http://washingtontimes.com/news/2008/sep/07/kosovo-prelude-to-georgia/
JATRAS: Kosovo prelude to Georgia?
James George Katras
Sunday, September 7, 2008
COMMENTARY:
In anticipation of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's recognition of the
independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, President Bush said "Georgia's
territorial integrity and borders must command the same respect as every other
nation's."
Critics of Russia's action include Sens. Barack Obama, Joseph Biden and Joseph
Lieberman; Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice; former United Nations
Ambassador Richard Holbrooke; and many others in the bipartisan establishment.
Among the specific criticisms are Russia's violation of the sovereign territory
of Georgia, a fledgling democracy and a member of the United Nations; a
disproportionate response to Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili's attempt
to settle South Ossetia's status by force, including Russian military
operations well outside of South Ossetia; and Moscow's tardiness in withdrawing
its forces under a deal brokered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
Evidently irony is not much appreciated in Washington. It seems critics have
forgotten President Bush's recognition of the independence of Kosovo, a
province of democratic, U.N. member Serbia. President Bush's reference to
"every other nation" whose "territorial integrity and borders must command the
same respect" apparently has at least this one exception. If he can violate the
United Nations Charter and the Helsinki Final Act, which guarantee sovereign
borders, what right does he have to accuse others of doing the same?
If Moscow stepped over the line in its crushing military response to Mr.
Saakashvili's offensive, what do we call 78 straight days of NATO's bombing
throughout Serbia, destroying most of that country's civilian infrastructure?
If Russia is to be faulted for imperfect implementation of the Sarkozy
agreement, what can be said about Washington's violation of U.N. Security
Council Resolution 1244, which ended the 1999 Kosovo war and reaffirms Serbian
sovereignty in the province?
The standard reasons cited for making Serbia an exception to the rule we demand
in Georgia is that NATO intervened to stop genocide of Kosovo's Albanians and
that they will never again accept being part of Serbia. But after the war
actual casualties among all ethnic groups - whether by military action,
atrocities committed by both Serbs and Albanians, and the toll of NATO's
bombing - proved to be far fewer than those cited in justification for the war.
Compared to South Ossetia's much smaller population, mutual accusations of
genocide against South Ossetians and Georgians, respectively, are
proportionally larger than those at issue in Kosovo. And are South Ossetians
and Abkhazians less adamant that they will not submit to Tbilisi's rule than
Kosovo's Albanians are with respect to Belgrade?
It also should be kept in mind that Kosovo's legal status is very different
from that of entities in the former Soviet Union. Under the Yugoslav
constitution - the same authority that justified the secession of Croatia,
Slovenia, etc. - Kosovo, part of Serbia since before Yugoslavia was formed, has
no legal claim to independence. In contrast, the 1990 Soviet law on secession -
which was the legal basis of the independence of Union Republics such as
Georgia - required that autonomous entities within their borders be allowed,
via referenda, to remain in the Soviet Union, and by extension its successor,
Russia.
Thus, while Kosovo's status as part of Serbia is unquestionable, South Ossetia
and Abkhazia can make a good case they were part of Soviet Georgia but never
the current independent state of Georgia. (The same would apply to
Transdniestria with respect to Moldova and Nagorno-Karabakh with respect to
Azerbaijan. When will they follow suit?)
By trashing the accepted international "rules of the road" on Kosovo,
Washington has created what amounts to the rules of the jungle. Each power acts
as it will, either to suppress restive minorities or to compromise other
countries' borders: The United States tries to force Serbia to accept Kosovo's
independence and pressures other countries (without much success) to recognize
it; Georgia tries to subdue the Ossetians and the Abkhazians and fails; Russia
moves to establish the Ossetians' and Abkhazians' independence and now also
will try to secure wider recognition. In turn, the U.S.-supported separatist
Kosovo Albanian administration itself threatens a miniature version of Mr.
Saakashvili's South Ossetia offensive to subdue Serbian enclaves, where the
remaining one-third of the province's prewar community finds refuge. Where does
the logic of "big fish eat little fish" end?
In Kosovo, Washington sowed the wind, and now Georgia has reaped the whirlwind.
Only a return to the negotiating table to address comprehensively Kosovo, South
Ossetia, Abkhazia and similar trouble spots elsewhere can prevent this
malignant precedent from spinning further out of control with incalculable
consequences for global peace and security. With each step down this road it
will be harder to put the genie of might-makes-right back in the bottle.
James George Jatras is a lawyer and director of the American Council for Kosovo
in Washington, an activity of Squire Sanders Public Advocacy, LLC, and Global
Strategic Communications Group, which are registered agents for the Serbian
National Council of Kosovo and Metohija. Mr. Jatras formerly served as a
foreign policy analyst of the U.S. Senate Republican leadership.
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