Russia and the Deadlock over Kosovo

Abstract

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Acknowledgements This article is published with the kind permission of Ifri (the French Institute for International Relations). A version was published in the electronic collection Russie.Nei.Visions and is also available in Russian and French on Ifri's website (www.ifri.org). Notes 1 ichard Holbrooke, ‘Russia's Test In Kosovo’, Washington Post, 13 March 2007, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/12/AR2007031200972.html. 2 Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 31 January 2006, http://www.ng.ru/politics/2006-01-31/2_kosovo.html 3 ee‘Putin:reshen??eproblemKosovoSee ‘Putin: reshenije problem Kosovo dolzhno bit’ universal’nim’ (Kosovo Solution Should Be Universal), in RIA Novosty, 8 June 2007, http://www.rian.ru/world/europa/20070608/66931903.html. 4 ee, for example, interview with General Leonid Ivashov, ‘Kremlevskie Intrigi Vokrug Kosovo’ (Kremlin's Intrigues around Kosovo), published in Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 18 March 2003, http://nvo.ng.ru/history/2003-04-18/1_ivashov.html; report by Research Institute of Social Systems, http://niiss.ru/yugo.shtml. 5 lexei Arbatov, ‘Poslednyi Shans Rossii na Balkanakh’ (Russia's last chance in the Balkans), Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 15 July 1999. 6 .G. Shamgunov, Strany Kaspiiskogo Regiona i Vneshniya Politika Rossiskoi Impperii i Rossiskkoi Federatsii (Urokki Istorrii) (Caspian Sea States and the Policy of Russian Empire and the Russian Federation: Historical Lessons) (St Petersburg: St Petersburg State University, 2005), http://www.http://www.history.pu.ru/biblioth/novhist/mono/vinogr/85.htm. 7 ATO Office of Information and Press, ‘Russia and NATO: Partners in Peacekeeping’, http://www.nato.int/docu/presskit/010219/brocheng.pdf. 8 peech by Russian Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov at the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, ’Peacekeeping Missions of the Russian Federation – Experience, Lessons Learned, Future Perspectives, Including Within the Framework of Cooperation with NATO or the EU’, 25 May 2004, available in Russian at http://www.old.mil.ru/print/releases/2004/06/101109_6856.shtml. 9 or more on NATO–Russian relations in the Balkans see Oksana Antonenko, ‘Russia, NATO and European Security after Kosovo’, Survival, vol. 41, no. 4, Winter 1999, pp. 124–44. 10 See, for example, Alexander Nikitin, ‘Partners in Peacekeeping’, NATO Review, Winter 2004, http://www.nato.int/docu/review/2004/issue4/english/special.html. 11 Igor Maksimichev, Institute of Europe Russian Academy of Sciences, is of the opinion that the position of the West vis-à-vis Kosovo is motivated by the desire to support ’NATO's reputation’. It all boils down to NATO not wanting to embarrass itself and to avoid conceding that the intervention in the Kosovo conflict was in vain and the destruction endured by Serbia was unjustifiable. The idea of Kosovo's independence is therefore underpinned by NATO's desire to prove its rightness. To read the full article, only available in Russian, please see http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=rus&q=34297&cid=16&p=21.06.2007. 12 Many argue that Chernomyrdin's agreement to support pressure on Milosevic came at a time when NATO was under pressure to suspend strikes and admit its defeat. There is still widespread speculation that Russia's agreement was linked to a $400m loan from the IMF in June 1999. In this view Russia's ‘betrayal’ of Serbia is synonymous with its weakness and dependency on the West. See, for example, Russian Journal, 27 March 2006, at http://subscribe.ru/archive/russ.politics/200603/27225409.html. 13 Shamgunov, Strany Kaspiiskogo. 14 Http://serbia.rustrade.org/economics/relations/info. 15 ‘Gazprom and Eni Plan European Pipeline’, International Herald Tribune, 24 June 2007. 16 See the FOM: Public Opinion Foundation opinion poll, available only in Russian at http://bd.fom.ru/report/cat/countries/serbia/d041309. 17 In an interview with journalists on 4 June 2007, Putin said: ‘We will find it difficult to explain to the small peoples of the North Caucasus why, in one part of Europe, some people are given this right, while here in the Caucasus they have no such right. Moreover, for example, some Ossetian people live in Russia, while others live on the territory of Georgia and consider themselves to be an independent state … Why can the Albanians act this way, but Ossetians cannot? It is impossible to explain’; http://www.kremlin.ru/text/appears/2007/06/132365.shtml. 18 Vitali Churkin, ‘Kosovo mozhet stat argumentum dlya separatistov’ (Kosovo Could become an Argument for Separatists), http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id=121016&cid=5. 19 According Vitaly Churkin, the Russian envoy to the UN, Russia is against setting any artificial time limits for the resolution of Kosovo status. See http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=rus&q=34297&cid=16&p=21.06.2007. 20 Susan Manuel, ‘The UN Security Council Visit to Kosovo’, press release, UNMIK/FR/0046/01, 22 June 2001, http://www.unmikonline.org/pub/ features/fr046.html. 21 Interview with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Der Spiegel, ’Everyone Ought to Stop Demonizing Russia’, 7 February 2007, ‘http://www.spiegel.de/international/ spiegel/0,1518,464531,00.html. 22 Http://www.rian.ru/world/europa/20070608/66931903.html. 23 For more information on Russia's policy towards Abkhazia see Oksana Antonenko, ‘Frozen Uncertainty: Russia and the Conflict over Abkhazia’, in Bruno Coppieters and Robert Legvold (eds), Statehood and Security: Georgia after the Rose Revolution (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2005), pp. 205–70. 24 Ahto Lobjakas, ‘Georgia: Solana Fears Kosovo “Precedent” for Abkhazia, South Ossetia’, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 4 October 2006, http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2006/10/8748c1ca-a82c-444b-b2a9-df357251aa54.html. 25 Ibid. 26 See Dmitri Trenin, ‘The Case of Kosovo’, Pro et Contra Journal, no. 5–6 (34), 2006, p.7 27 Http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=rus&q=34262&cid=16&p=20.06.2007. 28 Http://www.izvestia.ru/news/news137856/. 29 Judy Dempsey, ‘G8 Fails to Agree on Kosovo’, International Herald Tribune, 8 June 2007. Additional informationNotes on contributorsOksana AntonenkoOksana Antonenkois IISS Senior Fellow (Russia and Eurasia).