Posted on 04/14/2005 6:26:21 AM PDT by Pikamax
Europe attacked over Balkans failure Report calls for abolition of Ashdown role in Bosnia and radical change of regional policy that has 'reached a dead end'
Ian Traynor in Zagreb Thursday April 14, 2005
Guardian
Ten years of international policy and peacekeeping in former Yugoslavia have reached a dead-end in Kosovo, Bosnia, and Serbia, with the region threatening to turn into a "marginalised black hole", a panel of senior politicians and experts have concluded. Urging a radical overhaul of international and EU policy in the Balkans, the damning indictment calls for the abolition of Lord Ashdown's office of high representative in Bosnia, a post with dictatorial powers now seen to be hampering rather than helping Bosnia's democratic development.
The report denounces the UN administration of the southern province of Kosovo, calling for the Albanian majority territory to be granted a form of independence. The loose union of Serbia and Montenegro in the common state helped into being two years ago by EU policy-makers, is also deemed a failure and should be scrapped, the report says.
Criticising most of the pillars of international policy in former Yugoslavia since the end of the Bosnia and Kosovo wars, the report calls on Brussels to come up with a strategy to bring all the countries into the EU within a decade.
"The international community and the EU in particular have been engaged in the Balkans to an extent which is unprecedented," says the report, by the International Commission on the Balkans. "But despite the scale of the assistance effort, the international community has failed to offer a convincing political perspective to the societies in the region.
"The future of Kosovo is undecided, the future of Macedonia is uncertain, and the future of Serbia is unclear. We run the real risk of an explosion of Kosovo, an implosion of Serbia and new fractures in the foundations of Bosnia and Macedonia."
The 65-page report is based on a 12-month study by the panel of Balkan experts and politicians including six former prime ministers headed by Giuliano Amato of Italy.
The emphasis is on urging the EU to provide persuasive promises of EU membership to Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Kosovo and Bosnia.
Despite ploughing billions into the region and Europe dispatching "almost half of its deployable forces" to the Balkans, the medium-term returns have been meagre - "a mixture of weak states and international protectorates", zero growth, pervasive corruption, high unemployment, and public disaffection.
Although the report says that "a shift in international and Brussels thinking" is needed to break the impasse, Mr Amato sounds pessimistic that Europe is up to the challenge. "Enlargement fatigue hovers over the European capitals these days," he said.
But if Brussels fails, the EU will become bogged down as a "neo-colonial power" in Kosovo and Bosnia, the report warns. "The real choice the EU is facing in the Balkans is: enlargement or empire."
Lord Ashdown's absolute powers in Bosnia should be scrapped and his role should be taken by Brussels officials in charge of EU enlargement.
The most volatile flashpoint in the Balkans, however, is Kosovo, the status of which remains open six years after Nato drove Serb forces out of the province. The UN mission "bears a substantial share of the blame for the failure in Kosovo _ a failure which can be explained but should not be tolerated."
The report says Kosovo should be made independent by next year, albeit with international officials still empowered to enforce minority and human rights. The expected fierce Serbian resistance to such proposals should be bought off with EU promises of membership for Belgrade.
The report calls for an EU-Balkan summit next year aimed at producing "road maps" for each of the countries joining the EU.
Oh yes, they've just such a stellar job so far! Just ask the Serbs, Roma, and Jews whose rights they've been protecting and...oops, sorry, no Jews left in Kosovo, are there?
Peace will return to Kosovo only when the Serb Army returns.
Not everything can be bought with the promise of EU membership. Serbians see Kosovo as their 'holy land' where many old churches & monasteries are located.
So the terrorists won the first time with US airpower, now the terrorists expect to win again with EU money. Apparently crime does pay.
Once again Europe proves it cannot handle itself, and once again they will call on Uncle Sam to pull their chestnuts out of the fire.
I know this sounds harsh, but maybe we should just let these conflicts burn themselves out. Otherwise we'll be there forever.
And once again we'll be stupid enough to do it.
Sounds like a quagmire!
Suggestion: Look at the Iraq model! Next to the US, the EU is a model of incompetence and immorality.
It's not harsh and it is true. This conflict should have ended years ago but clinton had to get his willie stuck in it and ended up raping the Christian Serbians in order to help the islamic terrorist albanians who are squatting in Kosovo.
This war, like all wars involving the death cult known as islam, ends when the last islaminc dies or converts
And these are the countries that people like Jean Kerry were necessary to avoid catastrophe in Iraq.
I'm not too upset that some of these countries are not on our wing considering the mess they've turned the Balkans into.
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