Independent Kosovo? Why not the Basque Country?

Flirtation in some western circles with "the independent Kosovo" is dangerous not only for the stability of the surrounding Balkan countries but also for the whole region, as well as the outcome of the NATO mission

by Nevenka MITREVSKA

Start, Skopje, Macedonia, December 3, 1999

Place: private pub "Niko Petrol" in Tetovo. Participants: newly elected leader of the Socialist Party of Albania Fatos Nano, the leader of one of coalition partners in the Macedonian government PDPA, Arben Xhaferi, and the leader of the opposition party of Albanians in Macedonia, PDP, Abdurahman Haliti. The time of the meeting: unknown, but in any case recent. The topic of the conversation: how can the strategies of the Euro-Atlantic integrations for separate Balkan countries be put in service of the Albanian "national dimension... with the full integration of all 6 million Albanians"(!) living in the Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Montenegro, and the establishment of some sort of an all-Albanian "spiritual parliament" for the Balkans?

Liberated of all the spiritual and Euro-Atlantic waffle, this new all-Albanian project is nothing else but a very faithful copy of the old plan for Greater Albania. Therefore the "historic" character of the first agreement achieved by the participants of the secret Tetovo meeting - to together support the Party for Democratic Progress of the self-declared Kosovo "Prime Minister" Hashim Thaci indicates that the center of greater Albanian ambitions has moved from the motherland, Albania, to Kosovo with an obvious attempt to use the currently focused international attention and furthermore western confusion in the post-war period and flirting with the idea of independent Kosovo.

Not the Same, but Less Painful

The main problem of not only the KFOR commanders and the UN governor of Kosovo, Kouchner, but also numerous politicians, diplomats and journalists from the West that have so far mucked around in the Balkans, is their inability (or immense arrogance) to understand arguments presented locally to their naīve question "and why not independent Kosovo?" The same Westerners to the counter question "and why not the independent Basque Country?" or "united Ireland?" respond quickly and defensively, but without arguments by saying: "that is not the same!" And truly, it is not the same, but from our Balkan perspective, it is very similar and incomparably less painful.

The Basque problem has yet again become current since the ETA has declared the end of a cease-fire proclaimed in 1998 and returned to its old methods of struggle, including the struggle for independence, but this time not only in the part of the Basque Country controlled by Spain, but also in the part controlled by France. Why do not democratic governments in Spain and France react positively to these demands and grant independence to the Basque Country if the Basques are a totally different ethnic group from the French and Spaniards, just as the Kosovo Albanians differ from the Serbs? How come that the ETA, an organization that for decades has been fighting a bloody struggle for independence from Spain only a "terrorist" and "separatist" organization, while the "KLA" had overnight "grown" from a terrorist to a "liberation" army? While France, within whose borders lives a smaller part of the Basque nation, has opted to ignore the problem and keep it under police control, the Spanish authorities are trying to neutralize Basque separatism with almost the identical means as those used in the former Yugoslavia to neutralize the Albanian separatism. In 1980 Basques in Spain received wide ranging autonomy, which the Kosovo Albanians had already received in the 1974 constitution; they have their regional parliament, regional government, their minister for internal affairs. However, that is obviously not enough and they want their own state, politically independent from Paris and Madrid, but that would in every other way unavoidably be reliant on its two large neighbors which surround it from all sides. Why then, not the independent Basque Country?

Or, why have the British authorities, similarly, for decades fought against the Irish Republican Army and prevented the unification of the northern part of the island with the Republic of Ireland? Why is it so terrible if the northern Irish Protestants become a minority in the mostly Catholic united Ireland? It is difficult to obtain a meaningful answer to these questions, especially having in mind that both Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland are members of the European Union, and both of them already participate in Euro-Atlantic integrations in which formal state borders (isn't that the case?) are not supposed to be a barrier for economic, political, and even spiritual integration of nations divided by borders?

Quick Sand

What is "not the same" regarding the projects for the independence of the Basque Country and the unification of Ireland on the one hand and the "independent" Kosovo on the other, is not an argument in favor of the independence of Kosovo, just the opposite. The establishment of the independent Basque Country or a unified Ireland would be a final process. In itself these processes do not threaten to transform into quests for "the Greater Basque Country" of "greater Ireland". Their formation not only does not threaten to destabilize the neighboring countries, but also spares them from bomb attacks and the need to maintain unstable peace by huge involvement of the military and police.

Unlike the two above mentioned cases, independent Kosovo would be a second Albanian state in the Balkans, with which the "Albanian question" would only partially be resolved. On the other hand, the appetites for the global solution would only be increased. After Kosovo Albanians, Albanians in Macedonia and Montenegro, as well as those that remain in the south of Serbia will also demand independence. Nano and Xhaferi were sufficiently wise in Tetovo to for now not irritate Greece (and thereby the EU and NATO, whose member Greece is) and refrain from mentioning "the Albanian people" that lives in Greece, but it is not difficult to predict that the question of "Euro-Atlantic" integration of Albanians living in Greece based on the ethnic criteria will also be raised in the near future. That would, on the other hand, result in destabilization of all neighboring Balkan states, even ignoring the lessons drawn from the Kosovo example by other ethnic minorities separated by international borders from their motherlands - that armed rebellions for corrections of historic injustices pay off.

USA Pulling its Anchor?

Besides, "independent Kosovo, why not?" is not an easy way out for the western Europe and the USA from the Balkan quick sand in which they have so senselessly gotten stuck, first with a military intervention for purported prevention of a humanitarian catastrophe that failed to prevent that catastrophe, and than with incompetent obligations to introduce order and build "democratic institutions" in the province. Five months since the end of the bombardment, everything else but the basic peace and security for its inhabitants can be found in Kosovo. Ethnic Albanians, victims until recently, have now turned into executors who in front of the eyes of western soldiers and civilian governors and their assistants are killing, burning, raping, and destroying everything non-Albanian; armed gangs roam unchecked through the province, smuggling of weapons, oil, cigarettes and drugs goes on unhindered, as well as prostitution of adolescents and trade with people. Although NATO with its 45,000 soldiers is a nominal occupier, Kosovo is actually ruled by a mafia.

The similarity between the situation in Kosovo today and the one in Saigon just before the end of the Vietnam war and the disgraceful withdrawal of the Americans, is so striking that it would be more than unbelievable if the West, and especially the US with their "Vietnam complex" did not spot them. Certain shy signals that the West has begun difficult, ignominious awakening from this most recent adventure "in defense of democracy" can already be registered. Reacting to the bloody incident that took place on November 28, during the orgy on the occasion of the day of the founding of an Albanian state in the center of Pristina, the commander of KFOR, general Reinhardt for the first time referred to the victims of the attack as "innocent Serb civilians" and expressed open disgust with the lack of basic human emotions both among the attackers and the observers of the incident. Later, London The Independent, which after the entry of the NATO soldiers to Kosovo headlined all pages dedicated to Kosovo by "the liberation of Kosovo" has a long time ago abandoned the term liberation, and when it now uses it, it is placed between the quotation marks. In this and many other western media recently one can find many critical reports regarding the false numbers and "facts" spread by the NATO propaganda machinery in order to justify unprecedented military intervention in the Balkans, then regarding the chaos that neither KFOR nor the civilian UN administration seem capable of reining in, suffering of non-Albanians and their systematic extermination, phantom mass graves...

One of similar signs of awakening is definitely the brief news-announcement that the Americans may first "lift the anchor" and leave Kosovo under control of (what irony) some Eurocorps, whatever that may be having in mind that currently there is no united European military force. Having in mind the leading role of the USA in the Kosovo intervention, and the confirmed inability of Europe to resolve European crises on its own (let us only recall Bosnia before American involvement and the absolutely unsuccessful and purely European mission ALBA after the break-down of the Albanian state), a flight is not only not a solution for the Kosovo problem, not even for the Americans, but would also be highly irresponsible and immoral.

Translated on July 11 2000