Kosovo has never really been on the public agenda in Romania, except for today. In addition to this, Romania’s foreign policy has been everything but coherent with respect to Kosovo and to the former Yugoslavia in general. Starting from “oh Serbia… our old friend and ally” to “oh NATO… welcome us in your bossom” years ago, today’s Romania is torn between siding with the EU (which it has, since it is now contributing 6000 troops to EULex) and disapproving Kosovo’s recent declaration of independence. It might be a proof of the fact we’re still elegantly swinging back and forth between the West and rest. Paul Reynolds shows precisely how Kosovo is a typical East – West dispute in BBC News today.
Kosovo is also a dispute between law and politics. More about this in today’s Cotidianul (the article is flamboyant and hysterical, much like many samples of Romanian journalism I read every day). Kosovo also illustrates the difference between rhetoric and raw facts. Few could notice today that the newly-proclaimed state actually has a white and blue flag inspired from the EU flag. Instead, they saw their TV and laptop screens overwhelmed by red and black depictions of the Albanian dragon – despite Hashim Thaci’s statements that Kosovo’s a newborn entity deeply concerned with its minority population. It took me a while, some readings and several conversations with friends in the region to formulate an opinion on Kosovo.
Surprisingly to many, I agree with the position of Romanian politicians. I do believe Kosovo’s proclamation is a breech of international law. None of the legal criteria for self-determination has been met, and the precedent Kosovo establishes is unfortunate. I’d hate to see nationalist mobs take up weapons and seek justice on their own, at the same time rejecting consociational arrangements. As much as Kosovo’s independence is a triumph of self-determination (an ill-construed one, but nonetheless a triumph), it is also a triumph of bloodthirsty ethnic nationalism. The wretchedness the Serbian minority underwent in the last couple of years in Kosovo is deplorable.
At the same time, the ethnic cleansing that Kosovo experienced under the Milosevic regime is the most atrocious event in recent European history. Ethnic strife and all the ills deriving thereof where not solved in time, and the West failed in aiding Kosovo heal its wounds. Autonomy didn’t function because it was not set up rightly and independence has remained – to my mind – the only way out from this terrible mess Serbia got itself into. Bluntly put, Kosovo’s independence is illegal, hence wrong, but it’s the only solution for Kosovo at this sequence in history. Wrong alternatives are sometimes operationally wiser than right ones.
It’s a pity that Serbia’s reaction will plunge it several years back in history and alienate it from any hopes of prosperity derived from EU membership. At the same time, Kosovo is poor and ill-managed and it will struggle with state weakness for quite a while. All in all, Kosovo’s a fine display of cynicism…
