• From The Correspondent's Notebook
  
• Montenegro Tomorrow:
  A Sovereign State But of What Sort?
• Kosovo: A "Lollypop" for the Naive Diplomats?
• Recent Publications
• Moralistic Foreing Policy Sometimes Does Good

From The Correspondent's Notebook...

Kosovo

Romania

A new phase of training at the Kosovo Police Service School began on 3 July with a training course for Kosovo police officers who have potential to rise through the ranks to become supervisors, according to an OSCE press release issued on 30 June. "We want to create a pool of potential supervisors," said Rin Shadforth, chief of staff of the school. The press release stated that the course -- for which 15 men and 1 woman have been chosen -- will focus on leadership, management training and motivation, all steps toward the construction of "a democratic, trained police force for Kosovo."

On July 10, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) elected Romanian parliamentarian Adrian Severin as its new president in Bucharest. Severin is a former foreign minister, and the first person from South, Central or Eastern Europe to serve as president of the parliamentary body. In an address to the assembly, he said his main priorities would be "to make the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly the most important source of vision and the primary advisory body to the OSCE governmental Institutions."

Serbia

Romania

The Yugoslav parliament this week voted through constitutional changes enabling President Slobodan Milosevic to run for re-election when his current mandate runs out in a year's time. The changes throw down the gauntlet to Serbia's divided opposition and Montenegro's pro-Western president, Milo Djukanovic. Under the new system, the country's president and parliament will be elected directly through the ballot box - providing Milosevic with an opportunity to secure a second term in office and dramatically reducing the status of Serbia's sister republic, Montenegro

- In Budapest on 28 June, Romanian State Secretary and Stability Pact national coordinator Razvan-Mihai Ungureanu had a meeting with his Hungarian counterpart as Romania is to officially take over the co-chairmanship of the Working Table 1. Mr. Panayotis Roumeliotis, chairman of the WT1 and Mr. Donald Kursch, first deputy of the SP special coordinator, also attended the meeting. Romania is particularly interested in strengthening the involvement of the civil society from the region in the Stability Pact process. In this context, one of the main targets of the Romanian co-chairmanship is planned to be the drafting of a regional Charter for non-governmental organizations.

Kosovo

Albania

On 29 June, the European Commission announced that it would contribute 35 million euros to programs designed to help rebuild economic institutions and support health care reforms in Kosovo. The programs, which will be implemented by the European Agency for Reconstruction in Kosovo, will earmark 25 million euros for economic reconstruction and 10 million euros for health care reform.

In a report published at the end of June, the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly in Strasbourg declared that after years of political instability, Albania has made significant progress in honouring its obligations and commitments as a Council of Europe member. The report said that significant steps had been taken by the Albanian authorities despite the social and economic crisis of 1997 and the conflict in Kosovo in 1999. In particular, they have adopted a new constitution, abolished de facto capital punishment, reformed the electoral system, voted in laws on electronic media and reorganised the judiciary and the police. The authorities have made efforts to curb corruption, but the report underlines that this phenomenon is nonetheless increasing and is probably responsible for the 40% reduction in the levels of foreign investment. The Assembly encouraged the Albanian authorities, asking them to speed up and conclude some procedures, including the signing and ratification of certain Council of Europe conventions.

Kosovo

Bosnia

The World Committee for Press Freedom recently expressed concern at what it described as the unilateral introduction of regulations for electronic media in Kosovo by UNMIK chief Bernard Kouchner. The Committee, describing the decree as the dictatorial regulation of media, said it was a dangerous precedent that could be used by Balkan dictatorships to justify their own censorship. "The proclamation of decrees without any sign of a legislative process is not the rule of rights; it is the imposition of personal authority," said the Committee. Kouchner imposed the media regulations after the murder of a Serb whose alleged crimes, together with his address, were published in an Albanian newspaper. The newspaper Dita published an article on 27 April under the title "When Petar becomes Peter" claiming that Petar Topoljski had committed war crimes during the NATO attacks on Kosovo, along with a photograph and the addresses of his home and place of work. He was murdered several days later and UNMIK alleged that Dita was responsible for the murder. The author of the article and the paper's editor-in-chief have been detained for interrogation a number of times.

Testifying before the US Congress' Commission for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the head of the OSCE mission in BH, Robert Barry, stressed that this was not the time to give up on BH or to revise the Dayton Accords. Barry deems that the elections in autumn will bring new progress in favour of the alternative to the national parties in power and that the process of return will speed up. At the Vienna meeting of the Stability Pact dedicated to combatting organised crime, the Minister of Internal Affairs of the BH Federation, Mehmed Zilic proposed that a Directorate for Police Affairs be established at national level. There are no central police forces in BH, only police at the levels of entities, cantons and municipalities

Serbia

Kosovo

Yugoslavia submitted a demand to a Belgrade court calling on Romania and an Austrian company to pay US$2 million for damages caused by a cyanide spill in the river Tisza. Yugoslav state attorney Milos Bojovic said that an out-of-court settlement was possible if Romania "accepts its responsibility and expresses readiness to compensate the damage," quoted AFP.

The Central Elections Committee (CEC) has adopted the rules governing the registration of candidates for the forthcoming municipal elections in Kosovo, according to an OSCE press release issued on 12 July. Twenty political parties, citizens' initiatives and coalitions were certified to run in the elections. They must submit a list of candidates for each municipality in which they intend to contest the elections by 21 July.

***
"I express regret to all the citizens of the Republic of Croatia, especially the citizens of Konavle and Dubrovnik, for all the pain, all the suffering and all material damage inflicted on them by any representative of Montenegro as member of JNA during the tragic developments in the past years... Should it be determined that Montenegro ought to pay war indemnities to Croatia, we will not hesitate to do it... If any of the citizens of Montenegro should be on the list of war criminals, we will make sure that he appear in The Hague in order to eliminate the guilt from entire Montenegro."
Milo Djukanovic, President of Montenegro, during his visit to Croatia in late June

***
"I don't believe that Montenegro will stay in Yugoslavia. The only real way out for Montenegro is its state independence."
Ivica Racan, Croatian Prime Minister, 7 July, in an interview to Zagreb's weekly Globus

***
"Four years ago opposition parties ignored us when we offered them a 'Programme of Radical Economic Reforms' boasting that each of them had its own economic programme. Today, that same opposition accepts and signs our programme of the economic reconstruction of Serbia in the post-Milosevic period."
Mladjen Dinkic, member of a Group 17 Plus on a document signed in June by all leaders of the democratic opposition in Serbia with the exsception of the President of the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO), Vuk Draskovic, who didn't think it necessary to even respond to the invitation of G17 Plus to come to talks about that problem. The document was called "Proposal to the Stability Pact for South-East Europe for Donors' Conference for the Reconstruction of Serbia in the Period After Milosevic".

***
"Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic has shown the world how to destroy any legislation and any constitution…"
Vienna daily Die Presse article, July 7

Montenegro Tomorrow - A Sovereign State But of What Sort?

Nebojsa Medojevic (medo@cg.yu), an independent economist in Podgorica and member of the Group 17, writes about the chellenges that Montenegro is facing today

The question of emancipation and independency of Montenegro is nowadays more frequent and more serious than it has ever been during the past seventy years. What pleases one in particular is the pressure coming from different social groups expressing their own reasons for the state independency from their viewpoints.
Naturally, the question of state sovereignty is the question of all questions since having solved it we shall finally get the definite frame of the state, judicial law-enforcement and institutions within which we shall freely regulate all our internal relations and independently sovereignly create the system compatible with the European surrounding countries.
What I consider no less important than the question of state sovereignty, is the future social, political and economy system we are to live in once we have an independent and sovereign Montenegro. Bearing in mind the governing practice in Montenegro so far and rather modest effects achieved by the present coalition Government, we cannot be great optimists unless some more radical and positive political changes occur. On the contrary.
Having postponed the essential changes of system in Montenegro for ten years we are likely to effectuate a perverse transition out of an autocratic and totalitarian society in which the source of deprived freedom was ideology, into another also autocratic and totalitarian one in which the origin of deprived freedom lies in a non-controlled political and economic power in the hands of new oligarchy or, more precisely, "new capitalists".

During the past ten years, the Montenegrin authorities have skillfully and deliberately destroyed all the positive legacies of the past system such as the respect of law, system institutions and traditional moral standards. They have on the other hand conserved all the negative and destructive heritage such as strong political and authoritative influence upon the economy trends, a negative personnel selection and media control.

"NEW CAPITALISTS CLAN"
During the past ten years, the Montenegrin authorities have skillfully and deliberately destroyed all the positive legacies of the past system such as the respect of law, system institutions and traditional moral standards. They have on the other hand conserved all the negative and destructive heritage such as strong political and authoritative influence upon the economy trends, a negative personnel selection and media control. The combination of revoking the rules of the game and moral standards and managing economy resources without any control, created an ideal milieu for the colossal redistribution of national resources which are nowadays, ten years later, under the downright control of the newly formed class memebers or the "new capitalists clan". The entire philosophy of the privatization process was created in this way: "If you know somebody that can fix it up for you, you don't need money to purchase a company - you'll get it for nothing." Unfortunately, those who believe that the new-coming Montenegrin capitalism will develop market oriented economy and a free market everyone could benefit from (as it happened in the USA at the beginning of the century) are terribly mistaken.
That is why no foreign assistance and no "Pact of stability" will explicitly help Montenegrin citizens, unless deep and radical changes occurred in Montenegrin society and economy, the ones that could entirely modify all the mechanisms of reign and personal money making.
Apart from having devastated the economy, the political elite destroyed all positive ethical values of the society, creating the system in which the reign of power dominates the reign of law. Therefore I assume that besides the foreign capital which is more than ever absolutely indispensable, Montenegro needs internal cleaning, order and law according to the modern European surrounding. The first step would be to separate political power from business and economic processes in order to stop the corruption at the highest Government levels where the tragic concequences are most destructive. The strength and power should be transferred from Government to law and institutions where binding the law in practice would be controlled. Business activities must be regulated by regulations, not according to the decisions made by powerful Government individuals or the so called "businessmen".
Leaving behind enormous company losses and huge personal profits in friendly private companies, it is understandable why present managers get along very well with the practice of low salaries and zero responsibility that must be once and for all revoked. On the other hand, severe market rules of competition must prevail, which means that companies unable to make profit are to be closed immediately. In this way the incompetent managers incapable of fitting into the market oriented surrounding would be eliminated.
The corruption has been institutionalized and has turned into a natural phenomenon we are all used to, and that is where serious problems and mighty resistance will appear. How can a state fight corruption when it represents its strongpoint?

NO MORAL - NO DEMOCRACY
Introduction of international standards to the practice of conducting public business is therefore inevitable so that the possible conflict of interests and power abuse by the state officials could strictly be regulated. Such standards would treat as criminal offence any kind of practice in which Government members and their relatives conduct private companies having business arrangements with Governement or any state companies. For example: investement agreements drawn up by Government officials in regard to apartment and office building worth tens of millions of DM, without public competition, arranged secretly and in a face-to-face bargain.
It is quite obvious that if Montenegro becomes an independent state preserving the already tightly nailed ruling mechanisms, it will not be a society of equal chances and prosperities for all its citizens. Its entire system will be based upon maximizing personal benefits for the members of "the new capitalists" clan.
After all the havocs we have experienced during the past ten years, it seems that the devastation of traditional moral code system has left the deepest traces which are not to be erased that easily. There is no democracy without moral. There is no economy growth without democracy. It means there cannot be any economic prosperity without rebuliding the savagely destroyed moral code Montenegro had cherished for centuries. A thief was a thief, an honest man was an honest man. Nobody in Montenegro history has ever been proud of being a thief, a smuggler or God forbid a violator or a murderer. It has all turned up-side down and only this kind of bottom society level emerges from the darkeness striding into the world limelight where it has become important and respected. The fact that the majority of them are illiterate, ill-manered, grabby, prepotent, vulgar and indecent people, is of course their problem, but them and those alike represent high society of nowadays Montenegro. Excuse me, but that is my problem too as well as the problem of every well-bred and well-intentioned Montenegrin citizen. After all, those who rose from the gutter to a position of prominence are incapable of making any progress and cultivating a system in which we can live a better life. Such moral and intellectual Pigmys can neither turn their low and inferiority complex stricken views into a vision, nor their daily intrigues and gossips into strategy.

Kosovo: A "Lollypop" for the Naпve Diplomats?

Written by Dr. Ljubomir Frckoski, Executive Director of the Gligorov Foundation in Skopje

DEPENDNESS ON SOMEONE ELSE
But, why is it not happening? Because Albanians, until now, have shown that they are not capable to carry the responsibility for there own behavior. There is an obvious lack of a responsibility "towards themselves" which will engage energy for productive consolidation of the Kosovo situation, which will result with a formation of institutions and processes for re-establishment of order "from themselves" and not forced by some others (at this moment, the international community). This coincidentia opositarum - a coincident of opposition - is a very strange phenomenon, meaning of being dependable on someone else; firstly, in a negative sense, they were dependent from the rules established by the Serbian domination; and now, again, from the rules established by the international community.
Why is the instinct for creation of their own order combined with democratic institutions so weak, and lost in the "husk of protection", created by the international community? Normally, the semi-militant tribal organizations established on a primary social level can not be considered as institutions of low and order, because they are more typical for Mafia's, then for democratic inclinations.
Albanians are constantly in a position of requesting something from someone--from the international community, especially from some of its countries--representing themselves as victims of repression, which, for some time, they really were in Kosovo. But, when that period ended, a "cultural shock" occurred. There is nothing more to be requested, now its time for real work, but subjected by a minimal civil obedience and self-discipline.
There are two extensions of the culture of "requests": the request for independence and final status of secession from Yugoslavia, and the request for the "legitimate revenge" towards the Serbs. The second, as a pervert one, I would not comment at all. But we can look over the first one.
Namely, the request for complete independence of Kosovo is especially problematic from factual and legal aspects. The first one refers to the real impossibility for Kosovo's independence, defended by the Albanians. Still, they have desire for that. The Kosovo's Albanians, in fact, want independence as a symbol, even though they know that they are not in a position to protect it. In other words, they want others (the international community), in the same way as they "liberated them", to make them independent, and if possible to defend that independence from everybody around (especially from the Serbs). That means that the Albanians from Kosovo would have a status not only of independence, but also a status of international "babies" on which baby cry and request for help the international community should have the responsibility for fulfilling their demand in an especially committed manner. They would be in a position of independence, directly defended by others (which is contradictio in adjecto).
But, at the same time, they believe that they have the right to argue with anyone who, by some occasion, does not attend to provide their independence and defend it at the same time.

DOUBLED CRIMINAL ACTIVITIES
Certain political leaders from Kosovo are now saying, "UN Resolution1244 is overrun by the time". That really is indecent, since the Resolution (for which the whole international community sweated their a… and spent enormous energy for its mobilization, lobbying and realization) is not being half effectuated by now, much less overrun. The main problem is that it is not effectuated and there is a slight indetermination in it's realization, but not in the substance of solutions.
What can happen if, suddenly, the international community decides to leave Kosovo? Our "babies" would be shocked and run away again in Macedonia or northern Albania. In the following 48 hours Serbs will certainly re-occupate Kosovo, and UCK (or whatever it is), again, definitely, will not be capable to defend Kosovo. How pathetic and spoiled.
From legal aspect, the problem of independence opens up the precedence of changing the borders in a process of transition (which is unacceptable) and which is publicly rejected as an option. But, there is also something else: even if the independence request for Kosovo is looked upon with sympathy, according to the international law standards for state recognition at least two criteria are not accomplished: they can not efficiently control the territory (without international forces), and they do not respect or can not convey the rules of international law in protection of human and minority rights.
Also, the increase of the organized crime in that entity is doubled compared to last year. The eruption of the corruption and its effects are demolishing the chances for a creation of an appropriate democratic power in Kosovo. That will be a factor that will push that small state-like structure in a tribal and totalitarian waters, converting it into a small narco-fortress, making it a constant red-hot spot in the region.
Currently, Albanians from Kosovo can not solve this problem alone. They are very far away from that point at the moment, meaning that they should "bless" the foreigners and their efforts for normalization of Kosovo.
Mr. Bernard Coushner, in the mean time, instead of giving various statements--each one different from the previous one--must try to "detach" Kosovo and to set up the institutional framework of its selfconstitution (apart from its international status). Among all other things, he must incorporate Serbs from the northern enclaves of Kosovo, and establish a Kosovo's budget as well. It is understandable that those Kosovo citizens who receive their pensions and salaries from Belgrade do not see their future in Kosovo.
Finally, the borderline between Kosovo and Serbia must be kept and covered very preciously (from many independent reasons).

Meeting of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs in South Eastern Europe

                                                 "There is a need for faster implementation of the Stability Pact, otherwise the postponed realization of the promised commitments could send the wrong signals to the SEE countries"- said Mr. Aleksandar Dimitrov, Macedonian Foreign Minister, at the opening session of the Foreign Ministers meeting held in Ohrid on July 15, 2000.
During the two-day meeting the Foreign Ministers from Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Turkey, Romania and Macedonia, together with the Special Coordinator of the Stability Pact, Mr. Bodo Hombach, and other distinguished guest and participants, discussed issues relating to the efficiency and speed of implementation of the Stability Pact as well as possibilities for democratic development of the region, with stress given to the situation in Serbia and Montenegro.
The ministers expressed their deepest concerns about the still-not-realized "quick start package" projects. The first one who "broke the ice" was the Albanian Foreign Minister, Paskal Milo, who told Mr. Hombach "not to lecture too much but to start working" with the practical implementation of the projects. Macedonian and Bulgarian Ministers expressed their disappointment at the slow realization of the project about Corridor 8. On this topic, there were certain disagreements between Greece on the one side, and Bulgaria, Macedonia and Albania on the other, because they could not counterbalance their attitudes.
The situation in Yugoslavia was the second "hot" issue discussed at the Meeting. The democratic forces in Montenegro and the Serbian democratic opposition were fully supported by all the Ministers. However, certain concern was voiced about the present situation in Yugoslavia, particularly because of the changes that the Yugoslav Parliament has made to the Constitution. On the status of Kosovo, all Ministers agreed that the complete implementation of Resolution 1244 of the Security Council remains paramount. The Greek Foreign Minister, Mr. Papandreu, put forward an interesting proposal, demanding that the Montenegrin and Kosovar delegations be included as observers on one of the next meetings; this was, more or less, viewed by the others as a new, possible opportunity for the Belgrade regime to provoke new problems in the region.
The Meeting finished with a Statement given by the Ministers in which they expressed their expectations for a more efficient realization of the Stability Pact. In addition, they complimented the involvement of the donor countries in the latters' efforts toward the future stabilization of the region.
However, the impression given by the chair where the Yugoslav Minister was supposed to sit remaining empty, still cannot provide a firm guarantee that "the story is finished".

Moralistic Foreign Policy Sometimes Does Good

By Flora Lewis
(The author is a columnist with the New York Times Syndicate)