Russia in the Western Balkans: Is Russian influence getting stronger?

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Western Balkans. The backyard of the European Union as someone said. But if it really is a backyard of the European Union, why is it so hard for the EU to maintain its influence, and what are the reasons for strong Russian influence in this region? Why is it so hard to finally have the Balkan region without threats to some kind of conflict? In all of these possible conflicts, one party is Serbia and the other is different from time to time. Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and even Orthodox-majority Montenegro. EU is constantly trying to be the one to finally bring peace to the region but that is hardly possible because others want to be the peace-givers also, and the main problem is that Russia wouldn’t prefer the peace that is brought by the USA, NATO or EU, and vice versa, so there is a constant “diplomatic fight“ in Balkan countries. Furthermore, West wants to show that their project on the Balkan from late XX and early XXI century is still ongoing and Russia uses this conflict to justify their meddling in Ukraine, Georgia, and Crimea.

In that sense, the Balkan region is one of the „diplomatic battlefields“ where, whoever brings peace, will show the other global powers his strength. This region lost the priority over other, bigger conflicts in the world but still, no side wants to leave the region and let it „to its destiny“.

How the strife between Serbia and Kosovo helped Russia to increase the influence

The biggest issue in the Balkan now is the frozen conflict between Serbia and its seceded territory, Kosovo. At the end of the 20th century, there was a civil war that ended with peace and the UN Resolution 1244 that, in short, said that Serbian government should recall all of its security forces from Kosovo, to welcome international community and its organizations and in future to negotiate about the feasible solution. Twenty years later there is still no solution and it is hard that it will come in the near future.

In 1999. the western powers decided to bomb Yugoslavia because of the conflict in Kosovo and Metohija. It was first planned to do it under the auspices of the UN but as Russia wanted to use the veto in the Security Council, it was decided to do it under the patronage of the NATO. Was it an attempt to bring peace or just to impose influence in the region it is hard to say, but it is hard to accept that those global powers thought that Serbia will stand down and welcome the plan for independent Kosovo without any conflict. Russia then came as one of just a few powers that still considered Kosovo as a part of Serbia.

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The fight between east and west in Balkan was seen clearly also in 1999. when Russian troops seized the airport in Prishtina before KFOR came to Kosovo just to show the dominance. Again, after Kosovo unilaterally declared independence (2008.), in June 2009. US vice president Joseph Biden came to Serbia and shortly after, in October the president of Russian Federation visited Serbia. And every few years, the prime minister or president of Russian Federation visits Serbia or Serbian officials go to Moscow. Not to mention the Russian economic connections over natural resources, banks and oil companies in most Balkan countries. That is a clear confirmation that the Balkan region maybe doesn’t have the highest priority in Russian interests but still is one of the regions where Russia, as well as western powers, see the opportunity to raise influence and dominance on a global scale. And Serbia is it not the only Balkan country where Russia wants to increase influence. Also, Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro has economic relations with Russian federation over credits, the pipeline that should go through Serbia to Croatia, Slovenia, and the EU, and remarkably, many politicians carefully use words when speaking about Russia.

Furthermore, if the peace is the only thing that the western countries wanted, many other illogical moves were played, which literally made space for Russia to enhance its influence in Serbia with whom they share Slavic origin and Orthodox religion.

The aftereffect of unilateral decisions on a dialog

Is it hard to anticipate the consequences of supporting unilateral decisions of one side in a dialog that supposed to end the conflict and to help in the reconciliation of the people in the region? It doesn’t matter which side is that you support but when you recognize the decisions that are made outside of a dialog and without the consent of the other side, you send two messages.
The first message is to the side that made the decisions you support. That message represents aliment and encouragement for the next decisions. That side gets the message of sustenance for the future and, legitimately expects the recognition of every future unilateral declaration.
The second message is to the other side, where you send your determination of openly supporting the other party in a dialog. It is not strange that, as a consequence of that support, that side is pushed to look for the support of other powers. What should the other party expect from the dialog if unilateral decisions are almost always supported before they are even negotiated?

Serbia between the EU and Russia

The west strongly criticizes Serbian closeness with Russia but refuse to see that besides the fact that Serbia and Russia were relatively close through history, it is west that, with the moves that they take, actually helps Russia in keeping the dominance in a country that wants to become the member of EU. Moreover, during his visit to Republic of Serbia in January 2019., Putin said that Russia has many friends on the Balkans but that he sees Serbia as a strategic partner wich, with frequent bilateral meetings, shows that they are trying to keep and increase the influence and that Balkan is still very interesting for both East and West.Here we come to the paradox that a country like Serbia strives toward the EU but at the same time looking for support from Russia and China for the problem of Kosovo. It is a Gordian knot for the Balkan and South-East Europe that is hard to be solved in the near future. At least if the same tactics are used by western countries, the EU and the international community. „Apart from the energy sector and oil and gas imports, Russia’s role in the Serbian economy has been insignificant. In 2005-2013 Russia invested 598.4 million euros in Serbia, which is 4.5% of all foreign investments carried out over that period“ (Russia in Serbia – soft power and hard interests – Marta Szpala, OSW)

What is to be done to start the reconciliation?

The reconciliation between Serbia and Kosovo is almost impossible. Albanians from Kosovo think that they have the right to have their own state, and Serbs are resentful on the thought that Kosovo can be an independent state. Although Serbs are a minority in Kosovo, Serbia is very much connected to that territory for it was the crib of Serbian civilization. More than 1300 monasteries and churches of which more than 150 were destroyed after 1999. so the Serbs are afraid to stay in a country on their own. Also, the rhetoric used by politicians on both sides don’t really help people feel more secure.

As well, maybe the first thing that all countries in the former Yugoslavia should do is to start talking more about themselves and less about the others. As long as we accuse others of crimes, and at the same time avoid speaking of our own, the reconciliation is as far as we can imagine.

Besides all these hard issues it seems like the western community doesn’t have a perception of the dispute between Balkan people and what is the core difficulty of reconciliation. On the other hand, there is Russia, who strongly supports Serbian arguments and say that they will recognize Kosovo only if Serbia, as a central government, recognize it first. Until then, they consider Kosovo as a Serbian territory under the Resolution 1244. It can be that Russia uses this situation because of their own interest, but nevertheless, they speak what Serbs want to hear, about international law and how everyone should comply with it. They use arguments like international law, Resolution 1244, sovereignty and territorial integrity and in the eyes of people in Serbia, it seems like they care.

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More understanding of the overall situation is needed from the international community

The German government is openly against changing borders even though they weren’t against it when it came to changing borders of Serbia in 1999. That is why the Serbs are even more impending the German arguments because in Serbian perspective it doesn’t represent an objective insight and it seems like double standards. This is also one of the reasons why it is so hard for Serbs to accept any deal.
US government, in the last year, is more opened for a final deal, and don’t have anything against any deal that is accepted by both sides in the negotiations. However, this support maybe came a little late, because the Kosovo government came with a platform for the negotiations that is unacceptable for Serbia.

More honesty from all global powers is what this region needs but it is something that is almost impossible to get, because of the geopolitical situation and the possibilities that this region provides. The possibilities for the west to keep its dominance, and possibilities for the east to regain the influence and domination they want to have.

As a result of the last 30 years of politics and interests of the Balkan countries as well as international community and global powers, we came to the point where the full reconciliation is almost impossible and that situation is a fertile ground for rising capacity in today’s geopolitics.