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Washington is sending strange signals in the
Balkans. It has supported a decision by the international community
High Representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina instituting a
post-election change in the way votes determine outcomes. This
favors ethnonationalist political parties aligned with Moscow. The
Americans are canceling Kosovo ministerial visits with US officials.
Washington wants their Prime Minister to delay insisting on Kosovo
license plates in the Serb-majority northern municipalities of his
country, without assurance that further delay will bring compliance.
All this seems disconnected, maybe even random and
unimportant. It is neither.
It’s all about Belgrade
The through line here is Belgrade. Joe Biden was a
strong supporter of Kosovo’s fight for liberation from Serbia. But
he long ago decided Belgrade was the heavyweight in the Balkans. I
testified in the Senate more than 15 years ago in front of him. He
made it clear he supported getting Serbia into the EU accession
process, even though it was patently unqualified at the time. Biden
believed that would constrain Belgrade to move in the European
direction.
He and his White House have now delegated
responsibility for the Balkans to the State Department. There key
players believe Serbian President Vucic is seriously committed to
the EU accession process and also seriously concerned about the
welfare of Serbs in neighboring countries. Pacifying Serbia has
become a US policy objective. It welcomed recently a Serbian
diplomat who used the occasion for notably undiplomatic remarks
about Montenegro, a recent NATO member that has endured prolonged
political instability. State cheers for Vucic’s unnecessary and
divisive Open Balkans Initiative. That mostly empty box pretends to
do things better done in other fora.
Too bad it isn’t so
There is little evidence that Vucic is serious
about the EU. Serbia has made progress in recent years in
implementing the technical requirements of the acquis communautaire.
That is the easy part of qualifying for EU accession. The hard part
is meeting the Copenhagen criteria. Those include democratic
institutions, free media, an independent judiciary, rule of law, and
an open, market-based economy. Serbia has made little progress on
these and marched backwards on some. It has also failed to align its
foreign policy with that of the EU, especially but not only on
Russia sanctions.
On Serbs living in neighboring jurisdictions,
Vucic’s minions advocate what they call the “Serbian world.” Yes,
that’s just like the “Russian world” slogan that led Moscow to
invade Ukraine. Vucic has sought and largely achieved dominance over
Serb communities in Kosovo, Montenegro, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In all three, Russian “hybrid warfare” is helping Serbia push for de
facto if not de jure partition. Vucic aims to limit the authority of
his neighbors’ state structures and create an intermediate level of
Serb-dominated governance Belgrade controls. That is what the
license plate issue is really about.
The new dividing line in Europe
America after the end of the Cold War hoped for a
Europe whole and free. It is not going to happen any time soon.
Europe is dividing between a NATO sphere in the west and a
Russian-dominated sphere in the east. Serbia is opting to remain in
the Russian-dominated sphere, along with Belarus and whatever Moscow
can hold onto in Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia. Belgrade is also
hoping to maintain the pipeline of EU accession funds it receives
from Brussels. That is supposed to finance preparation for eventual
membership, but Serbia uses it to fuel a state-dominated economy.
A Serb-controlled level of governance in its
neighbors will be especially useful to Moscow. It The Russians will
use it to de-stabilize present and prospective NATO members. That
will make further Alliance enlargement a risky affair.
Ill-conceived and poorly executed
So what’s wrong with Washington policy on the
Balkans? It is ill-conceived because based on faulty assumptions
about Serbia’s EU ambitions and its activities in neighboring
jurisdictions. US policy is also poorly executed. There is no excuse
for changing the rules of vote counting after an election or failing
to recognize the “Serbian world” for the peril it presents to
Serbia’s neighbors and potential US allies.
The US needs to return to a Balkan policy that
would support the sovereignty and territorial integrity of each of
the Balkan states, as well as respect for the human rights of their
citizens. That should include their right to decide democratically,
without interference from Belgrade, on which side of the new line
dividing Europe they choose to be. We can hope Serbia will change
its mind about alignment with Russia, but that will require
strategic patience, not pacifying Belgrade.
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