Identity crisis and crime cause concern

Kosovo occupies a singular spot in the EU’s enlargement policy. The European Commission talks to the government in Pristina as if it were any other would-be member of the EU, yet five of the Union’s  27 member states have not accepted Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia in February 2008. For that reason, Kosovo’s prospect of accession is weak and depends on a resolution of its status.

The government of Prime Minister Hashim Thaçi has made progress on a number of reforms, duly noted in next week’s report – but there is doubt that Thaçi’s apparent determination to root out corruption is shared by the entire government.

Several senior officials have been investigated by Eulex, the EU’s judicial and police mission, in the course of this year, and corruption and organised crime are serious problems.

International officials on the ground say that the cases that have come to light are the tip of the iceberg. Kosovar officials say that they prove the government’s determination to combat crime.

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Legacy of war

Kosovo is generally acknowledged, in Brussels and Pristina, to be the weakest of the would-be members in the region, together with Bosnia and Herzegovina – the two main victims of the four wars that Serbia waged against its neighbours in the 1990s. The legacy of war and devastation continues, most tangibly in the control that Belgrade still maintains over the area north of the divided town of Mitrovica, whose Albanian inhabitants have been driven out. There is little prospect of the north being reintegrated.

The Kosovar authorities, meanwhile, are lukewarm about protecting the Serbs who remained in the country after 1999, or about facilitating the return of those few non-Albanians who are seeking to return to their homes.

Eulex is still very much needed, as is the international civilian representative who also serves as EU special envoy – but that does not make the international presence any more popular with Kosovars, who long to live in a normal European country.

Fact File

PEACEKEEPERS

On Friday (29 October), NATO announced that it will halve its 10,000-strong peacekeeping force in Kosovo over the course of next year. NATO has gradually reduced troop numbers since it took control of Kosovo from Serbia in 1999.

Next week’s progress report could hardly come at a less propitious time for Kosovo, as it is in a state of political paralysis following the break-up of Thaçi’s ruling coalition in October.

Early parliamentary elections, which are scheduled to take place on 12 December, have already delayed the start of negotiations with Serbia that the EU views as pivotal.