The Kosovo precedent and the rhetorical deployment of former Yugoslav analogies in the cases of Abkhazia and South Ossetia

Abstract

During the August 2008 war in South Ossetia and in the subsequent Russian recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states, Russian authorities repeatedly made explicit references to the ‘Kosovo precedent’ and consciously mimicked the rhetoric of NATO during the 1999 Kosovo war. This article explores precisely how Kosovo was deployed rhetorically in Russian foreign policy in the South Ossetian and Abkhaz cases, as well as the reception of this and other ex‐Yugoslav analogies in Serbia. The article points to inconsistencies in both Russian and Western foreign policy and concludes that, notwithstanding numerous similarities in the three cases, Russia’s use of the Kosovo precedent was coldly instrumental.