CNA - Public Report (December 1997

On invitation of Schüler Helen Leben, CNA ran a 10 day training event in nonviolent conflict resolution for a group of 16 participants, during a Schüler Helen Leben (SHL) Winter Camp in Szeged/Hungary. The group gathered young (average age 24) participants from all parts of BiH and all major ethnicities, who are in different ways engaged or interested in peace-work in its widest sense. The participants were invited through contacts of CNA and SHL, including recommendations from OSCE, who funded the whole Camp. The training team consisted of N.V. (CNA) and Maja Saric (Wings of Hope) with the support of Claudia Kukla (Pax Christi - Banja Luka), who was responsible for documenting the training.

The training was graded as very successful by the training team and the participants themselves. A 30 page documentation in English/German/Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian offers detailed information about the training programme and the course of the training (available through KURVE Wustrow). This training was the first one conducted since the project began. It energised us and initiated the cooperation of local NGOs both with CNA and also amongst themselves. CNA was invited to run training in Bijeljina and Gorazde. This invitation came from local NGO´s who wish to organise the event. CNA also received further inquiries for advice about applying methods to the daily work of participants (namely inter-entity moderation)

Together with Cvijeta Novakovic (CN) from Tuzla's Centre for the culture of peace and nonviolence (Centar za kulturu mira i nenasilja - CKMN), CNA conducted a training for youth of the Bosniak/Croat divided town in central Bosnia Gornji Vakuf/Uskoplje. This was organised by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and despite the information we received, the group was very young (average 18) and almost strictly Bosniak. In CN of CKMN, CNA found an experienced and reliable partner for the training team, which functioned very well.

Despite many organisational difficulties, the training was implemented and evaluated by trainers and participants as very successful. The depressing and tense situation in the town, and lack of perspective for people in G.V., led the trainers to conclude that there is a great necessity for youth activities there where young people are left on their own to find entertainment on the street. The Youth Club where the training took place was a meeting point for youth who could play music and meet in a safe place. Unfortunately the club was closed one month later due to lack of finances. Documentation of this training is available in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian language.

CNA and CKMN conducted a one and a half day training in nonviolent communication and team work for members of the local Youth Network "Nesto vise" (Something more). Twenty locals took part in the training held in Neum, a tiny town on the Adriatic cost, as preparation for their meeting where concrete future cooperation would be agreed upon. A further 7 international NGO representatives attended the meeting, including an OSCE representative (funders of the seminar). The training team consisted of 3 persons, including Jasmin Redzepovic a participant of the Hungary training who was in charge of
documentation, but also actively took part in the training preparation and evaluation. The documentation of this training is available in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian and English.

CNA has acted as consultant for workshop facilitation, at the request of one participant of the Szeged training. This request was made by a local NGO from Gorazde, the Agency for local democracy initiatives (ALDI). CNA accepted consultancy status in their "Democratic dialogue" initiative, and worked out a programme of 4 weekend trainings in nonviolence, based on information and the needs analysis provided by ALDI.

Through analysis of the present situation, and based on the 3 month report of December ´97, CNA has developed a detailed strategy for future work. This has been done in cooperation with the Project Group in Germany, and with KURVE Wustrow. Upcoming deadlines for grant applications which had to be made in Spring were a large factor in finalising future strategy, at this particular time.

The present project strategy differs from the original project idea that a KURVE volunteer would work within a local NGO that desires to develop it´s own training structures. This idea was based on the vision of a close link with local people and adjusting the project to their needs.

Soon after the beginning of the field work however it became clear that our local partner does not presently have the capacities to engage in nonviolence training. This produced a separation between between the two projects. Since then the CNA project has been registered and an independent office has been provisionally installed in Sarajevo. Furthermore a new strategy has been developed, led by the main goal of multiplication and supporting local people willing to engage in the work.

CNA has established partnerships with other local groups, and also with international NGOs where appropriate. CNA has gained no information about local NGOs (except CKMN) who are engaged in training work. Furthermore there are very few qualified local people in BiH who could presently lead workshops and training in nonviolent conflict resolution (NVCR). This is possibly the main reason why CNA has received so many requests from local and international NGOs. In accordance with this, the two and a half year work plan that CNA has developed revolves much of our work around training local people in NVCR training skills.

The overwhelming amount of requests and inquiries for training implementation and ideas received by CNA cannot be implemented by CNA alone. The above mentioned lack of local people skilled in conducting training and the necessity for training in local language are issues to be addressed. Therefore CNA has set up an agenda which includes:

CNA does not know of any similar programmes in BiH. Perhaps this illustrates the scale of the need.

Schüler Helen Leben (SHL) are a partner willing and capable to give logistical and organisational support for training. SHL's access to OSCE funds also secured two 10 day trainings to be held this year, and the first part of the Training for Trainers. Both 10 day trainings will have a 3 day follow-up meeting.

ALDI
CNA responded positively to a cooperation request of ALDI, Gorazde to implement a programme of nonviolent conflict resolution training, consisting of 4 weekend events. The programme will be implemented this Summer, leaving it open for continuation. The target group for the training is young people from Gorazde, and the main goals of the training are to produce an understanding of peace building and induce openness for dialogue and reconciliation. Gorazde is a small town in Eastern Bosnia, presently with an almost 100% Bosniak population. Many of the refugees are from the surrounding area, including former Bosniak enclaves (former "UN Security zones") Zepa and Srebrenica. The town suffered casualties during the war as a result of a 3 year long siege by the Bosnian Serb army. Hence most of the Gorazdans are highly radicalised and make very fertile ground for nationalist manipulation. The economic situation in the town is very bad, intensified by the fact that all roads to the Federation of BiH run across Serb territory. The necessity for communication across the entity lines is present and obvious here, more than anywhere else in BiH. In the Republika Srpska (RS) surrounding Gorazde are the towns of Foca and Visegrad, well known for their hard line Serb nationalist policies, and also as nests for war criminals.

Zenska Akcija Vidra, Pax Christi, Youth Bridge International
CNA responded to a request from Banja Luka to run a 2 week training for teachers of the Banja Luka - Jajce - Bihac area in Central-West Bosnia, with another 10 day training for youth leaders of the same area. These trainings are scheduled for July and August. The mentioned areas are respectively populated by a majority of Serbs, Croats and Bosniaks.

The organisers of the trainings are a coalition of 3 NGOs, local, German and US American (Zenska Akcija Vidra, Pax Christi, Youth Bridge International). Two training teams will be engaged in the teachers training, who will be divided in two groups of 20 persons each. Apart from CNA a training team from Croatian Anti Ratna Kampanja (ARK) will be engaged.

CKMN - Centar za kulturu mira i nenasilja
All of the above mentioned trainings will be implemented by a training team including Cvijeta Novakovic of CKMN - Tuzla. CKMN is a young NGO with basically no budget and very little experience in NGO management and some more in training practice. The present coalition between CNA and CKMN which has been agreed for the coming year will hopefully allow growth of CKMN. An important experience exchange will take place through this common ground and CKMN will be supported by CNA as much as possible.

Additionally CNA will include at least one less experienced local in each training event. Through this they may learn necessary skills by participating in the training preparation and evaluation, and eventually test her/himself in the work with the support of more experienced colleagues.

Dependent on funding, CNA plans to employ further 2 volunteers from September 98. Detailed talks have been led with two persons who expressed their willingness to join the team and suit the needs of the project.

Cara Gibney comes from Belfast, Northern Ireland, with work experience for the Balkan Peace Team in Croatia, an NGO doing human rights work. Cara is 35 years old, she understands and speaks basic Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian language, has NGO management and training experience.

With Cara joining, CNA gets a qualified person, who may immediately share some of the office duties including: fund raising, documentation, bookkeeping, etc. Apart from that, her main work area will focus on follow-up counselling of groups and individuals with whom CNA is in contact. Her advisory activity will on one hand cover the needs of local NGOs, like NGO management, but also structural issues, like decision making etc. Besides that, it is also possible that supervision may be done for local activists. Through this work, she will pursue networking as a background agenda. Her work will enable Nenad to focus more on training. As an international Cara offers more security to the rest of CNA staff and is able to travel easily through the region.

An initial idea that Cara could focus more intensely on womens groups, has been dropped out, as this would mean a widening of the work field, which could not be covered with CNA resources.

Jasmin is a 25 year old Bosnian, who has some training experience as participant. He wants to receive education as a trainer in nonviolent conflict resolution. He has very little experience in the NGO sector. He will be included into the team on equal basis and brought into all aspects of work with the support of the other staff. Although his main field of interest lays in training work, he will learn about NGO management and get introduced to numerous CNA contacts. Jasmin is an additional and direct investment into multiplication, the main goal of the CNA project.

Due to his origin, Jasmin will most likely have easier communication with the local authorities of the Federation BiH, which is opposite to the present staff member. Jasmin speaks excellent German, very good Italian and basic English.

The project expansion is a reaction to the work overload CNA faced after a very short period of time. The main question is how CNA will transfer the work onto locals. At the moment there are two possible scenarios for CNA development, based on a time frame of three years (end of the project in August 2000). In September 1999, two years from the start of the project a
final transfer strategy will need to be set up.

There are two possible developments:
1 An establishment of a local organisation CNA staffed solely by locals.
2 Transfer of work carried out by CNA to the cooperation partners
(other NGOs with whom CNA will work together in the coming two years).

The establishment of a local CNA depends on the availability of local people capable and willing to continue the work. In the coming 18 months CNA will work on the training and support of local trainers. The participants of this training may eventually find their place in a future organisation, focusing on training work, either in a separate organisation or incorporated in the work of other NGOs. The most important thing is that the work is being done, not necessarily that a local group named CNA exists.

Inclusion of locals into CNA at this stage influences CNA and secures the sharing of knowledge about NGO management. Training and advisory work takes more time.

Hardly any of the participants who apply to participate in training in nonviolent conflict resolution can relate to the notion of nonviolence or identify themselves with it. Different to trainings in the "West", NGO activists in BiH are used to getting invited to different kinds of seminars and meetings which are organised and paid for by international GOs and NGOs. Very often participants attend simply to get some time out and maybe relax in the atmosphere of hotels they could never afford to visit otherwise.

In the past, seminars and meetings have been often held outside the country because of the need to offer neutral ground for multi- ethnic groups. Another important reason for joining in is simply to meet people and also an interest and curiosity about the announced themes. As training in nonviolence demands a high degree of active participation from the trainees, they are often surprised by the invitation/expectation to contribute actively in the course of the training. This situation means we must put effort into ensuring that really interested people get the chance to join the training. Participation fees are difficult to introduce as many people could not afford even symbolic expenses of 20-30 DM.

CNA has concluded that holding training events outside the country is no longer necessary as the security situation in view of travel to different entities has improved and carries little risk, particularly if internationals are present. Unfortunately there are no modest seminar houses in BiH, where training events can be held. This means that using hotel accommodation is presently unavoidable. CNA knows of efforts to establish seminar-houses in the near future which would be ideal for training and correcting the local perception that expensive accommodation is a normal thing for NGOs. Hence the wrong idea is being established that NGOs represent "big business".

Another problem is the inflexibility of large NGOs and GOs who appear as funders. Their budget lines and plans are made on a very long term basis, which minimises the space for local NGO´s to adjust plans when necessary because this would mean fighting the decision through a large hierarchy. CNA experienced such a situation while negotiating with one large GO about the funding of a training programme. Despite the understanding of the responsible person in the GO, a decision to implement training within BiH could not be made, because the GO foresaw seminars outside the country. A compromise was found to run one training outside and two inside the country. It was a difficult decision to meet for CNA to make, as the training outside the country will cost twice the price of those held within BiH, but this was the most we could get out of the negotiation. CNA will push that the training takes place in a very modest place and not in an expensive first class hotel.

This situation illustrates the picture that is painted in BiH that a lot of money is wasted because there is no flexibility among large funders to adapt to changes and reflect on the possible negative impact that "money wasting" has. Indeed many local activists take it for granted that NGOs have the right to demand only first class accommodation and transport for their activities. In view of the fact that international funders will pull out of BiH in 2-3 years, local NGOs will be left with an infrastructure that cannot stand up on it´s own.

"Nonviolence equals passivity", is the most common idea of people in BiH. CNA avoids bringing in theories and "ideology" about nonviolence, and focuses instead on letting people find out what possibilities of nonviolent action are possible for them in their environment. Nonviolent communication as a theme is an easy step towards establishing some sort of understanding with participants on what the training can be useful for. Tolerance and better understanding of differences are issues of major importance in BiH. Some of the short trainings focus directly on communication and taking responsibility, leaving other aspects aside.

What role do trainings in nonviolence play in the present political system in BiH?
Hierarchical structures which impose passivity on people to follow orders, and leave them no chance to actively create within their work, is also present in the majority of NGOs in BiH. NGOs are the social element which should give a decisive influence on the creation of civil society and democratic structures in BiH. But they are instead just a mirror image of the party political scene, even if their causes differ from the nationalist, segregational ones. There is no quick solution for Bosnia Herzegovina, it will take years and years and civil society will not suddenly appear the moment political opposition, wins the elections. It is the illusion of the international community that new leaders mean civil society. Civil society can be built only from the basis - the citizens. It cannot be imposed from above.

Training in nonviolence plays no direct part in the political game in BiH and the territory of former Yugoslavia. The major target groups are NGO activists who can act as multipliers, and they can only start from themselves, as each citizen in BiH needs to take responsibility and recognise the power he/she can have in the process of social change. Citizens need to demand the responsibility of political leaders, they need to impose the understanding that political leaders are their servants, and not the other way round. Nonviolent action as a response to the suppression of freedoms and political abuse should be an answer and a means to reach peace. But this path has to be stepped by citizens of BiH themselves.

It is a long way ahead, but does that mean that it is not worth the effort? Is there a better alternative? As long as people keep on measuring their own interests through the lens of national interests there will be no civil society. The moment they recognise their interests beyond "national issues", their present leaders will disappear from the political stage and dive out at the economic stage with all the wealth and resources they gathered through their governing period.

An NGO in BiH is not automatically an NGO Political parties recognised a long time ago that the international community directs their financial aid into physical and social reconstruction through NGOs, and they reacted quickly by establishing their own "non-governmental" Organisations. Quite a few NGOs stand for radical nationalist policy in line with the government´s, which makes the situation very complex and demands a high level of knowledge by any international organisation who wishes to "help Bosnia". Of course some do have this knowledge and others don't. That is why it often happens that alot of money flows into causes which are opposed to the initial proposal. Like opposition parties that ally with the ruling party immediately after the elections, some NGOs are nothing more than financial sources for political activities.

The expected enforced return of refugees from Germany and Switzerland has the potential of an outbreak of social unrest and humanitarian disaster, as there are no housing capacities available. This particularly effects the Federation of BiH which is under the control of the Bosniak dominated Army of BiH. Most of the refugees will be sent to the Federation because their original home is in Republika Srpska (RS) which is still closed for Bosniak refugees. The government in Sarajevo (in the Federation of BiH) seems to accept this enforced return, probably speculating that it will pressurise the government of RS. At the same time however, because RS has a new more liberal government, it is presently receiving most of the international financial aid that has been denied to them over the past 6 years. The Federation of BiH is certainly very unhappy with this new policy of the international funders, as they feel they hold the right to receive all of the aid. This is due to their perception of them being the only victim during the war.

On the other hand, the new government in RS seems to be gaining control over the East territories of RS, which have so far been controlled by their political opponents, the nationalist hard line SDS Party. Milorad Dodik, the new prime minister of RS, has a thin majority in the parliament. This was secured through the votes of Bosniak members of the parliament, which makes his position very unstable. In particular the Brcko dispute (a city which is presently governed by RS) is an issue that could topple him. A final decision (rescheduled twice) should be made by an international commission set up to deal with the issue.

The Federation of BiH, constituted by Bosniaks and Croats, is still nonexistent. It was created under US pressure in 1994 by the Washington agreement after the Croat/Bosniak war. Joint police forces function only in a few areas in central Bosnia, refugee return is particularly slow and military forces are still clearly divided. However a common "Command" has been set up to make both armies eligible to receive US military aid. US policy still sees armament as the best precautionary measure against war. This policy may possibly be fatal, in view of the high tensions between rival national parties. The opposition in the Federation aims at NATO membership, seeing it as the only possible security guarantee for the country, surrounded by Serbia and Croatia and governed by nationalistic, Bosniak hostile governments.

The upcoming general elections in Autumn may weaken the present positions of the SDA, the ruling Bosniak party. But they can hardly endanger President Izetbegovic who is still seen as the most trustworthy authority. The unification attempt of two main opposition parties in the Federation, the SDP and UBSD (both social-democrat), initiated by the UN Office of High Representative and EC, failed due to animosities between the respective party leaders. The ruling coalition in RS will most likely strengthen its position as they have managed to get millions of dollars for the salaries of workers and clerks that were delayed for months. The hard line nationalist Croatian ruling party, the HDZ, will keep its positions in areas controlled by HVO (Bosnian Croat army) in BiH, as they basically have no opposition except for the fascist HSP.

Nenad Vukosavljevic
For Centar za nenasilnu akciju
the Project office of KURVE Wustrow

Aktionsgemeinschaft Dienst für den Frieden - AGDF
Deutsche Friedensgesellschaft Vereinigte Kriegsgegner - DFG VK Bielefeld
Internationale Ärzte zur Verhütung des Atomkrieges - IPPNW Deutschland
Menschenrechtsreferat des Diakonischen Werkes
Peace Brigades International - PBI Deutscher Zweig
Quaker Peace and Service
Stiftung Leben und Umwelt
CNA Support group Hamburg
Towae Stiftung

CNA will very much welcome feedback, suggestions, questions and criticism
concerning this report and our general work.
Your thinking along, helps us!
Thank you.