Face to face with a Scorpion

The head of ECFR's Madrid office, Jose Ignacio Torreblanca, is writing this blog on a short visit to Kosovo and the Balkans

We've put together an 'ECFR reports' special podcast on Kosovo - click here for the audio

We also have the full length version of Jose Ignacio's interviews with Jovan Teokarevic (click here) and Mimoza Kursari-Lila (click here).

* NEW * Jose Ignacio finds out how basketball unites young Serbs and Albanians, even when there's no national team to support. Click here for his interview with the head of Kosovo's basketball federation

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Part 4: Face to face with Momcilo the Scorpion

I am in front of a Scorpion. His name is Momcilo. The phoenix tattooed on the necks of such men means there's no chance of mistaking them. The Scorpions were the most feared Serb paramilitary unit during the Bosnia and Kosovo wars. In one infamous video which went round the world, we saw them laughing at several Bosnian civilians who are packed into a truck on the roadside in 1995. Later, they executed them.

A few days ago, when we were in Belgrade, we met Natasa Kandic, a renowned Serbian human rights activist who dedicates her time to bringing war criminals like the Scorpions to court. She faces countless difficulties, with judges and prosecutors discharging detainees, and police officers refusing to cooperate. But despite the frustrations and only slight chance of success, Natasa says the process is essential if Serbian society is to become aware of the recent past and take responsibility for it. Due to the propaganda machinery set up by Milosevic, she says, many Serbs still believe that the Srebrenica killings and the massive deportation of Albanians in 1999 are stories fabricated by the Americans to turn the world against Serbia. Even today, the government has refused to reconstruct the Ministry of Defence, bombed by NATO in 1999, so as to continue making Serbs feel like the victims, rather than the perpetrators, of war and killings.

It is a strange feeling after meeting Natasa, and hearing about her crusade to establish truth and bring people like the Scorpions to Court, to find ourselves sitting in front of one of them. Momcilo is a community leader in Northern Mitrovica and is giving us a talk on the situation in the Serb-dominated area of northern Kosovo. His manners are calm, and his English excellent. He explains the problems Serbs face, most notably the fact that the Mitrovica court is still closed after incidents during which one Ukranian peacekeeper was killed, and how difficult life is for Serbs in Mitrovica and other enclaves.

What Momcilo does not tell us is that there is parallel security administration operating in the area, composed of Serbian security forces and intelligence services, and that it is very likely that he is the link between them and more visible institutions like the NGO he runs or the Kosovo police force, which some Serbs have joined. The ‘Bridge Watchers' of Mitrovica are part of this set up. They sit, sipping coffee in cafes that overlook the bridge over the Ibar that divides their city, monitoring the Albanians, Serbs and members of the international community who pass by.

Some people claim that the remaining Serb ultra-nationalists, like this Scorpion, have a vested interested in the situation not improving. They are said to be the ones benefitting personally from lawlessness, profiting from all sort of illicit activies. This would hardly be a surprise: ethnic wars in the Balkans have been quite a profitable business for nationalists on all sides. Hiding behind their weapons and aggressive rhetoric, they've made impressive fortunes.

So is Momcilo sincere when he speaks of practical cooperation with the government in Pristina? Is this simply a well rehearsed speech, telling foreign listeners what they want to hear? It is hard to say. But sincere or not, it matters that he has swapped a murderous paramilitary group for an NGO dedicated to community building. Even if this is a façade, a continuation of war by other means, it feels like progress. And you can see the results on the ground: compared to other divided cities, there is now little barbed wire at all in Mitrovica. Although tensions are high, the number of inter-ethnic incidents has dramatically decreased since independence.

Do Scorpions hold the key to the future of the Western Balkans? In Serbia, Natasa would argue that their prosecution could force people to face the past. In Kosovo, Momcilo's seeming conversion could pave the way towards an accommodation with independence. One thing seems certain to me now this trip is drawing to a close - they know they have lost, and Kosovan independence is irreversible.

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Part 3: Life in an enclave

In the last blog post I wrote about the Serbs living in the north of Kosovo, north of the River Ibar. The Serbs there are the majority and they feel a measure of security, in territory contiguous with Serbia proper. But in the rest of Kosovo the situation is very different, with Serbs living in isolated enclaves surrounded by the ethnic Albanian majority. Meeting with Serbs in these areas it is clear that they feel squeezed between Pristina and Belgrade, neither of which, they feel, really cares about their practical needs.

The first meeting is with Goran Avramovic, a Serb journalist running an independent radio for the Serbs in an enclave close to Pristina. He says life in the enclave is miserable for Serbs. Most of them struggle to make a decent living, and are simply selling their places to Albanians and leaving for Serbia proper. He himself has his family in Serbia, because having a small child down here, he says, is impossible: there is no way to live a normal life when even electricity is not taken for granted. He complains of Serbs having no future: he says Milosevic's oppression has now been replaced by oppression from Pristina. Goran says very few people take their rights seriously: on paper, with the Ahtisaari plan, they are entitled to many things, but the reality is very different.

Goran gives me one simple example: "If this is a multi-ethnic country," he asks, "how is it that road signs are only in one language?" We ask him about the European Union and the role that it could play, but his answer takes us by surprise. He tells us, quite aggressively, that he has no faith in the EU. "How can we believe in the EU's role in the region when they can't even get to agree on whether to recognize Kosovo or not!" He does not care about the European perspective: what he needs, he says, is European standards. The bitterness in his words is evident: he feels like a victim, a loser, and he has to live with a very uncomfortable reality which may well end up defeating him.

Next we have a fascinating meeting with the mayor of Gračanica, a Serb municipality close to Pristina. It's the site of one of the most famous Orthodox monasteries, under close protection from KFOR troops. To our surprise, the mayor complains about Belgrade even more than about Pristina. He says his situation is unique: he lives between two virtual administrations. On the one hand, the Serbian "parallel administration", made of those civil servants and public employees who have mostly fled to Serbia but still get their salaries paid for (theoretically) administering Serb enclaves. On the other hand, the Pristina government, which has not even defined the borders of his municipality, transferred a budget or assigned a building for him to run his municipal businesses from. Guess what happens when electricity supply is interrupted: nobody is responsible. His tone on questions of status, recognition, and geopolitics is ironic. He says he needs to deliver practical solutions to the problems faced by the inhabitants of its municipality, and that is why he decided to participate in the elections organised by the government in Pristina.

Once again, the practical problems for ordinary citizens are at the top of the agenda for those who live there. But once again, it's clear that Serbia is using Kosovo for its own purposes and Pristina does not have a clear vision of how to deal with the problem. Can't geopolitics be put aside for one moment?

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Part 2: A divided city

In Mitrovica we see what it is like to live in a divided city. The River Ibar runs through Mitrovica, cutting it in two, with ethnic Serbs living in the north and ethnic Albanians living in the south. Our guide is an ethnic Albanian who used to live in the northern half. During the war in 1999 she fled her home, and when she returned after the fighting she found it occupied by Serbs. It's now a decade since she has been able to reach her flat, and the UN has been of little help.

The division either side of the Ibar feels permanent, and few Albanians or Serbs live outside their own community. It is possible to cross the bridge, but the Serbian flag flies at its northern end, as a firm reminder that the Ibar is far more than just a feature on the map. So-called "bridge-watchers" closely follow all the traffic. There are rumours that Serbian secret police and security forces are very active in northern Mitrovica.

This Serbian part of the city is the gateway to the Serbian-dominated part of Kosovo. Between Mitrovica and the border, Serbs can go about their lives free of complications from the de facto partition. They can travel freely to Serbia proper, and go about their lives without even seeing an Albanian.

But in Mitrovica itself, life is difficult. The only hospital is in the south, the university campus is spread across both sides, and sewage and electricity infrastructures cannot be separated. For residents of the city, the status question - in other words whether Kosovo's independence is recognised or not - is not a theoretical issue but rather a practical one. We talk to some Serbs who complain about Belgrade interfering in every decision, no matter how technical, in order to make sure there is no practical cooperation. Even if the European Commission offers them €6 million to repair the sewage system, they are not allowed to engage in talks with the EU.

The problem doesn't seem to have a solution. Some Serbs want to push for a partition of Kosovo, and the integration of the Serbian-dominated areas into Serbia proper. Reality, however, is more complicated, as more than 60% of Kosovo's Serb population lives south of the Ibar, often in enclaves surrounded by Albanian-dominated areas. These Serbs would therefore remain under Albanian administration if northern Kosovo split off.

Life in these enclave municipalities is very different. Serbs there are increasingly taking practical decisions, such as voting in last November's municipal elections so they can rule themselves. This fits in with the Ahtisaari plan, which provides for decentralisation and ample powers for municipalities.

In Belgrade, leaders want to use Kosovo, recognition, the threat of partition and the difficulties on the ground as a bargaining chip in order to get more EU money and a faster approximation. But, as some Serbs recognise, this is a dangerous game: the clock runs against Serbs. It divides them in two: those who cannot afford to cooperate with the new Kosovan state, and those who can afford it. 

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Part 1: Arrival in Belgrade

This is the first post of a short series I am going to be running during a brief visit to Serbia and Kosovo. I was invited here by the Kosovo and Serbia Open Society Foundations, and I'm travelling with two members of the Spanish Parliament's Commission for Foreign Affairs, a lawyer and former MP who specialises in human rights and a journalist.

I've been in Albania and Macedonia before, but never Belgrade, where my trip begins. I'm surprised by the beauty of the Danube, but shocked by how run-down some parts of Belgrade are. In some ways it reminds me of a post-war city. As I walk down the main pedestrian street to the Fortress, overlooking the confluence of the Danube and the Sava rivers, I look at the young people and wonder how much they care about this region's recent past, its wars, and the dispute over Kosovo.

In the morning after our arrival to Belgrade we are briefed by Peter Sorensen, the EU's representative here, on the daily difficulties the recognition issue causes for the two million Albanians and Serbs living in Kosovo, and how difficult it is to get any regional cooperation. We discuss the plans of the Serbian government, the attitudes of the main political parties, and the likely meaning of the ruling of the International Court of Justice, expected later in the year.

Later on, we meet Nataša Kandić, a renowned human rights lawyer who is famous for having successfully put Serb security forces to trial for war crimes committed during the Kosovo war of 1999. It's a frustrating job, with courts sometimes unexpectedly releasing the accused without explanation. But she does not despair: thanks to her, Serbs are coming to terms with the truth about their country's involvement in those terrible events.

Over lunch, I meet with Jovan Teokarević, a professor of political science at the University of Belgrade, who publicly sustains an argument seldom heard in Belgrade: that Serbs should forget about regaining Kosovo and should look to the future. Moreover, rather than thinking, as they do now, that the worse Kosovo looks in terms of unemployment and insecurity, the better Serbia will look upon the eyes of the international community, he holds the opposite to be true: the faster Serbia understands that its fate its linked to Kosovo (and therefore the better Kosovo functions) the easier it will be for both countries, and Serbs in particular, to join the EU.

Professor Teokarević's position is therefore that Serbs should sit down with ethnic Albanians from Kosovo, and figure out practical solutions to the practical problems of ordinary citizens across both sides. As a good friend of mine who lives in Belgrade and knows the region quite well likes to say, the history of nationalism in the Balkans is the history of elites hiding behind nationalism while disregarding the actual well-being of people.

Tomorrow, Kosovo: But first we have to cross the border by bus at night, through heavy rain and thick fog, on an incredibly bumpy road.

 

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