The risk of isolation

The risk of isolation

Feb 22nd 2008 | PRISTINA
From Economist.com

What the violence in the capital of Serbia says about that country's future

OVER the past 20 years it has often seemed that even when Serbs have a good point to make, the way that they do so ruins and cancels out their message. The events in Belgrade late on Thursday February 21st were a case in point. Some 200,000 people followed a government call to rally in the Serbian capital, to protest against the independence of Kosovo. This was peaceful and dignified. But what the world saw was rioting by a few and the torching of the American embassy. One person died in the blaze. The British, Canadian, Croatian, Bosnian, German and Turkish embassies were also attacked. The rioters also turned looters, attacking banks and shops such as Nike and Benetton. Vuk Jeremic, Serbia's foreign minister, has condemned the attacks in which 150 people were injured.

To Serbia's rage Kosovo declared independence on Sunday. It has a population of 2m of whom 90% are ethnic Albanians. Ever since the end of the war there in 1999 it has been under UN jurisdiction, although it had remained, technically, a province of Serbia, which regards it as the cradle of its civilization. As a hardline nationalist and Serbian Orthodox archbishop, Metropolitan Amfilohije, said on Thursday: “Kosovo is the apple of our eye, the heart of our heart, our Jerusalem, our soul and destiny and we cannot renounce it.”

Serbia has excellent anti-riot police. It is unclear whether officials decided to deploy them late in Belgrade in order to make a point. America and most European Union (EU) countries have recognised the new state of Kosovo. But in the past few days members of the government from the party of Vojislav Kostunica, the prime minister, have encouraged attacks on property in Kosovo and said that violent rage was understandable. When border points were burned down between the Serbian-controlled north of Kosovo and Serbia, Slobodan Samardzic, the minister for Kosovo, said that this “might not be pleasant but it is legitimate.”

Serbia's government is bitterly divided between supporters of Mr Kostunica and backers of the president, Boris Tadic, who was conspicuous by his absence from the rally on Thursday. He chose to go to Romania instead. Although ministers from Mr Tadic's party have been busy in Serbian parts of Kosovo in recent days, talking about developing them economically, Mr Tadic wants to halt Serbia's drift back into isolation. He hopes to see Serbia continue on its path to European integration. In contrast Mr Kostunica has, in effect, said that the possibility of co-operation ended once the EU began deploying a big mission in Kosovo.

In 1999 after NATO bombed Serbia for 78 days, and after Serbian forces along with its administration retreated from Kosovo, the then Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic told his people that they had just enjoyed a great victory. After Mr Milosevic fell in 2000 some hoped that Mr Kostunica would concede that Kosovo was lost. He did not believe it. In 2003 Zoran Djindjic, the then prime minister who was contemplating trying to deal with Kosovo in a realistic fashion, was assassinated. For the past couple of years Serbian leaders have repeated that Kosovo would never be independent. No wonder ordinary Serbs are angry and confused.

Much of the recent violence has been ascribed to Serbia's “lost generation”, young people who grew up in the 1990s, dark years of war and sanctions. But there is widespread dismay. Some observers talk of a “Trianon syndrome”, referring to the treaty signed after the first world war in which traditional Hungarian lands, or areas with large numbers of Hungarians, such as Vojvodina and Transylvania were given to new states such as Yugoslavia and an enlarged Romania, leaving Hungary embittered, irredentist and an easy prey for fascism.

Are Serbia's leaders likely to take their country in this direction? If so, honeyed words from the mouths of European leaders about needing and wanting Serbia will count for naught and a strategy of containment will come to the fore. Yet that would be a tragedy for Serbs. Mr Tadic’s strategy of engaging the EU is evidently the better one for his people, even if it is a difficult one to promote at the moment.

独立的风险

独立的风险
Feb 22nd 2008 | PRISTINA
From Economist.com
塞尔维亚首都的暴动将如何影响这个国家的未来

在过去的二十年中，我们经常可以看到，即使塞尔维亚
有一个很好的出发点，他们的方法也是有如此的破坏性，
抵偿了他们所做的努力。在二月二十一号星期四发生的
事件是一个非常恰当的例子。大约两万人响应政府的号
召在塞尔维亚首都举行集会，抗议科索沃的独立。这是
非常平和且有品格的行为。但世界所看到的是一小撮人
引起的暴乱和焚烧美国大使馆。在动乱中有一人死亡。
同时英国，加拿大，克罗地亚，波斯尼亚，德国和土耳
其的大使馆也同样受到了攻击。这些暴乱者同样也是抢
劫者，攻击银行和商店，例如耐克和贝纳通。Vuk Jeremic，
塞尔维亚的外交部长，被指责应对袭击中150人受伤负责。
使塞尔维亚愤怒的是，科索沃在星期天宣布独立。它一共有
两百万人口，其中90%是阿尔巴尼亚族人。虽然它从名义上
说是塞尔维亚的一个省，而且被认为是它的文明发源地，甚
至直到1999年战争结束之前，它仍然在联合国的管辖范围之
内。作为一个强硬的民族主义者和塞尔维亚东正教的大教主
，Metropolitan Amfilohije，在星期四说：“科索沃使塞
尔维亚的珍宝，我们的心腹之地，我们的耶路撒冷，我们的
灵魂和命运，我们不能断绝关系。”

塞尔维亚有非常好的反暴乱警察队。现在并不明晰官方是否
不久在巴格达会授权他们来使暴乱平息。美国和大多数欧盟
国家承认科索沃的新主权。但在过去的几天，来自总理
Vojislav Kostunica党派的政府官员鼓励在科索沃对财产的抢
劫还说这次猛烈的暴乱是可以理解的。当塞尔维亚人控制的北区
和塞尔维亚边境的冲突渐息，Slobodan Samardzic，科索沃的
部长认为：“这并不令人愉快，但这是合法的。”

塞尔维亚政府被Kostunica的支持者和反对者痛苦地分割了。
Boris Tadic，在星期四集会上的缺席引人关注。出人意料的，
他选择去罗马尼亚。尽管Tadic先生政党的主要负责人这几天都
忙于讨论如何发展科索沃的经济，Tadic先生想要停止塞尔维亚
的回到独立的想法。他想要看见塞尔维亚继续走在欧共体的路
上。相反Kostunica先生认为从欧盟开始在科索沃发展一个“大
项目”时合作的可能性就已经结束了。

在1999年北约轰炸塞尔维亚78天以后，在塞尔维亚人连同它的
行政部门从科索沃撤出以后，接着塞尔维亚的领导人Slobodan
 Milosevic告诉他的人民他们刚刚享受了一场伟大的胜利。在
Milosevic在2000年任期到期后，一些人希望Kostunica先生将
承认已经失去科索沃。但并没有。在2003年，当时的总理
Zoran djindjic企图用现实的方式处理科索沃问题——暗杀。
在过去的几年中，塞尔维亚的领导人一直在重复科索沃将不会
独立。不难想象普通的塞尔维亚人为什么会如此的愤怒与困惑。

最近大多数的暴力事件大多要归因于塞尔维亚的“迷茫的一代”
。在1990年成长的年轻人经历了战争和制裁的黑暗岁月。但那
也有一股广泛传播的迷茫与沮丧。一些观察家谈论一种
“Trianon综合征”，意指对条约谈判的恐慌。其起源于一次
世界大战后，将传统的匈牙利领地或有大量匈牙利人的土地，
像伏伊伏丁那（Vojvodina）和特兰西瓦尼亚（Transylvania）
合并为其他国家像南斯拉夫和扩张罗马尼亚。使匈牙利的苦难
加重，民族统一，和作为法西斯主义的受难人。

难道塞尔维亚的领导人想要重蹈历史覆辙吗？如果答案是是的，
从欧洲领导人嘴里冒出来的甜言蜜语关于想要塞尔维亚从零价
值起跑接着牵制政策（strategy of containment)将变为现实
。那时候对塞尔维亚将是一场悲剧。Tadic先生反对欧盟的战略
明显是对他人民更好的一个选择，即使现在是推进的一个困难
时期。