Moving Balkan borders: Peace plan or Pandora’s box? by Ian Bond
A frozen conflict can ‘thaw’ in two ways: through a peaceful resolution, or a return to war. For the first time since Kosovo declared its independence in 2008, some of the Western Balkans’ frozen conflicts seem to be thawing. Can the EU ensure that they end in peace? In June 2018, Prime Ministers Alexis Tsipras of Greece and Zoran Zaev of ‘the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ (as Macedonia is known internationally) agreed on a compromise formula for the name of the country, after a dispute that began when Macedonia declared independence in 1991. If the Macedonian and Greek populations back the deal in referendums (by no means certain), the country will henceforward be known officially as ‘the Republic of Northern Macedonia’. Greece will then lift its block on Macedonia’s accession to NATO, and on the opening of its accession negotiations with the EU.
President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, appeared together at the ‘European Forum Alpbach’ in Austria. Thaçi said “countries in the region should not be afraid of an agreement … even if it includes border change”. Vučić implied that he agreed with this, saying that nobody had asked Serbs and Albanians about the borders of Kosovo.
European reactions verged on rapture: European Council President Donald Tusk said that “the impossible is becoming possible”; EU High Representative for foreign policy Federica Mogherini and Commissioner for enlargement Johannes Hahn said that it contributed to “the transformation of the entire region”. Russia reacted more negatively: its intelligence services sought to organise opposition to the deal in both Greece and Macedonia.
Thaçi subsequently suggested that he wanted to exchange the northern part of Kosovo (largely inhabited by Serbs and de facto outside Pristina’s control since NATO intervened in the Kosovo conflict in 1999) for the Preševo Valley, a majority-Albanian area in southern Serbia. Vučić has not said so far whether he would agree. Serbia’s main road and rail connections to Greece run through the district, making a transfer of the whole area difficult. But a deal, which would need to be ratified by referendums in both countries, would clear the way for Serbia’s EU accession negotiations to move forward more quickly. It would also allow Kosovo, with full international recognition, to begin its EU application process.
Meanwhile, there is also progress in the dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia. In August, the President of Kosovo, Hashim Thaçi, and the
International views on the nascent Thaçi/Vučić agreement are mixed. After the latest round of talks in Brussels between the two presidents