WHY RUSSIA IS AGAINST KOSOVO PLAN
The Christian Science Monitor
June 28, 2007 edition
Ahead of Bush-Putin summit, the issue threatens to stymie efforts to
repair relations.
By Fred Weir | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
Moscow – Less than a week before presidents George W. Bush and Vladimir
Putin sit down for a heart-to-heart in Maine, the status of Kosovo
is emerging as a primary sticking point in US-Russia relations.
True, the tiny territory seized by NATO in a 1999 war lies far outside
Moscow’s claimed post-Soviet sphere of influence. But Russia’s
key concern, which it says the West is ignoring, is that granting
independence to Kosovo will encourage a wave of imitators across
the former USSR and beyond as well as boost the passions of Russian
ultranationalists who dream of gathering pro-Russian minorities in
neighboring states back under Moscow’s sway.
Kremlin opposition to a US-backed plan that would put the tiny Serbian
province on the road to independence has grown so vociferous that
experts say the dispute could stymie efforts to repair collapsing
Russia-Western relations at the Putin-Bush summit.
"Never since Hitler and the Western allies carved up Czechoslovakia
at Munich in 1938 has a sovereign state been dismembered with the
agreement of the international community, as the West is proposing to
do with Serbia," says Nadezhda Arbatova, head of European studies at
the official Institute of World Economy and International Relations
in Moscow. "Russia is asking the West to stop and think about the
precedent they are setting. Kosovan independence might make life a
little simpler for Europe, but they are opening Pandora’s box for
the rest of us."
Statelets set to follow suit
Last week, a group of four breakaway post-Soviet statelets – South
Ossetia, Abkhazia, Transdniestria, and Nagorno-Karabakh – signed a
joint statement calling on the world community to "recognize the will"
of their peoples for independence.
Though Russia backed the emergence of those rebel territories,
all four of which won wars of secession against their ex-Soviet
parent states in the early 1990s, Moscow has never recognized their
independence. Experts say that Russia, a multiethnic federation with an
active separatist rebellion of its own in Chechnya, has good reasons
to support the status quo. But the looming Kosovo verdict could tip
the balance in favor of insurgent minorities, they warn.
Moscow has threatened to veto the plan for independence if it’s
brought to the UN Security Council. But that would not necessarily
prevent Kosovo from declaring independence, or the US and European
countries from recognizing it.
Many Western leaders seem exasperated by what they view as Russian
stalling on the issue. "At some point, sooner than later, you’ve
got to say enough is enough," Mr. Bush said in Italy on a recent
European tour. "The question is whether or not there’s going to be
endless dialogue on a subject that we have made up our minds about. We
believe Kosovo should be independent."
Kosovo, an Albanian-majority province of about 2 million that Serbs
consider the cradle of Serbian civilization, was the scene of a
separatist war and brutal Serbian crackdown in the late 1990s. After
reports of Serb-backed ethnic cleansing that may have killed up
to 10,000 Albanians, NATO intervened, pummeled Serbia in a 78-day
bombing campaign, and occupied Kosovo. The territory has since been
administered by the UN, backed by some 16,000 NATO troops.
West say Kosovo a unique case
Western experts argue that Kosovo is a special case because of the
genocide it experienced under Serb rule and the overwhelming desire
of its population for independence.
"There is no situation anywhere in the world that bears a resemblance
to Kosovo," explained Daniel Fried, the US assistant secretary of
state for European and Eurasian affairs, at a roundtable talk in
March. "There is no place where the UN has been administering for
seven – now close to eight – years. There is no case where NATO was
forced to intervene to stop a massive process of ethnic cleansing."
Russia strongly opposed NATO’s 1999 assault on an Orthodox, Slavic
country with whom it has strong traditional ties. "The Russian
support for Serbia is mostly about symbolism," says Masha Lipman,
an expert with the Carnegie Center in Moscow. "Russians can go for
years without thinking of Serbia, but when the US attacks a country
that’s so similar to Russia, this is quickly seen by Russians as
something that could happen to them."
But beyond sympathy for Serbia, the Kremlin may be genuinely
worried about rising nationalist pressures unilaterally to recognize
breakaway statelets on post-Soviet turf. "Kosovo’s independence will
trigger a wave of appeals for similar treatment for Abkhazia and the
others by Moscow, which will agitate the whole post-Soviet space,"
says Konstantin Zatullin, director of the official Institute of the
Commonwealth of Independent States. "Putin doesn’t want this to happen,
so he’s pressing for a different solution to the Kosovo issue."
Though they are not well known in the West, the tiny entities
clamoring for independence from Georgia, Moldova, and Azerbaijan each
have their own narrative involving oppression by ethnic majorities,
which is familiar to Russian audiences.
"We have more moral and legal grounds for independence than Kosovo
has," insists Alan Pliyev, foreign minister of South Ossetia, which
broke away from Georgia after a bitter civil war 15 years ago. "We
survived genocide and think we have every right to be free."
Russian experts argue that a better solution for Kosovo might
be to make it remain within Serbia and work for reconciliation
between Albanians and Serbs, much as the warring ethnic groups of
another former Yugoslav republic, Bosnia, have been treated under
UN supervision.
"I don’t believe the Kremlin wants to face the situation that a Kosovo
independence precedent would create in the former USSR. It could lead
to a disastrous chain reaction," says Ms. Lipman. "On the other hand,
there is a rising mood of defiance in Russia and a feeling the West
never listens to our concerns. In that case, the political pressure on
Putin to react might be overwhelming. There are no good options here."