Kosovo party leader sees 'three-speed' approach to status

BBCM, Jun 24, 2005, 19:00 GMT

Text of commentary by The Hour political party leader Veton Surroi entitled "Three speeds" published by the Kosovo Albanian newspaper Koha Ditore on 23 June

1. In order to understand the Kosova [Kosovo] issue, which is entering a new phase, it seems one needs to have a lot of knowledge about physics. For three consecutive years, we have seen a doctrinaire debate about the Standards that Kosova is supposed to meet so that the process of defining its status can start. First, there was the formula called "Standards before status" and for almost two years we had debates on this, which became almost theological debates, similar to the debate about the existence of God. Then we had the phase called "Standards and status", which suggested that Kosova had to meet the Standards and simultaneously prepare itself for the status.

Since a few weeks ago, however, Kosova has in fact entered the phase of "Standards after status", meaning that any delay in implementing the Standards should not obstruct the opening of the process to define Kosova's status. Such a position can be noticed in the statements by the highest US official dealing with Kosova, Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns. Though not explained in detail, such a position derives from the accumulated knowledge (which is privately explained) that Kosova does not have decisionmaking capacities to implement more Standards if it does not reach a more favourable status. A simple analysis of the law of physics shows the Standards and the status have their own speeds - both of them moving in the same direction, but at a different pace. Furthermore the speed of the Standards is adapted to the speed of the status, and not the other way around.

2. However, this generalized context is not comprehensible to all. When dealing with the Standards, the three parties of the triangle that in one way or another will determine Kosova's status - the international community, the Kosovars and Belgrade - have three different speeds. So today we have three speeds regarding the approach towards the status.

First, the international community has reached the phase of Standards after status, that is to say, it sees the opening of the negotiations at the beginning of the autumn.

In this context, the mandate that has been given to special envoy Kai Eide is intentionally broad, and it does not have to do only with the fulfilment of Standards, but also with a wider political context. This is so because Eide will identify that there is a willingness in Kosovar society to fulfil the Standards (which is very true), but there are also two key obstacles to the future: the lack of institutional capacity for a functional state and the real problems in the Kosovar political establishment that impede the building of a democratic state (which is also true).

Kosova will enter the negotiating process with this state of affairs, but the defects identified in Eide's report will seriously impact on the status formula. And this is due to a simple reason: the status frames have already been set. If one looks at the position of the Contact Group, one sees that Kosova is moving towards its full legal independence from Belgrade, but not towards full sovereignty in the international context. In fact, the negotiating process will be greatly oriented towards the competencies that the international community should keep in Kosova. As far as the NATO presence is concerned, there is full consensus in Kosova about this. Also, this process will be oriented towards the level of Serbs' self-administration in Kosova.

3. The power in Kosova is moving at a slower speed than the international community. Caught amid "Standards and status", the government has been almost fully focused on the half-cosmetic and half-genuine fulfilment of the priority Standards. Being focused on this formula, moving with an unusual institutional clumsiness, and being involved in non-democratic activities (autocracy in the Assembly, corruption, the mismanagement of public money, the lack of economic policies and the existence of parallel security structures), official Kosova will make bulky the part of Eide's report about the necessity for the intervention of the international community in Kosova after the solution of the status. The correlation here is very simple: the more inefficient and non-democratic this government is, the thicker will be the file of obligations of the international community in Kosova and the more crippled Kosova's sovereignty will be.

The nature of relations between the government and the international community may be clearly seen by looking at a simple issue: it promises every day that it will implement the pilot [municipality] projects by demonstrating a spirit of cooperation with the internationals and by buying an alibi for the negative activities that have been following this government this year, from the mismanagement of public money to corruption. If things continue like this, Kosova will enter the status phase with a poor negotiating position, and this risks leading to a complex status in the future that would cause even more damage to functionality.

4. The Serbs, both in Kosova and Belgrade, which has given only instructions so far, are moving even more slowly than the Kosovar government. They are still in the phase of "Standards before status", hoping in vain that there will be a kind of assessment that will prevent the opening of the negotiating process. In fact, the Kosova Serbs have been the biggest losers in this because they have not succeeded in creating a legitimate platform regarding their needs, by being content only with Belgrade's basic ambition to be a negotiating party when the time for status comes.

The time for status is getting close, and Belgrade will be consulted about this, but the requests of the Kosova Serbs have not been legitimized yet. The coming months should be a turning point for the Kosova Serbs when they will have to move from Belgrade's concept about "territorial sovereignty over Kosova" and the "more than autonomy, but less than independence" offer to a context of their real needs in Kosova and functional proposals as to how they can be satisfied in a half-sovereign state of Kosova, which will be after the negotiations.

5. Can these three speeds be accommodated? In physics, there is no theoretical problem with regard to why they cannot be adjusted. In the economy, the approach is usually reaching an average. But if the lesson will be the experience learned from the past, then one should know two things. First, the international community is a machine that is not easily set in motion when dealing with trivial issues, as is Kosova, but when it starts moving, it is difficult to stop. Second, when this machine is set in motion, those moving slowly should speed up and catch it, and not the other way around.

Source: Koha Ditore, Pristina, in Albanian 23 Jun 05 pp 10, 11