Brussels have any timelines?

- Deadlines emerge from legally prescribed procedures. Due to the many tasks facing Kosovo authorities on their path to European integration, including the continuation of the dialogue with Serbia, it is first and foremost in the interest of the citizens, to create an efficient government with a full mandate as soon as possible.

And how do you comment on the possibility that the Serbian list addresses the Constitutional Court of Kosovo and postpone the parliamentary constitution?

- We cannot comment on it. Everyone has the right to use all the resources that are provided within the rule of law.

The Head of Office for Kosovo and Metohija of the Government of Serbia Marko Djuric, also announced that he will discuss the number of Serbian seats with the international community. Is it real and how many and on what basis can the Serbs could get seats in addition to the 10 guaranteed?

- Elections are completed and were conducted in accordance with relevant laws and regulations. Once all seats are officially verified, we will know exactly to whom the people gave their trust to represent their interests in the Assembly of Kosovo.

When and how, in accordance with the Brussels Agreement, should the Community of Serbian municipalities be constituted?

- It shall be constituted when its charter is adopted. This will happen when all of its conditions become acceptable for everyone.

And how does the EU look at the invasion by the Kosovo Privatization Agency on the State Property of Serbia in Strpce, since that property, per Resolution 1244, can only be managed by the international administration?

- A colleague from the Office of the Special Representative of the EU has met several times with KAP officials to discuss many issues regarding the Agency governance. The reason was concern over the privatization process in general, but also specific cases such as the Hotel "Junior" in Strpce. During all these meetings, it has been insisted that the CAP must operate correctly, because their activities can directly affect the citizens in question. As far as we know, "Junior" is in the process of liquidation and its sale is being prepared. Currently, 83 Kosovo Serb IDPs live in it. All of them must be given existential security before the hotel is sold.

Silence about EULEX

"The current mandate of EULEX, with the exchange of letters, is defined by 15 July 2016." Zbogar briefly answered to the petition of Danas to clarify his announced "accelerated transfer of EULEX activities on to other European bodies and local institutions," as well as to answer the question if the fact that in the next two years, "EULEX will gradually be leaving its executive functions in the areas of justice," means that its mandate will not be extended after 2016. We also received no answer from Zbogar to the question whether in relation to the extension of the EULEX mandate, in addition to the exchange of letters between Pristina and Brussels, Belgrade and the UN Security Council were consulted, since this mission has been deployed in Kosovo in 2008 with the consent of Serbia and the opinion of the SC.

 

Djuric visits displaced at the “Junior” Hotel in Strpce (Tanjug)
Director of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija Marko Djuric told IDPs, who are housed at the "Junior" in Strpce, it is the duty of the state to be with them, and "while there is the state of Serbia, they will not remain homeless and without bread on the plate."
During a visit to the hotel, Djuric said that a few days ago the Kosovo Privatization Agency (KPA) officials  stormed the hotel "Junior" in the enclave Strpce, placed their own security personnel and took over the administration of the hotel.
- So, we again want to expel those people, who have experienced incredible trauma during the war, loss of family members, loss of property, the greatest stress that a living person can experience. I just wonder if people who make such decisions whatever their nationality, have any sense for other people and their suffering, regardless of nationality - Djuric asked.
- It is obvious that, unfortunately, they do not, and our duty, the duty of the state of Serbia, is to be with these people, and we will be with them - he said.
Djuric told IDPs he admires their courage, their survival and their remaining there, and they can count on never “being homeless and without bread on the plate" as long as the state of Serbia exists.
A few days ago, the Office for Kosovo and Metohija, said that, according the information of the institution, Privatization Agency of Kosovo, in the past, brought the decision to liquidate the hotel "Junior" and that the said activities are undertaken for the purpose of later selling the hotel.
Since 2001, the hotel was used as a refugee center for Serbian families expelled in 1999, and the owner of the hotel is the Republic Fund for Pension and Disability Insurance. Per the agreement from 2001, the responsibility for housing and feeding people living in a hotel lies with the Commissioner for Refugees and Migration.

Currently, there are 85 IDPs, who were earlier banished from Urosevac and Prizren, for whom this is the only shelter, and who are threatened by a humanitarian disaster, a statement said.

 

 

REGIONAL PRESS

 

Regional conference on missing persons (Beta, Blic)

A regional conference on the issue of missing persons is being held today and tomorrow in Sarajevo.

The conference is organized by the regional coordinating body of associations of families of missing persons from the former Yugoslavia. Chair of the Board of the Regional Coordination, Ljiljana Alvir said that the aim of the conference is to find a model for resolving the missing persons issues or at least to speed up the process, as the families of missing persons are extremely dissatisfied with the slowness of the process.

President of the Commission for Missing Persons of the Government of Serbia, Veljko Odalovic, who is attending the conference, said that Serbia attaches great importance to the problem of missing persons.

"The specificity of our problem is that most of the missing person we are looking for are on the territory of other countries, and in Kosovo and Metohija," he said.

"These are the territories that are not under our legal jurisdiction and that requires engaging primarily the authorities in these territories - UNMIK and EULEX in Kosovo and Metohija, and state authorities who function in the territories under the authority of their countries," Odalovic added.

The conference is organized with the financial support of the International Commission for Missing Persons and the Balkan Trust for Democracy.

Indictment filed for war crimes against Serbian civilians (Fena)

Prosecutor's Office of BiH filed an indictment against four former members of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, who are charged with war crimes where more than 20 Serbian civilians were killed.

SARAJEVO –The Prosecutor's Office of BiH has filed an indictment against four former members of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, who are charged with war crimes where more than 20 Serbian civilians in a refugee convoy, were killed.

The accused are Muhammad Sisic (51), Emir Drakovac (42), Aziz Susa (44) and Tarik Sisic (42), all citizens of BiH.

The accused are charged with attacking a convoy of refugees of Serbian nationality, who were moving from Jabuka to Rogatica, and killed at least 21 people, on 27 August, 1992.

The crime was committed in the village Kukavice, on a convoy of refugees in several cars, and among the dead were minors and the elderly, mothers with children. Several people were wounded, and property that the refugees carried was looted and burned.

Muhamed Sisic was charged as commander of the Reconnaissance Squad, and others as members of the Squad of the Army of BiH.

Accused Emir Drakovac was charged that at the end of 1992, he committed war crimes of killing three people in a very cruel way, in the municipality of Foca.

The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, together with the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Serbia, conducted a thorough investigation of the case and collected evidence to indict and prosecute those responsible, the State Prosecution announced.

The indictment was forwarded to the Court of BiH for confirmation, along with more than 200 exhibits and materials and the interviewing of about 80 prosecution witnesses is proposed, the agency Fena announced.

 

INTERNATIONAL PRESS

 

'Park' on Bridge Causes Confusion in Divided Mitrovica (BIRN, by Valerie Hopkins and Edona Peci, 20 June 2014)

Serbs and Albanians in Mitrovica are eyeing the new barricade that has gone up in town, replacing the huge concrete and rock structure cleared away suddenly this week.

While the old containers have been removed, cars still cannot cross the bridge because of a new “Peace Park” that Serbs have planted in the centre, composed largely of conifers in pots.

“Yesterday the barricade was removed and another was put up. This is not a Peace Park it is a Park of Division,” Emine Peci, an Albanian from the Kodra e Trimave [Hill of the Braves] quarter in the northern part of the town said.

Serbs in the town erected the barricade on the bridge three years ago in a protest against of Kosovo police and customs on the contested border with Serbia.

Mitrovica residents on both sides came to look at the changes on the bridge, as local Serbs laid sand and mulch with a view to planting flowers and erecting pots there.

The new barricade has caused uncertainty among Albanians who ask themselves whether they will be able to get to the northern side of town more easily once again.

Rushid Rushiti, came with several of his friends to gape at the as-yet unplanted mud pit.

“For five or six years we worked together now, having meetings, giving documents, and I crossed frequently,” Rushiti, 49, told BIRN. “Now I can cross the bridge, but to go further? I’m not sure.”

The Serbs who dominate the northern part of town believe it is their right to "mark" their territory however they wish.

"Do you watch Animal Planet? You can see that any animal knows how to mark his territory, and we can't even do that?” Dimitri a middle-aged Serb from the north told BIRN.

“This is a game being played by Serbia, not decided here. This is dictated by what Europe tells Serbia and Serbia then does here," he added.

If the barricade was removed totally, it would mean "a mass exodus of the people who live here”, he added.

It is still unclear who gave the order to remove the original concrete barricade, and who owns the machinery that was used to remove it.

North Mitrovica Mayor Goran Rakic told Kosovo's RTK2 that it was not his decision to remove the barricade, nor was it his decision to plant the “peace park.”

He described the decision to destroy the barricade as a “citizens' initiative”.

North Mitrovica Municipal Assembly leader Ksenija Bozovic said she was not informed about any plan to remove the barricade.

She said she believed it must have been organized and planned as the municipality of North Mitrovica does not have the equipment needed to remove all of the cement and stones

“I have lots of questions about this,” Bozovic told BIRN.

“Why did they do it at night, why did they have to do it now? People are scared, and there is not enough trust built between both sides yet. To say that this was a citizen initiative is wrong, because the people are not behind this,” she said.

But, the new barricade angered officials in Pristina.

Hashim Thaci, the outgoing prime minister decribed the transformed barricade as "a shameful act".

"This embarrassing and dangerous game, but above all illegal is unacceptable to the values of our democratic society and state", Thaci said in a press release issued on Thursday.

"Those that are responsible for these illegal actions will face the law sooner or later. Freedom of movement is a fundamental right and cannot be violated by anyone", he said.

Since the conflict in Kosovo ended in the late 1990s, the north of the country has been beyond the Kosovo government's control while Serbia has continued to finance local security, judicial, health and educational institutions.

Kosovo declared independence in 2008 but Serbia refuses to recognize it. However, both sides are now conducting an EU-facilitated dialogue aiming to "normalize" relations.

On April 19, 2013, authorities in Pristina and Belgrade adopted a draft agreement, which mainly concerned the position of Serbs in the north.

Under the agreement, an Association of Serbian Municipalities with broad powers is to be set up, including the four Serb-run northern municipalities of North Mitrovica, Leposavic, Zvecan and Zubin Potok.

 

Macedonian parliament votes in PM despite opposition boycott (Reuters, By Kole Casule, 19 June 2014)

Macedonia's parliament voted in Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski for a fourth term in office on Thursday despite a boycott by the centre-left opposition which accused his party of having won a tainted election.

Gruevski and his conservative VMRO-DPMNE party won 61 seats on April 27 and its ethnic Albanian coalition partner, the DUI, secured 19 seats, giving them a comfortable majority in the 123-seat parliament.

The Social-Democrats (SDSM) won 33 seats but resigned all of them in protest over what it called a fraudulent election, accusing VMRO-DPMNE of blackmailing and manipulating voters.

Lawmakers in the southern Balkan country approved the new government in with 77 votes for and 6 against. The SDSM said its boycott would last until another election was held.

European election monitors assessed the ballot as "efficient and orderly" but said that campaigning beforehand had not created a level playing field for all. "I do not say we made miracles...But we have done a lot and the people appreciate that," Gruevski said in his inaugural speech.

Gruevski said his government's priority would be to attract more foreign investment and cut a now 20 percent jobless rate.

"We plan GDP growth of 3 to 6 percent in this mandate, with inflation remaining at 2.5 or 3 percent a year," he told parliament before the vote on his premiership.

VMRO-DPMNE has been in power since 2006 but Skopje's bid to join the European Union and NATO has been frozen throughout due to a dispute with neighbouring Greece over use of the name Macedonia. Greece's northernmost province is also called Macedonia.

But Gruevski, 43, has achieved solid economic growth, low public debt and a rise in foreign investment, unlike most other Balkan countries.

Diplomats have also praised Gruevski for keeping in check tensions between Macedonia's Slav majority and its large ethnic Albanian minority, whose rebellion in 2001 to secure more political rights brought the country to the brink of civil war.

After a Western brokered peace deal, most of the rebel commanders swapped their uniforms for suits and formed the DUI party, now the junior partner in the governing coalition.

But opposition parties have accused Gruevski of creeping authoritarianism and corruption while some foreign diplomats in Skopje say there are concerns about media freedom and political pressure on journalists.

In an effort to ease tension Gruevski invited SDSM leader Zoran Zaev to a meeting in coming days to renew dialogue. (Reporting by Kole Casule; Editing by Ivana Sekularac and Mark Heinrich)

 

Bosniak Soldiers Charged With Attack on Fleeing Serbs (BIRN, 19 June 2014)

Four former Bosnian Army servicemen have been indicted for allegedly staging an attack on Serb civilians who were fleeing the conflict in Gorazde in 1992, leaving 21 people dead.

The four men were charged on Thursday with attacking the civilians who were in a refugee convoy heading from the Gorazde municipality towards Rogatica on August 27, 1992.

Muhamed Sisic, the former commander of the Bosnian Army’s Reconnaissance Squad, and Emir Drakovac, Aziz Susa and Tarik Sisic, all former members of the same unit, are alleged to have killed the civilians, who included minors, elderly people and mothers with children, in the village of Kukavice.

Many others were wounded and the possessions carried by the refugees was burned or stolen.

In a separate count, Drakovac is accused of torturing three victims with an axe, and crippling and killing them in the Foca area at the end of 1992.

The indictment has been forwarded to the court for confirmation.

 

EU hopeful Serbia in quandary over Ukraine (Eubusiness, 20 June 2014)

(BELGRADE) - The Ukraine crisis has strengthened some alliances and severed others. But things are not so clear for Serbia, which finds itself in a tug-of-war between the European Union and its historical ally Russia.

Since the crisis broke out in November, the Balkans country has been walking a fine line between respect for its obligations toward Brussels as an aspiring EU member, and maintaining good ties with Moscow.

But analysts say its neutral position is increasingly under threat and the country at some point will have to clearly pick a side.

In particular, Brussels has sought to pressure Serbia to support sanctions against Russia in response to its annexation of Crimea, a measure that Belgrade would like to be exempted from to avoid offending its traditional ally.

"It is out of the question to impose sanctions against Russia," Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic said recently. "Everyone knows that I love Russia, but that doesn't mean we have to unite with Russia," he said, reflecting his country's quandary.

Russia is a one of Serbia's key economic and political allies. It has supported Belgrade, which opened membership talks with EU in January, in a series of sensitive international issues such as the independence of the former Serbian province of Kosovo in 2008. Russia, like Belgrade, still does not recognise Kosovo's independence.

As well as providing political support to Serbia, the two countries have deep economic ties that Belgrade would be loathe to lose.

The Russian state-owned oil and gas giant Gazprom holds a majority 51-percent stake in the Serbian oil company NIS.

Since last year, Russia has granted Serbia loans in the amount of $1.3 billion (960 million euros) for reconstruction of its railways and dealing with a huge budget gap.

But these ties are increasingly under strain as countries opposed to Russia's actions in Ukraine attempt to isolate Moscow from its allies.

"The intention of the United States is now to oust Russia from the Balkans," said Predrag Simic, a professor of international relations at Belgrade University.

"Serbia's neutral position will soon face serious problems," he added.

Simic pointed to the EU's intervention in a $45 billion Russian pipeline that is to pass through Serbia as just one part of the West's campaign to wrest Balkan countries away from Moscow's influence.

Work on the South Stream pipeline, which will bypass Ukraine and deliver gas to Europe, was suspended in neighbouring Bulgaria earlier this month following protests from Brussels and the US.

Both had raised objections to the selection of a consortium led by Stroytransgaz -- a Russian company subject to US sanctions -- to work on the project.

The EU had also suggested that the selection process may have broken the bloc's rules.

Serbia initially said it too would suspend work on the pipeline but later reversed its position with Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic saying the South Stream project "is going on as planned."

The incident clearly illustrated Serbia's dilemma as it seeks to protect its interests while looking Westwards.

- 'Moscow responds' -

In a visit to Belgrade on Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said there were "no changes in the (joint) projects of Russia and Serbia."

Lavrov also voiced Moscow's "respect" for Serbia's EU accession talks. But analysts suggest this support may not be as forthcoming as it seems.

"We are witnessing mounting pressure from Russia, which hopes to block Serbia's European integration," political analyst Jelena Milic told AFP.

Milic pointed to the flurry of visits to Belgrade from top Russian officials since the crisis in Ukraine began as proof of Moscow's effort to drive a wedge between Serbia and the EU.

Serbia's neutral stance has also come under strain from elsewhere.

On the eve of Lavrov's visit to Belgrade, US Vice President Joe Biden urged Serbia to be "on the side of its European partners" as concerns the Ukrainian crisis.

Although Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic pledged this week that his country was calling for dialogue to resolve the Ukraine crisis, its position is increasingly becoming untenable.

"Serbia is trying to keep equally close relations with both Moscow and with Brussels, but I don't think it could last for long," said political analyst Sasa Popov.

"What is certain is that if Serbia wants to make progress towards EU membership, it will have to choose a side."

 

Putin Is Behaving in Ukraine Like Milosevic Did in Serbia History repeats itself (The New Republic, By Vera Mironova and Maria Snegovaya, 19 June 2014)

As if the similarities between Yugoslavia and Ukraine weren’t strong enough already, Igor Girkin (now calling himself Igor Strelkov), the head of the self-declared Donetsk Republic, recently drew another sinister parallel. If Putin "betrays Novorossia"—the Russian imperial term for the Black Sea region—he might end up like Miloševic, a defeated figure, internationally shunned.

Putin’s tactics in Ukraine strikingly resemble Miloševic’s treatment of the so-called Greater Serbia region (the region with self-proclaimed pro-Serbian republics, partially located in modern-day Croatia) during the breakup of Yugoslavia. First, both Serbia and Russia fueled intense nationalism among Serbs and Russians against Croats and Ukrainians through mass media propaganda. Then they empowered the uprising of ethnic minorities within Croatia and Ukraine, and next, they engaged the military under a declared “need to protect minorities.” Finally, they established self-proclaimed, semi-independent republics in both Croatia and Ukraine. But the resemblance between Putin and Miloševic’s cases is more than just a similarity in tactics—it embraces the fundamental myths and historical clashes between Serbs and Croats, and Russians and Ukrainians.

The story begins in the early twentieth century, when the USSR and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia were established. In both cases, the metropolises of Russia and Serbia—both countries of Eastern Orthodox religion that considered themselves alternative, non-Western civilizations—imposed their rule upon the Catholic and much more pro-Western Croatia and Ukraine. Understandably, both Croatia and Ukraine resisted what they perceived as invasion, and in the 1940s, this resistance translated into substantive support for fascists in both countries. (Germans were viewed as liberators against the dominance of a foreign culture.) In Croatia, this support for independence led to the popularity of Ustaše—an organization founded by Ante Pavelic with an ideology that mixed fascism and ultra-conservatism. Likewise, in western Ukraine, Stepan Bandera, an Ukrainian Greek-Catholic priest and a leader of the Ukrainian nationalist movement, tried to negotiate with Hitler in order to liberate Ukraine from communist invaders. By contrast, Russia and Serbia, respectively, viewed Ukrainian and Croatian support for the Nazis as a betrayal, which they never forgot. The echo of this story is still reflected in the narratives built by Putin and Miloševic around Greater Serbia and Novorossia in recent conflicts.

When both metropolises felt the threat of their former colonies escaping their influence (in the case of Croatia, directly separating from Yugoslavia; in the case of Ukraine, switching to European Union), both Putin and Miloševic realized the impossibility of retaining control over all of Ukraine and Croatia. In addition, the threat of NATO engagement made direct military engagement undesirable. Thus, the metropolises chose a more sophisticated strategy: Both leaders attempted to retain only those areas with a substantive share of the ethnic Serb and Russian population (ethnicity was largely religion- and language-defined). Russia and Serbia mobilized co-ethnics in the border regions of Croatia and Ukraine that had the largest shares of Serbs and Russians. Those territories became the self-proclaimed republics of “Greater Serbia” (as it was called by the Serbs) and Novorossia in the Russian case. The newly established, self-proclaimed republics (Serbian Krajina among others) kept multiplying to allow the metropolises to retain control. (One consolidated unit would be harder to keep in check.) The false pretext of protecting minorities was used to justify Russia’s and Serbia’s engagement (sending the arms to the rebels, participating in negotiations, et cetera). In other words, an ethnic conflict was created where none existed before.

Russian and Serbian propaganda referenced the old myths of Croatian (and Ukrainian) fascists. Just as Kremlin propaganda linked Ukrainian nationalists to fascists, Miloševic portrayed Croats as new version of Ustaše, the World War II fascists who threatened the existence of peaceful ethnic Serbs. In the Croatian case, the role of the horrible fascist devil—played by “Pravyi Sector” in Ukraine—was assigned to the Croatian Defense Forces (HOS), who were portrayed as hardcore Nazis by the Serbian propaganda. To personalize the link with the Nazis, the historic character Ante Pavelic was used in Croatia, just as Stepan Bandera was used in Ukraine. And both the Serbian and the Russian official narratives went as far as to deny the very existence of Croatia and Ukraine as separate nations.

Similarly, in both cases, the Orthodox Church has been used extensively by the metropolises to fuel the conflict, engaging the historical resistance between the Orthodox and Catholic traditions within those territories. The Orthodox symbolism has been used extensively by Miloševic; Orthodox priests blessed weapons and were the biggest war supporters. The most notorious paramilitary group, Tigrovi, used to stop in a church on the way from Belgrade to the frontlines of Vukovar to pray. Miloševic went as far as to suggest that Croats were Serbs converted to Catholicism, hence the conflict was framed in terms of Croatia choosing the evil pro-western religion. Likewise, the recent evidence suggests direct involvement of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) in fueling the conflict in eastern Ukraine through a network of pro-Russian priests. One of the paramilitary leaders turned out to be an Orthodox Church priest himself. The personal protector of Igor Girkin is Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeev, known to be a deeply religious Orthodox Christian. Moreover, pro-Russian separatists have been using churches, cloisters, and other religious organizations as their bases, supposedly with the consent of the ROC.

Are those similarities in tactics and ideology between the Russian and Serbian stories just a coincidence? Or are all dictators driven by a similar logic? It is only natural for Vladimir Putin to look to the example of Yugoslavia; after all, in the last quarter-century, Miloševic was arguably the only other dictator of a collapsing empire who attempted to regain control over its former territories. And let’s not forget that some of the key figures in Russia’s operation in Ukraine have extensive Serbian war experience, which they might be directly applying in Ukraine. For example, Igor Strelkov participated in the Bosnia war on the Serbian side (as a volunteer) and even published a “Serbian diary” in 1998. Strelkov is also closely linked to Russia’s state security organization, the FSB, and was acting in Crimea by the order of the Russian Federation. Some of Russia’s top officials also have extensive Yugoslavia conflict experience. Vladimir Zhirinovski is reported to be a best friend of Arkan, a notorious commander of Serbian paramilitary. Slobodan Miloševic’s brother, Borislav, was an ambassador for Yugoslavia in Russia and worked closely with Russian political and business elites. Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov worked in the U.N. during the Yugoslavia conflict and has an explicit knowledge of the Croatian war.

Fundamentally, however, the similarity is driven by the identity of the universes in which both Serbian and Russian leaders operate. As stressed above, both conflicts embrace the underlying myths that exist in the history of the Russia-Ukraine and Serbia-Croatia relationship. In the Kremlin’s view, Miloševic’s tactics against Croatia were correct, and it was the NATO engagement that prevented him from success. The moral of the story is that the Kremlin will likely keep copying the Yugoslav scenario, but will apply subtler tactics to avoid provoking the NATO involvement. Further events will show us how far the resemblance will go.

 

 

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Media summaries are produced for the internal use of the United Nations Office in Belgrade, UNMIK and UNHQ. The contents do not represent anything other than a selection of articles likely to be of interest to a United Nations readership.