In Kosovo issue Vucic came to complete surrender, not compromise

Recently, new representative of the US administration US Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Wess Mitchell visited the Balkans for the first time. According to reports appeared in Serbian media before his visit, the US diplomat intended to submit a new Washington’s plan for Kosovo and Metohija. Russian expert on the Balkans Anna Filimonova comments on the essence and the contents of Mitchell’s visit to EADaily.

I would like to note that the US public diplomacy followed by diplomacies of pro-American countries (in particular, the Serbian leadership has been pursuing the pro-American policy since 2009) has been quite discreet. So, everything we hear are statements on the need for peace, stability, and wealth of the people. No sound human will ever dispute this. But these are statements of the kind «for everything good against everything bad.» Although constitutionally leadership of any country, including Serbia, must inform the citizens on measures being taken and essence of talks held. Nothing of it is done in Serbia. Everything is done secretly, the public is informed only after the fact, official statements are full of clichés that mean nothing.

For instance, before Sergey Lavrov's visit to Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic had a very interesting talk with the head of MI6. The contents of the talk was unknown. Later, after Lavrov’s departure, Vucic has talks with Angela Merkel essence of which wasn’t made public either, apart from insignificant phrases. Now, it looks like a sudden deterioration in the actions of the American diplomacy starts. The notorious Hoyt Brian Yee is being replaced by other people. Noteworthily, Wess Mitchell first came to Pristina, where he made a clear statement that the Kosovo Security Force will be transformed into a full-fledged army and that no one has a veto right in this issue. This is a totally new moment in the American policy, because before that the US diplomacy insisted that only in accordance with the constitution all national minorities must agree to forming armed forces of the «Republic of Kosovo». It means that Americans gave «a green light» to the «Kosovo army». After that the representative of the United States (a country that recognized Kosovo and that supports and strengthens it) goes to Serbia. And here, Aleksandar Vucic makes a statement that Serbia is ready for compromises. But Serbia not only made compromise, it surrendered. All the agreements within the so-called Brussels process have a nature of complete state surrender with unambiguous signs of the high treason, because the matter concerns breaching the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Republic of Serbia.

Aleksandar Vucic had no authority to sign the Brussels agreement. To be more clear, the Brussels agreement contradicts the constitution of the Republic of Serbia and Resolution 1244 of the UN Security Council on Kosovo. Moreover, it looks like Serbia not only withdrew from Kosovo police, court, civil protection, i. e. all government agencies, gave an international dialing code: there is no such concession that Serbia did not make. Moreover, Vucic goes further. His Serb List (the party of Kosovo Serbs that participates in functioning of the «parliament of the Republic of Kosovo» and established with the help of Belgrade — EADaily), in fact it is an instrument of extinguishing the social and political life of Serbs in northern Kosovo. No voice can sound from there without volition of the Serb List. The Serb List is fully incorporated in functioning of the parliament of «the Republic of Kosovo», with its connivance Ramush Kharadinaj was elected prime minister (he is accused in many military crimes — EADaily). This is all about unbelievable manipulation of a global scale that the Serbian leadership organized not only for its citizens, but for the Russian Federation as well as for everyone who speaks against Kosovo independence. Serbia is taking completely egregious, illogical, anti-constitutional actions towards the population living in Pristina. Even the International Court ruled in 2010 that a group of separatists proclaimed independence, but it means nothing in reality.

Now, let’s have a look at what the Serbian leadership is doing now. They spare no effort to pretend that the matter is about establishing an association of Serbian municipalities. I address you to a document of the Serbian government, the 2014 report on implementation of the Brussels Agreement prepared by the Office for Kosovo and Metohija. The document published on the site of the Serbian government shows clearly that at the moment of signing the Brussels Agreement, the Serbian side had no understanding of what was meant by the sides under the notorious Association of Serbian Municipalities. The document contains numerous complains and claims that Pristina understands it like duplicating Kosovo municipalities, i. e. the municipalities of «the Republic of Kosovo.» In this sense, the duplicating, the Serbian document stresses, has no sense. But you signed this document, because the Brussels Agreement is only about the constitutional and legal order of the «Republic of Kosovo».

Naturally, Pristina handles everything within frameworks of their laws, and Albanians do not want to establish a duplicate for the system uniting Kosovo municipalities that is already working. They do not need it. But if the international community and the USA insists, they will certainly establish anything — on paper only. The aspiration to insist upon establishing the Association of Serbian Municipalities, an absolute nonsense from the point of view of the Kosovo legislation, is very dangerous, because if this all about this, this is the bone that can be thrown to Serbs. They can produce some formal paper on formal alliance of Serbian municipalities that will be insignificant, as this is only about functioning on the local level. I do not think Pristina would allow some association making decisions even on coating a playground with asphalt. It is aimed at distracting attention, bluffing, hoax.

It is completely unclear on what ground Aleksandar Vucic’s regime breaches the Helsinki agreements on inviolable borders. Why do they present a second state to Albanians, although it is impossible even on the basis of the notorious right for self-determination that was written in the constitution of the Socialist Federative republic of Yugoslavia: Albanians had a status ща an ethnic group, not a nation. An ethnic group cannot be granted statehood. The tragic nature of the situation is that this is done by Belgrade. And it is doing it in such a way that makes other participants involved.

Where is the trap for the Russian Federation? In its foreign policy, Russia cannot derive from the principle Ad Hominem, support of an individual. The Russian foreign policy can be successful only when Russia was firmly standing on the international principles of morality and justice. When those principles are breached, we can see collapse of the remnants of international order. The process of giving up Kosovo can affect irreversibly the Russian-Serbian relations. So, the only thing to do now is to break all those Brussels agreements, go back to Resolution 1244 of the UN Security Council and elaborate the method to settle the issue with Albanians only within the legal and constitutional field of the Republic of Serbia.

I wish to Albanians happiness, good health and wealth. But Kosovo is the territory of the Republic of Serbia. The question of separating a part of the Serbian territory cannot be raised at all.

As for Americans, they have their own clear interests, they are formulating their strategy and working on it all 24 hours a day. One needs to understand the logic of the American policy: there will be no mercy. We are entering the period of final solution of the Serbian issue with the most disastrous consequences for the Serbian people. One should not be deluding oneself here.