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61. SLOVAKIA AND HUNGARY: WHAT CAN BE DONE FOR THE WESTERN BALKANS?

Author:
Imre Szilágyi
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Issues: Slovak Foreign Policy Affairs
Institution:
Slovak Foreign Policy Association
Abstract:
The author argues that during the period of the second Gyurcsánygovernment Hungary continued its previous policies vis-à-vis the Western Balkans and managed to preserve good relations with all of the countries of the region. He reflects on the government's policies with respect to the entire Western Balkans – more precisely the countries of the former Yugoslavia, except Slovenia – as well as its guiding principles and activities supporting the Euro-Atlantic integration of the region; policies vis-à-vis the individual countries; efforts to improve the situation of the minorities and the enhancement of the Hungarian economic role in the region. He concludes that due to the fact that the greatest aspiration of Western Balkan countries is to join the Euro-Atlantic integration processes and because Hungary – as an EU and NATO member state – is an important partner country in regional relations will ostensibly become more dynamic in the years to come.
Topic:
NATO
Political Geography:
Yugoslavia, Balkans, Hungary, and Slovenia

62. Serbia: Maintaining Peace in the Presevo Valley

Publication Date:
10-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
Southern Serbia's Albanian-majority Presevo Valley is one of the rare conflict resolution success stories in the former Yugoslavia. Outwardly, it is increasingly normal, with no major incidents in over three years. Yet, tensions linger: massive unemployment is still the single largest problem but the shadow of Kosovo's future status darkens the political landscape. How Kosovo's final status is determined in the next months will have a profound impact. If formal partition or large-scale violence accompanies independence, the peace could unravel; in a worst case scenario, ethnic cleansing in southern Serbia would be accompanied by significant, cross-boundary, two-way refugee flows. All parties – local Albanian politicians, the Serbian government and the international community – need to work with greater urgency on developing the region's economy and ensuring that developments in Kosovo do not disrupt its peaceful progress.
Topic:
International Relations and Security
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe, Kosovo, Yugoslavia, Serbia, and Balkans

63. Serbia's New Government: Turning from Europe

Publication Date:
05-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
Serbia finally has a new government but one that is deeply divided between pro-Western and nationalist forces. Facing two difficult issues–Kosovo status and cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY)–its choice is between moving towards European integration or on to a more isolationist path. The government's composition, deep mistrust among many of its members and the parliament's nationalist majority suggest it will follow the second option. Pro-Western forces have suffered a significant setback, the government is vulnerable to manipulation by the security services and oligarchs, and the system of divided responsibility for the security services renders unlikely serious cooperation with the ICTY, especially the arrests of Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic. Although Kosovo independence could destabilise the government, it may surprise and last far longer and prove more stable than expected. The West should prepare for Serbia turning increasingly away from Europe and towards Moscow.
Topic:
International Relations, Government, and Nationalism
Political Geography:
Europe, Eastern Europe, Kosovo, Yugoslavia, Moscow, and Serbia

64. Confronting Colonialism: Maryknoll Catholic Missionaries in Peru and Guatemala, 1943–968

Author:
Susan Fitzpatrick Behrens
Publication Date:
05-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
My goal in writing this paper was to try to explain how Catholicism became embedded in the social and political structures of Peru and Guatemala and how this affected Maryknoll proselytization in Puno and Huehuetenango in the twentieth century. I argue that during the colonial period Catholic clergy served as intermediaries between indigenous communities and Spanish officials. The character of their relationship depended on local demands for labor and was, as a result, distinct in Peru and Guatemala. Demand for labor was consistently high in Puno because it was near the site of the Potosí mines, recognized as the most important source of income for the Spanish crown during the colonial period. This relationship ensured that Catholic clergy acted as enforcers of Spanish efforts to dominate indigenous communities. For their part, Andean caciques charged with protecting community interests and mediating with Spanish officials sought to limit incursions by Spanish clergy, economic elites, and governing officials. By contrast, Guatemala was an economic backwater during the colonial period. Spanish clergy came to act as “defenders of the Indians” in opposition to the interests of Spanish economic elites and governing officials. Mayan people engaged with Catholicism to restructure their communities and to establish barriers to incursions by outsiders.
Topic:
Civil Society and Religion
Political Geography:
South America, Yugoslavia, Peru, and Guatemala

65. The Inquiries of the ICTY. Interview with Jean-René Ruez

Author:
Jean-René Ruez
Publication Date:
03-2007
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Cultures & Conflits
Institution:
Cultures & Conflits
Abstract:
This article presents the principal results, the process, the working methods and the limits of the investigation carried out by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) concerning the Srebrenica massacre of July 1995. This investigation brought to light a vast operation to forcibly displace the women and children and to execute the men. The executions were organised and took place in three phases: (1) a sporadic phase, (2) a systematic phase, and (3) a phase of moving and hiding the bodies. The investigation revealed the military architecture underlying this operation of prisoner extermination. Despite the immensity of the crime scene, the police commissioner uses classic investigative methods (crossing of testimony, search and seizure, etc.) and plays the role of coordinator for a team of investigators and experts (in archaeology, forensic medicine, ballistics, etc.), working to put together the pieces of a huge puzzle.  Cet article présente les résultats principaux, le déroulement, les méthodes de travail et les limites des enquêtes menées par le Tribunal pénal international pour l'ex-Yougoslavie (TPIY) sur le massacre de Srebrenica de juillet 1995. L'enquête a mis au jour une vaste opération de transfert forcé des femmes et des enfants et d'exécutions des hommes. Ces exécutions organisées ont été menées en trois phases, d'abord sporadiques puis systématiques, puis de déplacement et dissimulation des corps. L'enquête a révélé l'architecture militaire de cette opération d'extermination des prisonniers. Devant l'énormité de la scène de crime, le commissaire de police utilise des méthodes d'investigation classiques (croisement de témoignages, perquisitions, etc.) et joue le rôle d'un coordinateur d'une équipe d'enquêteurs et d'experts (en archéologie, en médecine légale, en balistique, etc.) pour rassembler les pièces d'un immense puzzle.
Political Geography:
Yugoslavia and Balkans

66. Foreword

Publication Date:
03-2007
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Cultures & Conflits
Institution:
Cultures & Conflits
Abstract:
No abstract is available.
Topic:
Foreign Policy
Political Geography:
Yugoslavia

67. Kosovo: What Can Go Wrong?

Author:
Daniel Serwer and Yll Bajraktari
Publication Date:
03-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
At the end of the NATO/Yugoslavia war almost eight years ago, the Albanian-majority Serbian province of Kosovo was removed from Serbia's governance and placed temporarily under a United Nations protectorate, administered by the UN Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK). Last summer, UN Special Envoy Martti Ahtisaari was tasked by the Security Council with resolving the question of Kosovo's future status, with support from U.S. and European Union envoys (Frank Wisner and Stefan Lehne respectively). Ahtisaari's effort is now drawing to a close. He has delivered to both Pristina and Belgrade a plan that explicitly allows a great deal of protection for Serbs and their religious monuments in Kosovo but implicitly ends Belgrade's sovereignty. His plan opens the prospect of a sovereign and independent Kosovo under continuing international supervision. It is anticipated that Ahtisaari will take his plan, with some revisions, to the UN Security Council this month. This USIPeace Briefing discusses potential drivers of conflict in Kosovo during the status decision and in the period thereafter. These drivers of conflict arise from the international community, the Kosovo Albanians, Serbia and the Kosovo Serbs. They have the potential not only to make Kosovo dysfunctional but also to destabilize the region.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, NATO, Ethnic Conflict, United Nations, and War
Political Geography:
Kosovo, Yugoslavia, Serbia, and Balkans

68. Cultural Challenges in Military Operations

Author:
Tibor Szvircsev Tresch and Cees M. Coops
Publication Date:
10-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
NATO Defense College
Abstract:
On 15 and 16 March 2007 a conference was held at the NATO Defense College on the topic of “Cultural Challenges in Military Operations”. It offered a preliminary overview of the operational and multicultural challenges of cooperation among different forces with NGOs, IOs and the local population in theatres.
Topic:
Defense Policy, NATO, International Cooperation, and International Security
Political Geography:
Middle East and Yugoslavia

69. Transatlantic Transformation: Building a NATO-EU Security Architecture

Author:
David C. Gompert, Jan M. Lodal, Leslie S. Lebl, Walter B. Slocombe, and Frances G. Burwell
Publication Date:
03-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Since 1989, the security environment facing the United States and its European allies has changed beyond recognition. The Soviet Union has disintegrated, as has the division of Europe between East and West, and new threats have arisen. The disintegration of Yugoslavia in the 1990s demonstrated that instability and war emerging from failing states could affect the peace and security of Europe. After 2001, global terrorism became the priority threat, especially when linked with the prospect of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
Topic:
Security, NATO, and Development
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia

70. Reverse Balkanisation? Trade Integration in South-East Europe

Author:
David Kernohan
Publication Date:
08-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS)
Abstract:
Recent research from the World Bank and elsewhere suggests that openness to trade was a vital ingredient in the transition of the former Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs) that joined the EU in May 2004. Current EU association agreements in South East Europe indicate that future enlargements may need to accommodate the remaining former Yugoslav Republics as well as the existing candidate countries. This paper examines persistent concerns that trade openness in South East Europe generally, and the former Yugoslav Republics in particular, is much less advanced than it was for the former CEECs in the mid to late 1990s. In particular we examine the issue of whether the present network of bilateral trade arrangements put in place under the Stability Pact has had much effect in boosting trade integration and whether trade within the region is currently at or below its potential. Given the small size of many of the countries in the region, we find that trade patterns remain problematic. In some cases they are smaller than might be expected but in several cases there is an overdependence on trade with old Yugoslav neighbours. In view of this, we consider that current plans to extend the Stability Pact matrix of bilateral trade agreements into a pan-regional trade association are likely to be inadequate. A better option, and one more likely to have a more immediate effect, would be to extend the present Customs Union with Turkey to include trade with the entire South East European zone of countries linked to the EU.
Topic:
International Relations and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia, and Balkans