Serbs lash out at Ottawa

http://www.thestar.com/News/Canada/article/347701

TORONTO STAR (CANADA)

Serbs lash out at Ottawa

TheStar.com - Canada - Serbs lash out at Ottawa

TARA WALTON/TORONTO STAR

Thousands of ethnic Albanians rally in Queen's Park in Toronto yesterday
afternoon after Kosovo's parliament proclaimed independence, a decade after
a bloody separatist war with Serbia.

Envoy sees trouble looming with Quebec as Canada recognizes Kosovo's
independence

March 19, 2008

Allan Woods
Ottawa Bureau

OTTAWA-Canada's decision to recognize Kosovo's independence will set a
dangerous precedent should Quebec sovereignists ever win a referendum,
Serbia's ambassador to Canada warns.

Dusan Batakovic, expressing his anger over Ottawa's controversial decision,
said Canada has shown disrespect for Serbia's constitution, for United
Nations resolutions and international law with its decision to back the
breakaway republic, which unilaterally declared its independence from Serbia
a month ago.

By the end of the week, Batakovic will return to Belgrade as a sign of
Serbia's displeasure with Ottawa.

Batakovic said yesterday the Kosovo decision could come back to haunt
Canada.

"Imagine that Quebec, for instance, proclaims independence in the same way
that Kosovo did, unilaterally. Would Ottawa then recognize Quebec as an
independent country?" he asked. "How would it react if other countries,
without notifying Ottawa, recognize an independent Quebec?"

Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier, announcing Canada's position
yesterday, said the strife that preceded Kosovo's separation from Serbia
makes it a "unique case" with which Quebec sovereignists can draw no
parallels.

"The unique circumstances which have led to Kosovo's independence mean it
does not constitute any kind of precedent," Bernier said.

He noted that many of Canada's allies have recognized Kosovo, bringing
Ottawa's decision into line with a "new international reality."

Serbia will today deliver a diplomatic note of protest to the Canadian
government charging that Ottawa is violating United Nations Security Council
Resolution 1244, a legally binding document that, according to Batakovic,
defines Kosovo as part of Serbia. The 1999 UN resolution sets out the terms
for the international intervention in Kosovo to end fighting.

Canada was part of a NATO force that intervened militarily in Kosovo in 1999
to stop Serbian attacks on the civilian population. Kosovo, which is 90 per
cent ethnic Albanian, has not been under Serbian control since the NATO
force moved in after massive air strikes.

A UN mission has governed Kosovo since, but Serbia, backed by Kosovo's
Serbs - who make up less than 10 per cent of the population - refuses to
give up the territory.

Opposition parties agreed with the government that there was a significant
difference between the situation in Kosovo, prompted by a civil war and the
campaign of ethnic cleansing almost a decade ago, and that of Quebec, where
grievances are primarily cultural.

Liberal foreign affairs critic Bob Rae said it is irresponsible to suggest
the situation in the Balkans sets a precedent for Canada. "It would be wrong
for anyone to suggest any such thing," he said.

But sovereignists are taking heart at the international support for Kosovo's
independence, and some observers say Canada's recognition could form an
important part of the dossier for Quebec separation should a referendum
succeed.

Because Kosovo declared independence without first consulting the Serbian
government, Quebecers would similarly have no obligation to consult Ottawa
before separating, the argument goes.

"Certainly this can be used as an instrument in a range of arguments that
can be presented by the sovereignists, that the federal government has
recognized the legitimacy of this kind of process ...," said University of
Montreal professor Pierre Martin.

Quebec has held two referendums on separation, in 1980 and 1995. Both have
failed to come up with the majority support of Quebecers.

In the aftermath of the near defeat of the federalists in the 1995
referendum, Liberal unity minister Stéphane Dion, now the party leader,
drafted the Clarity Act setting out the terms and conditions that would
govern secession from Canada. It was passed into law in 2000, but has never
been tested.

In 1999, the Supreme Court said Quebec has no right under the Constitution
or under international law to unilaterally secede.

While Dion is reviled by separatists in his home province, he backs Kosovo's
independence because of its bloody history and because NATO has been
enforcing a buffer zone between Serbia and Kosovo.

Included in the 30 countries that have now recognized Kosovo are the United
States, the United Kingdom, France and Australia.

- With files from The Canadian Press

A Second Look at Kosovo

http://www.nysun.com/article/73213

NEW YORK SUN (USA)

OPINION

A Second Look at Kosovo

BY EUGENE KONTOROVICH

March 19, 2008

Kosovo's succession from Serbia, while winning applause in Washington and
Europe, is a grave defeat for international law and international order.

Kosovo's independence did not come about unassisted. This summer, America
and Europe went to the United Nations Security Council seeking authorization
and legitimacy for partitioning Serbia between the Serbs and secessionist
Albanians. The Security Council refused to authorize the carve-up of an
existing country along ethnic lines - consistent with the international
rejection of dividing Iraq into three ethnic states.

Having failed to win Security Council approval, America and Europe simply
indicated to the Kosovars that they could announce independence anyway.
Serbia of course, cannot resist the succession militarily, as Kosovo has
been held by NATO troops since 1999. Thus the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization is providing the vital military cover for Kosovo's
independence. Kosovo did not simply tear itself away from Serbia. It was
conquered from the Serbs by NATO and the West, and handed over.

So America makes a pitch to the Security Council, gets rejected, and then
does what it was going to do anyway. Sound familiar?

The defiance of international law dates back to NATO's original intervention
in Kosovo in 1999. Responding to Serb abuses against the ethnic Albanians in
the region, NATO launched a campaign of aerial bombardment against Serbia.
The Security Council also refused to authorize this action, and
international lawyers widely agree that despite its humanitarian motives,
NATO's war was completely illegal. Further, since even small military
casualties could spoil public support of a poorly-understood war, the
bombing was carried out from high altitudes to minimize military causalities
at the expense of greater collateral damage.

The Serbian military was finally kicked out of Kosovo, and an incipient
ethnic cleansing halted. NATO forces secured the province. On NATO's watch,
the Albanians turned the tables, perpetrating ethnic cleansing on the Serbs,
a large proportion of whom were chased out of the province through murders,
church burnings, and pogroms. With their security forces barred from the
province by NATO, the Serbs, who are a majority in Serbia but a minority in
the Kosovo province, were powerless to defend themselves. NATO deserves the
credit for stopping the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo's Albanians, but must
bear at least some responsibility for the ethnic cleansing of the Serbs.

The Kosovars invoke the international law principle of self-determination.
They constitute 90% of the population in the region, having bolstered the
ratio by evicting most of the Serbs, gypsies, and any other minority who
lived there.

Yet self-determination is no guarantee of independence. The Tamils in Sri
Lanka, the Russians in Transdniester/Moldova, the Kurds in Turkey, Syria,
Iraq, and Iran; Uighurs in China, Chechens in Russia, and similar groups in
dozens of other countries also predominate in a particular region, and have
made massive and violent efforts to win self-determination.

Yet in all these cases, the policy of the West is either indifference or
outright opposition to succession. It seems self-determination is a
principle of very selective application. Indeed, the Serbs in Kosovo are
actually a majority in one well-defined enclave; they themselves wish to
succeed, but the new Kosovar government will hear nothing of Serb
self-determination within Kosovo.

An important ingredient of Kosovo's success in achieving self-determination
seems to be their constant threats of violence. The Kosovar prime minister,
a former leader of an armed rebel movement, often warned of "dangers" and
"unforeseeable consequences" if the province were not allowed to succeed.
With 16,000 NATO troops in the area, the last thing Europe wanted was an
insurgency that could become a jihad-magnet.

As a result, NATO and America have become parties to the carve-up a
sovereign state that they subdued by force. To say that this goes against
the core principles of the U.N. Charter is an understatement. For
international law, the entire process is a string of humiliations. The
Security Council comes out looking like a joke; the right of
self-determination looks like it depends on the product of a group's
ruthlessness and proximity to Europe; peacekeepers are hostages; and
sovereignty is trumped by the threat of terror.

Mr. Kontorovich is a professor at Northwestern University Law School,
specializing in international and constitutional law.