BRUSSELS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 16th June, 2020) Hashim Thaci, the president of the self-proclaimed Republic of Kosovo, on Tuesday expressed hope that the meeting between him and his Serbian counterpart Aleksandar Vucic in Washington on June 27 will normalize the relations between the two sides, setting a positive tone for the upcoming negotiations which could lead to a break in what has been a painful political process, fraught with complicated issues.
The meeting was announced by US Special Envoy Richard Grenell on Monday and will be a continuation of similar negotiations at the White House in March.
Since the collapse of Yugoslavia, the status of Kosovo has been viciously disputed between Serbia and Kosovo's Muslim Albanian population. In the 1990s, an armed struggle between Albanian separatists and Serbia prompted NATO to launch a military campaign against the latter. In 2008, Kosovo unilaterally announced its independence from Serbia. Russia, as well as the overwhelming majority of Latin American and Asian nations, do not recognize the self-proclaimed republic.
Since then, the relations between the two could be characterized as a fragile truce without neither side willing to compromise its stance.
The Belgrade-Pristina Dialogue was set up in 2011 to facilitate a political settlement.
Things changed for the worse when the Kosovar authorities slapped 100 percent import tax on Serbian goods in 2018, inflicting significant trade losses upon Belgrade.
That measure, however, was lifted by Kosovo's new government earlier in the month, signaling an opportunity to come to an agreement.
The Kosovar political life has been plagued by instability and conflict, especially in recent months, marked by the collapse of the Albin Kurti government, less than two months in power, over the response against the COVID-19 pandemic and removal of the aforementioned tariff on Serbian goods. It succeeded by the one led by Avdullah Hoti, who assumed his position via a parliamentary vote instead of a snap election.
The political turbulence is complicated by Kosovo's rampant criminality, including flourishing drug trafficking operations.
"Kosovo is an example of the complete corruption of power. All party leaders without exception are sponsors of organized crime, of the mafia. The president's nickname is 'The Snake,' another party president was a nightclub bouncer. Kosovo's dream is to merge with Albania, also corrupted by drugs, arms, and other [types of] illegal trafficking," political analyst Nicola Markovic told Sputnik.
The issue of territory will likely be the most pressing one during the talks as Kosovo was the site of the key battle between the Serbs and the Ottomans, which still looms large in the Serbian national imagination. This makes it nigh impossible for any Serbian leader to abandon that territory without essentially annihilating his or her future political prospects, without getting considerable concessions in other areas.
The other pressing matter is the fate of minority populations on both sides. There have been reports about a potential territory swap, which involves ceding majority-Serbian and majority-Albanian areas to the other side.
"Perhaps Trump will be able to sign a temporary agreement, leading to mutual recognition of Serbia and Kosovo, in stages, but Vucic in Belgrade cannot let go too much in the face of his strong nationalist opposition. An exchange of territory makes sense, but it will be almost impossible immediately for Vucic to sign the loss of Kosovo," Markovic said.
The analyst recommended viewing the Balkan situation while keeping a bigger picture in mind.
"There are Serb minorities in Bosnia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Kosovo. The Serbian president should be able to obtain the merger of the Bosnian Serb republic and the protection of the Serbs elsewhere in these countries. Belgrade would have to get something substantial in the protection of Serbian minorities - there are almost 140,000 of them - to dare to sign. There are also ethnic Albanians everywhere, as far as Greece, they would also like protection by a Greater Albania," he added.
Despite seeming like a natural mediator in the Belgrade-Pristina debates, the European Union got sidelined by the US, due to its lack of clear stance on the issue, according to Thierry Mariani, a member of the European parliament from the French National Rally political party.
"Europe is non-existent on this issue and the EU High Representative, the socialist Josep Borrell, is very upset. It is the Americans who negotiate without even consulting the Europeans who have not been able to define a common position. Europe and its diplomacy are totally ineffective," he told Sputnik.
Markovic holds similar views on the European involvement or lack thereof.
"Europe has given a lot of money to the region but fails to have a common policy on the issue. Even France and Germany do not agree!" he said.
Another problematic issue is the April appointment of Slovak diplomat Miroslav Lajcak, viewed as partial to the Serbian side, as the new EU special representative.
"Miroslav Lajcak is a Slovak and the Kosovo president treated him very badly in public, saying that the European Union disqualifies itself for the Balkans, because Brussels gave officials from 2 countries: Slovakia and Spain [meaning Borrel] ... that have refused to recognize the state of Kosovo! Actually, the European Union pays a lot to be loved, but Kosovo knows that its future is in its relation with the US that acted in the past and can be trusted by Kosovars," Thierry stated.
Whatever the outcome of the Washington talks might be, the US has emerged as the driving force in the Balkan peace process, which now has the potential of awarding Trump with an unexpected diplomatic success ahead of the presidential election.
