Ruairi O'Connell

Trip to Gjakova/Djakovica

A day trip to the South-West Kosovo town of " Gjakova " in Albanian; "Djakovica " in Serbian on Saturday. Gjakova , historically a centre of Albanian intellectuallism , and later Albanian nationalism (dating from Ottoman times), suffered heavily in the war. During the fighting in 1999, Yugoslav forces drove out the population of the city; many hundreds of people are still missing. Having driven out the population, the Yugoslav forces then proceeded to burn down or blow up the historic centre of the city.

After KFOR entered Kosovo in June, most of Gjakova's population returned - and set about rebuilding the destroyed town. Today, most of it is rebuilt, offering a glimpse of Kosovo's Ottoman past.

But, alongside the return and reconstruction, there was also further destruction; the Serbian Church in the centre of town was destroyed in a revenge attack. The church, a modern build, has not been a priority for restoration work, and the site remains empty. With no Serbian community in Gjakova to rebuild it for (even before the war, very few Serbs lived in Gjakova - mostly connected to the state structures) , it's not clear when, if ever, the Church will be rebuilt.

This leads me to consider some of the questions people have put on the blog. To answer some of your questions, as I noted before, Mosques and Churches were targetted by using culture as a weapon in the conflict. The war in Kosovo wasn't related to religion; Islam does not play a central role in Kosovo Albanian identity. Neither were Mosques used to store weapons; they were targetted as symbols of the Albanian community.

It also leads me to a final thought; the Kosovo that existed before the war will only be fully restored once the Kosovo Serbs come back to rebuild - and they themselves choose to get involved.

Posted at 11:01 08 May 2008 by Ruairi O'Connell  | 

Outreach II

I was down in the village of Babljak/Bablak*, south of Pristina, on Friday. An encouraging visit.

Bablak's history demonstrates an interesting problem in Kosovo. In 1999, the Albanian villagers were driven out, and many of their homes were destroyed. In 2004, many of the Serbian villagers in the Pristina had their houses burnt. In both cases, it was people from outside the village who caused the problems.

Relations in the village now are much the same as ever . The villagers talk to each other, get on, and have similar concerns, mostly about unemployment. The head of the municipal administration recently visited the village. The K-Serb villagers told me that the visit had been 'super'; they were happy to receive guarantees from him and the local police chief - but were now looking to the local politicians to fulfill their promises.  But both Serbian and Albanian villagers are concerned that 'outsiders' will cause problems in their village. This is a lesson that we have learnt since 2004. In order to promote values of tolerance, and reconcile the communities, we need to focus less on the point of interaction between the communities (i.e. stop having multiethnic round tables) and deal more directly with each community. 

This leads me to some of the points that Rory and Stefan have made - I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

The first is the idea that the Kosovo institutions discriminate against Kosovo Serbs, and that Kosovo Serbs cannot leave their villages 'without the danger of being shot'. Clearly, immediately after the conflict, when NATO entered, life was hard for the Kosovo Serbs. Many left - either by choice, through fear, or by force.  There were revenge killings directed against the Kosovo Serbs who had chosen to stay. Progress was made; but the events of March 2004 were a big setback, when 19 people (Serbs and Albanians) were killed in riots across Kosovo.

However, the situation has improved since. Regarding K-Serb safety, it is true to say that many Kosovo Serbs feel insecure - the outreach programme is meant to help address this. But levels of inter-ethnic violence are low and decreasing. Hundreds, if not thousands, of Kosovo Serbs come to Pristina daily, mostly, but not exclusively, for work. People speak Serbian on the streets. People interact in the villages; I was at a point-to-point horse race south of Pristina last year, where Serbs took part alongside Albanians (I was the only foreigner there - the multi-ethnicity was spontaneous, not prompted by the international community). The story isn't the same across Kosovo; Serbs in North Mitrovica (the divided city in Northern Kosovo - see http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=3650&l=1) do not feel safe to travel to South Mitrovica, and Albanians in the South (excluding those few tolerated in North Mitrovica) are prevented from crossing the river that divides the city by leather-jacketed thugs. But I can't agree that Serbs in Kosovo are in danger of being shot if they leave their homes; things have improved.

Equally, about the Kosovo government. I've frequently said in the past (including in the Kosovo media) that I'm not paid to lobby on behalf of the Kosovo government. They have got things wrong. But how one responds to problems is quite indicative. The riots of March 2004 were appalling. But the Kosovo government's reaction to it, I think, is interesting. Unprompted, they pledged to rebuild, from their own funds (the Kosovo budget even today is less than 1bn euro annually) every destroyed house and church. They have come through - although Church reconstruction is held up by disagreements in the committee designed to oversee the process, almost every house has been rebuilt.

The sense I got from  my current and previous work in the Balkans is that it is almost impossible to talk about the Balkans without people seeing the issue in a zero sum way; if you want to help Albanians, then you must be 'against' the Serbs.

It is clear that the Serbs have suffered too since the start of the 1990s. My Serb friends often tell me that the Serbs were Milosevic's biggest victims. I don't buy this. But I would agree that no-one has done more harm to the Serbs - whether in Serbia or elsewhere - than Milosevic and the people who carried out his policies. In any case, I am clear about what our (UK, Europe, my) long-term goal is - it's to get the whole of the region ready for EU membership. The only way for this to work, is to shed the zero-sum mentality.

* All Kosovo's villages, towns and cities have at least two names - in Serbian and Albanian, and sometimes also in Turkish - similar to Londonderry/Derry in Northern Ireland. The UN convention is to list both in English, putting the name used by the majority population first. We follow this convention, but it can be a bit clunky, especially in speech ("I went to Ferizaj/Urosevac the other day"), so I often mix it up - use one name first, then the other. This works in Kosovo (where everyone knows the various names), but can be confusing for outsiders at first.

Posted at 13:36 12 February 2008 by Ruairi O'Connell  |  Comments[3]