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What chance for Kosovo?
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What chance for Kosovo?
West's commitment under question
A SERIES of high-level diplomatic conferences designed to ensure future stability and promote regional co-operation concluded in the Balkans last week. Yet, despite all the promises of financial assistance and determination, the reality is that the security situation inside Kosovo is deteriorating.
The initial military deployment which started on 12 June was a huge operational success; in many respects, this is still the case. By the end of July 700,000 Kosovar refugees had returned home. Roughly 80,000 remain in neighbouring countries, but they continue to pour into Kosovo at the average daily rate of between 2,000 and 3,000. Kosovo is the only case in modern history where a systematic removal of ethnic groups has been reversed. Furthermore, the material damage on the ground is less than Western governments originally feared. Most of Kosovo's housing stock is still useable (unlike Bosnia, where a full 60% was destroyed by the time the war ended in 1995) and the basic infrastructure works: electricity, safe drinking water and passable roads all exist in Kosovo. Yet a closer look at these undeniably important achievements will reveal a more ambivalent score-sheet for NATO.
Ethnic pockets
Although wholesale violence has been avoided, persistent intimidation of Serbs continues. The numbers of Serbs who have left the province are hotly contested, but it is clear that at least 85,000 Serb residents are now refugees, residing mainly in Yugoslavia. The Serb population inside Kosovo has therefore been reduced to about 100,000. Even this probably masks a more profound population transformation: most of the Serbs who fled are from the rural areas, which will now be pure ethnic Albanian. Therefore, only some of the towns in Kosovo will still have a substantial ethnic minority presence; the guess is that even there, Pristina will probably accommodate most Serbs.
The situation is even more dramatic with the Romany population (or Gypsies), who sided with the Serbs during the war and who are now openly victimised by the Albanians. Up to 120,000 Romany people may ultimately be evicted; UN figures put the number of Romany refugees by mid-July at roughly 46,000.
A patchy peace
Although there is a modicum of stability throughout the province, there are considerable differences between the individual sectors. By all accounts - and NATO's admission - the sector controlled by the British is the best: KLA fighters are nowhere to be seen, and violence is kept at a minimum. The Germans had great difficulty in establishing control over their sector but are getting better at their tasks, while the French, who originally had little difficulty in controlling their allotted sector, are now beset by the classic problems of ethnic divisions. In one of the cities, the French have been reduced to merely policing a territorial division between Serbs and Albanians: precisely what NATO promised never to tolerate.
KLA respect for the disarmament agreement reached with NATO remains, at best, patchy. Since nobody has a clue as to how extensive the KLA's arsenal may be, and since many of the weapons are basically small firearms that are virtually impossible to detect, the disarmament process will remain a cat-and-mouse game between NATO and the KLA. Neither side believes that, ultimately, all weapons will be accounted for; at the very best, NATO can hope to reduce the KLA's military might, rather than eliminate it entirely. Given the magnitude of the task on the ground, some of these problems were, perhaps, inevitable, but the difficulties in Kosovo are multiplying and the biggest problems are only now beginning to loom.
The size of NATO's military presence
Under the original plan, roughly 50,000 troops were supposed to be stationed in the province. Seven weeks after the operation began, the force is still 16,000 soldiers short of this number, and arrivals of new forces have slowed down to a trickle. To make matters worse, the UK - which led the operation and still commands the NATO Kosovo Force (KFOR) - is now eager to draw down on its commitment. Up to 3,000 British troops will be withdrawn by mid-October this year. The HQ of the Rapid Reaction Corps, a separate NATO body also led by the UK, would withdraw by January. It is thus clear that, far from rushing into the province, potential contributing governments are now holding back their commitments in full anticipation that they may be asked to replace existing forces on the ground rather than just make up the numbers which they originally pledged.
Law and order is deteriorating
Returning ethnic Albanian refugees have helped themselves to most of the property left by the Yugoslav administrators and ethnic Serbs, and self-appointed committees now run the villages. The key to the restoration of law and order is the creation of a local police force, which will take time. The UN has been tasked with the creation of an international police force until a local force can be raised and trained, but the process is painfully slow: by mid-July only 210 potential policemen had been pledged by various governments - barely a fifth of the number agreed with the UN in June. An initial plan to incorporate KLA fighters in a newly created Kosovo police force appears to have been shelved. To all intents and purposes, Kosovo's rural areas have been abandoned, with predictable consequences such as the recent massacre of ethnic Serbs.
The absence of a clear timetable for the political process in Kosovo was originally touted as a great achievement: NATO is not bound by any unrealistic promises. Elections for a local assembly have been tentatively scheduled for the first quarter of next year. Again, perhaps inevitable, but a decision which carries its own dangers. The moderate elements inside Kosovo are not getting stronger, as the West originally hoped when it decided to postpone the elections. Furthermore, no talks about the final status of the province can be undertaken with Belgrade until the province's representatives carry a democratic mandate from their own people.
A marked reluctance to commit financial resources completes the picture. The EU has accepted the need to shoulder most of the costs of reconstruction, but the Union itself suffers from a Euro 5 billion deficit in this year's budget (as a result of financial reforms which have nothing to do with the Balkans), and EU governments have decided that no further funding will be granted to Brussels. As a result, regional reconstruction efforts will be funded out of existing allocations plus a diversion of funds from the EU's aid budget to Third World countries and any specific contributions made available by other donor states. To date, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has received only US$160 million out of a total of $400 million budgeted for the return of Kosovo's population. If the contributions have not been forthcoming for what, after all, remained the most urgent task, it is difficult to see how they will be made available for longer-term projects.
The chances still are that the province's arrangements will increasingly resemble those in Bosnia: another former Yugoslav republic which the West promised to rescue. As in Bosnia, vast promises made in the heat of war are likely to be quietly shelved. And, as in Bosnia, there is the prospect of democracy being replaced by the rule of the gun.
Foreign
Report