NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg completed a tour of Western Balkan countries this week, to show his support and commitment to a region facing fires on several security fronts.
“This region is strategically important for NATO, but there are reasons for concern,” Stoltenberg said at a news conference in Skopje, the North Macedonian capital, on Wednesday at the end of his trip. “We see secessionist threats in Bosnia-Herzegovina, a fragile security situation in Kosovo and stalled normalization between Belgrade and Pristina.”
Since the end of Cold War In the 1990s, NATO played a major role in security in the region. She intervened in Bosnia and Kosovo in the bloody wars that marked the final breakup of Yugoslavia into separate states. Today, three of the six Western Balkan states are part of NATO (Albania, Montenegro and North Macedonia)and three are not (Serbia, Kosovo and Bosnia Herzegovina).
Shooting in Kosovo is worrying
Hostilities are escalating between the ethnic Serb minority and the ethnic Albanian majority in Kosovo, which was a province of Serbia during the Yugoslav era, but broke away from it and declared independence in 2008 following a bloody war in the 1990s. The United States and 22 of the 27 EU states recognize its status as a state, while Serbia and Russia consider it a breakaway province.
In May, soldiers from the NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping force were injured while trying to manage clashes between Serbs and Albanians in northern Kosovo, near the border. Serbian border. Kosovo Serbs are often very distrustful of national authorities and maintain close relations with Serbia. In September, four people were killed after a shootout between ethnic Serbs, barricaded in a monastery, and Kosovo authorities.
As a result, NATO sent 1,000 additional soldiers in Kosovo and intensified patrols in the Serb-majority north. This brings KFOR’s total strength to more than 4,500 troops, according to the Reuters news agency.
Speaking in the capital on Monday PristinaStoltenberg said NATO would “do what is necessary to maintain a safe and secure environment and freedom of movement for all people in Kosovo.”
“We are currently considering whether we should have a more permanent increase to ensure that this does not spiral out of control and create a new violent conflict in Kosovo or the wider region,” he said.
Republika Srpska threatens to secede from Bosnia
Meanwhile, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, one of the two political entities of this multi-ethnic state, the Republika Srpska, threatens to secede. Republika Srpska makes up about half of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s territory and is home to some 1.2 million people, most of them ethnic Serbs. It was also formed during the violent collapse of Yugoslavia and in a context of bloody war.
The EU, which leads a peacekeeping mission in Bosnia Herzegovina, is unpopular in Republika Srpska. Rather, the entity maintains close ties with Serbia and Russia. EU forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina followed a NATO mission in 2004.
Message to Moscow
As various fires smoldered, Stoltenberg’s statement in Skopje at the end of his tour on Wednesday was delivered alongside the leaders of four NATO Balkan allies – Albania, Croatia, Montenegro and North Macedonia – and was partly aimed at Moscow.
NATO sees Russia as playing a destabilizing role, particularly since the invasion of Ukraine.
“Authoritarian states like Russia seek to undermine our democracies with cyber and hybrid threats,” said Stoltenberg, who is expected to soon leave his post as head of the Western military alliance.
As Bojana Zoric of the European Union Institute for Security Studies explains, Russia’s overall goal in the region is to prevent NATO expansion and state absorption. in the EU.
The war in Ukraine has also highlighted existing divisions, the EU-funded research agency analyst said: “The Western Balkans are not united when it comes to responding to the war in Ukraine”.
This was to Moscow’s advantage.
“Russia always wants to seize every opportunity given to it to sow disorder and stir up hostilities in the region and, in a way, use ethnic divides for its own benefit,” Zoric told DW.
What was Stoltenberg trying to accomplish on his trip?
For Zoric, Stoltenberg’s trip was primarily intended to send “a clear message to the region and other actors present and involved, including Russia, that NATO remains firmly committed to ensuring security.”
A greater NATO presence Kosovo should encourage all parties to exercise restraint and therefore hopefully support the relaunch of an effective normalization dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade, she said.
Serbia, which aspires to be part of the EU but not NATO, it would not itself risk conflict with the military alliance, Zoric said. Most EU states are part of NATO. Today, Belgrade maintains stable relations with NATO, according to the analyst.
What is the risk of a new conflict?
The analyst, however, does not see any danger of open confrontation on the horizon.
“Even now or in the near future, Russia will not be able to afford to go to war on the Western Balkans front, especially since half of the Western Balkans are part of NATO,” Zoric said.
Instead, Moscow would be more likely to continue its current modus operandi of encouraging disorder by working with key regional interlocutors, she argued.
Edited by: Carla Bleiker
