With all eyes on Kosovo, the world witnessed a rare spectacle last month. I’m not referring to the American flags flapping in the air and pro-U.S. chants on display, although that in itself is something Americans don’t see very often these days. An ethnic minority managed to declare independence with little immediate bloodshed. Soon after Kosovar Prime Minister Hashmin Thaci released a formal declaration of independence, the United States, United Kingdom and several EU countries joined together in recognizing Kosovo as a sovereign state, independent from its former country, Serbia.
This isn’t to say the declaration has been welcomed around the world. Serbia, obviously, does not recognize the declaration. Russia, which throughout its history has supported Serbia, denounced the declaration and notably did not rule out the use of military force in response (although, as is par for the course for Russian statecraft, their bark is worse than their bite). China also denounced the declaration, and along with Russia will almost assuredly prevent Kosovo from becoming a member of the United Nations. Their resistance hardly qualifies as trenchant criticism given their respective track records in dealing with ethnic minorities in their own countries.
In part, China and Russia fear the international precedent being set. Russia is still dealing with separatists in Chechnya, who are not all that dissimilar from the Albanian Muslims who live in Kosovo, and in Georgia and Azerbaijan, as well. China, of course, has Taiwan, Tibet and the Xinjiang Autonomous Region, all of whom have independence movements. Their predictable line is that sovereign territories can’t declare independence from their mother countries. Silly analogies followed from the anti-independence camp. My personal favorite came from a Serbian-American in The New York Times posing the devastating question, “How would you feel if some other country gave independence to Queens [New York]?”
On the surface, this sort of response has some logic to it. It poses the question: How does one demarcate freedom fighters from terrorists? At what point does a violent rebellion become an independence movement? The answers obviously lies in the realm of opinion. For my money, Serbia lost its governmental mandate over Kosovo when it engaged in ethnic cleansing during the Kosovo War.
The independence movement in Kosovo has existed in its modern form since Tito ruled Yugoslavia with an iron fist, and Albanian Muslims and Orthodox Serbs have been fighting one another for centuries prior to that. Atrocities have been committed by both sides, and both groups seem to have legitimate claims on the territory (gee, sound familiar?). The Kosovo War, which was precipitated by ethnic violence and led to a NATO intervention led by the United Sates, set in motion the mechanisms for the newfound independence of Kosovo.
The response from Serbia, Russia and China requires one to take a superficial understanding of the various ethnic and national conflicts taking place in the world today. While there are parallels between, say, the Xinjiang region and Kosovo, there are far more differences. The best approach is to look at each case individually and take a reasoned appraisal of the various factors at play.
The role of demographics cannot be overstated. Estimates on the population in Kosovo range from a 92 percent to a 96 percent Albanian Muslim majority. Going back to the Xinjiang example, only 45 percent of the population there is Uyghur, some of whom seek to declare independence from China. I think one could also reasonably take into account the recent treatment of the ethnic minority at the hands of the majority. In the case of Kosovo, the attacks initiated under Slobodan Milosevic hardly inspire confidence in Serbian goodwill toward the Albanians.
No matter what calculus one ends up using to determine the validity of an independence movement, camps will inevitably divide based on self-interest. Kosovar independence is decidedly in the favor of America and its allies, and their declaration represents one of the few major diplomatic coups under the current U.S. administration (although much of the credit arguably belongs with Clinton). Given Condoleezza Rice’s abject failure to further the goal of a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it will most likely be the last, as well.
If the region holds stable, Serbia will be fast-tracked for membership in the EU. The Swedish Foreign Minister also declared the possibility for Kosovo to join the EU, despite not being a member of the U.N. If these things happen, both would increase American and European inroads in the Balkans and Eastern Europe and potentially decrease Russia’s sway over the area. It would also represent the end to a long-standing powder keg in Europe – one of the few that had the potential to embroil other nations in conflict. The long-term effects are still to be decided, but be wary of any country that tries to extrapolate a general rule from the case of Kosovo, even the United States.
Hunter Pavela is a senior Chinese and philosophy major who is currently studying abroad in Beijing. He can be reached at hpavela@umd.edu.
