Socio-political context 2015

| CNA |
september 2014 - september 2015
11/23/2015
23. November 2015

Regional context: Yugoslavia, 20 Years Older, Still Dead

Bosnia-Herzegovina: Three Paths from Dayton

Croatia: The Postman Knows Them

Kosovo: Rumelia, a story in transition

Macedonia: Së bashku. Заедно

Serbia: Liberté, égalité, fraternité, 2015


 

Regional context: Yugoslavia, 20 Years Older, Still Dead

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A little more than 20 years ago, I decided to dedicate myself to peacebuilding in my former homeland of Yugoslavia. Twenty years ago, the very word “Yugoslavia” was almost universally despised in most parts of this former country. Today, it has found its place in history and is no longer perceived as a threat by most people.

If at that time, when I started working on peacebuilding, someone had offered me the current situation as the peace that would come after 20 years of work, I think I would have respectfully declined. This does not mean that I am sorry for choosing the path that I have taken, because at the time I thought the goal before us was more or less clear: freedom, peace, trust, respect. The situation we are currently living reminds me in many ways of the hurt felt because of the general injustice perpetrated against masses of people at the time of the ending of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia, and on the eve of the outbreak of war in Kosovo (because that war had actually begun much earlier and only escalated in 1998 and finally broke out in 1999). There is a lot more freedom and less fear from direct violence, but it seems to me that by winning freedoms and reducing fears, the vacuum they left was filled with hypocrisy and a refined, concealed form of racism and hatred.

When in 2000, we did a pilot training in English that brought together, in addition to the countries of ex-Yugoslavia, people from Albania, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary, we were somewhat taken aback by the depth of prejudice and historical interpretations we heard from our neighbours (non-ex-YU). I admit, we also saw a silver lining, namely, that despite the war, we did not come out as the worst. It seemed to me that the experience of coexistence from the past, even despite the subsequent war, equipped us with sufficient understanding of others to build a future, to build peace. The river of people from Syria and Afghanistan that started flowing through the Balkans in the past few months made me think of that experience from 2000 more than once. I kept wondering why these people did not go from Turkey  through Bulgaria, which was a shorter journey? Testimony of refugees who did take that journey speak of their inhuman treatment by authorities of this EU member state (since 2007). At the training back in 2000, when asked about the exodus of hundreds of thousands of Bulgarian Turks, a participant, a historian, said they chose to leave. At the time, behind the iron curtain, no one called it ethnic cleansing. The vilification of the Hungarian minority in Romania and a similar approach vice versa completed the picture that remained in my mind since that encounter.

The attitude towards refugees is determined to a large extent by the attitude of the government, that much I understand. Will the government kindle fears and xenophobia or will it appeal to the humanity of the public?

How is it possible that a country such as Serbia is so much more humane and civilised than established EU member states? After a few months of inaction, someone in the government realised it would not cost them much, and that they could significantly improve their reputation by acting this way, so they chose the right path. I have no illusions that this attitude would have been the same had the refugees intended to remain permanently in Serbia. And I have no illusions either that the attitude towards, for instance, Albanians, will become full of benevolence overnight. Still, I am glad it was so. And I am glad that people from Croatia, from Bosnia and Herzegovina, people from inner Serbia (Sandžak, for instance) also delivered aid to the refugees at the Belgrade bus station, that we found each other, at least for a moment, gathered around the task of human solidarity. This is something we can be proud of.

Did I stray too far in my thought from the achievements of peace advocacy in the past 20 years?

There is no result we can achieve to know that we have succeeded, that our efforts to reconcile societies have come to an end. Our societies need to change, we need to effect change where we can instead of throwing blame across the fence. We should find ways to be better, not just richer, but to live without fear or hatred.

I still refuse to accept the offer of calling this peace.

I will be travelling to Kosovo in two weeks, and I am slightly worried about moving through Kosovo with Belgrade licence plates, that is our reality. That is how far we’ve come after 16 years of “peace”.

The day after tomorrow, I will be going to Bosnia, and I don’t have the same kind of concern, but I do worry about friends and colleagues planning on marking unmarked sites of suffering there with adhesive signs. That’s how far we’ve come after 20 years.

Should we trust that everything would be all right as we get closer to joining the EU? We, people from BiH, Serbia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Albania? Certainly not. Should we instead despair? Certainly not.

There are good, positive, clever people on all sides determined to make this place a better place to live. That much is certain.

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A look back at the past year in the intertwined regional context

The Kosovo Wave

At the end of 2014 and beginning of 2015, the top news item was the river of refugees from Kosovo going through Serbia and Hungary and arriving in Germany to seek asylum, which they had no chance of getting since they were not being persecuted by a repressive regime. Still, feeling persecuted by the hopelessness of the situation in which they were forced to live and the absence of any indication of improvement, people tried to change this by a desperate move. Whole families with small children would sell off all they owned and set out on the uncertain journey to Western Europe. According to Kosovo government estimates, from the summer of 2014 to the summer of 2015, 120 000 people had emigrated. Kosovo is evidently not progressing as many had expected: corruption, poverty, poor state administration, an authoritarian style of governance and unmasked nationalism make for an explosive combination. With the fostered myth about a pure, justified and liberation war against the Serb oppressor, and the brisk diplomatic action against Kosovo’s membership in international institutions by the government of Serbia, it is logical to expect a less than favourable attitude towards the Serb minority. Kosovo authorities exhibited strong resistance to implementing the obligation to establish a court to punish the crimes committed by the OVK, but it was broken under maximum pressure exerted by Western allies, i.e. the US and the EU. Resistance to implementing the obligation to form the Community of Serb Municipalities in Kosovo, as part of the deal with Belgrade on numerous contentious issues, was also strong and the government found itself facing mounting pressure from the opposition. The political situation is unstable because the government had to undertake unpopular steps. The future remains uncertain regarding these two issues that could potentially open the perspective of a lasting agreement with Serbia, i.e. some form of peace agreement, which has thus far been absent because Serbia still officially considers Kosovo part of its territory, although it has had no jurisdiction over it in the past 16 years.

The Syrian Test

Less than half a year after the wave of Kosovo refugees, small groups of Syrian refugees that could be seen around the bus station in Belgrade swelled, turning the nearby parks into temporary refugee camps. Instead of groups of young men seen in the past months, whole families were now arriving with small children, old and sick people. For months the authorities in Serbia did not react, and it was only groups of citizens that self-organised to start providing assistance to refugees in transit. In the meantime, Hungarian authorities blocked the path of the refugees by building a wall on the Serbian border and treating them brutally, thereby inciting the anger and disgust of decent folks around the world.

With the Hungarian blockade of its border with Serbia, the inevitable happened and the column of people turned towards Croatia as the only alternative route to Western Europe. After a few days of receiving people, the Croatian authorities concluded that there were too many refugees and that Serbia must send them towards Hungary (to the closed border!?)  or towards Romania (to Eastern Europe). Since this did not happen (and you needn’t be a rocket scientist to see it would not happen), in retaliation against Serbia, the Croatian government closed the border for cargo traffic from Serbia, and a few days later, Serbia did the same for Croatian goods and cargo traffic from Croatia. This escalating situation culminated when citizens of Serbia and vehicles from Serbia were prevented from crossing into Croatia. A few hours later, the ban was reduced to just the vehicles. Throughout all this, the wave of refugees that was allegedly the root cause, continued just as before.

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Hit Thy Neighbour

The difficult to understand escalation of animosity between Serbia and Croatia was caused by irresponsible and inappropriate behaviour mainly by the Croatian premier, but also by individuals from the Serbian government whose repertoires included racist jokes, disparaging remarks, i.e. the language and overall conduct characteristic of (political) thugs. The evident lack of political culture, the exploitation of the basest feelings and hatred, that some have explained by the proximity of the upcoming elections in Croatia (with the hatred of Serbs apparently contributing to better ratings), the front pages of newspapers in Serbia talking about starting a war, calling the Croatian premier an idiot[1], all of these led to rising fear among ordinary people.

If it seems logical from the perspective of Western Europe that there are serious shortcomings in the democratic culture of Serbia, a candidate country for EU membership, that much like Turkey in the past many years, is waiting to open membership negotiations, the question that remains is: well, what about Croatia, then.

“European” incentives to boost fascism

Croatia has been an EU member state for over 2 years already. Ever since, the presence of hatred and many barbs directed primarily against Serbs, both those that make up a minority in Croatia and those living in neighbouring countries, have become much more visible. The visibility was achieved through the passivity and cowardice of the authorities to stand up to statements which have no place in a democracy. What is more, it could be said that flirting with the extreme right, which honours the legacy of the Ustasha ideology from World War II, has become common practice, and that a step further has been made into supporting such running riot.

It is thus possible that the official celebration of Victory Day on 5 August includes a concert by Thompson (known for his pro-Ustasha sentiments), that the masses chant “Kill the Serb”, and that a reporter standing up to this becomes news. Breaking and removing signs in the Serbian language in those part of Croatia where there are enough Serbs to warrant the exercise of this constitutional right has become commonplace, and in the past year, a further step was made when the majority in the regional assembly proclaimed this constitutionally guaranteed right inapplicable in its territory. The proliferation of hatred in Croatia is a direct consequence of the past war, which is glorified as a holy war and which leaves no room for remembrance or empathy with Croatian citizens of Serb nationality, masses of whom were expelled, thus permanently changing the ethnic make-up of large parts of Croatia. None of this was a point of discussion when Croatia was joining the EU, it was simply glossed over, and what we see now is the true sad state of a society driven mad by war, fear, hatred, advocating force as a solution, a society numb to the suffering of others.

What should be the consequence, apart from the obvious loss of respect and influence of Croatia within the EU, is learning a lesson for the future. Serbia also harbours fascist ideologies, insulting victims from other groups, vilification and hatred of minority communities and neighbouring peoples. A declarative distances is not sufficient, what is needed is respecting laws protecting agreed social values. If at a moment of crisis, it is possible to turn a blind eye to hate speech in the media (directed at Croatia and Croats), if it is possible to persist in tolerating hate speech against Albanians, even more detested by the Serbian public, then that speaks volumes about the (un)democratic culture of Serbia.

“After me, the flood”

The bridges of cooperation and trust, painstakingly constructed since the time of war until today by rare peace groups who were for the first time joined by state actors in the guise of the previous presidents of Croatia and Serbia, Josipović and Tadić, are something that their successors neither understand nor need. Blind self-love, misconceptions about one’s own grandeur and the insignificance of neighbours, threats of force, these are the political mannerisms of the 1990s which brought us war, mass killings, ethnic cleansing, and the forceful relocation of vast numbers of people. These are the self-same mannerisms exhibited in this situation by the Croatian premier Milanović, exhibited on many occasions by certain ministers of the Serbian government and its president, and at times even its premier, and it is beyond doubt that they play into the hands of those who started and maintained the war in the 1990s. And truth be told, it should be noted that numerous current Serbian officials built their careers precisely during those times. But they are not surprising, some of them have learned much and even changed a few things, some haven’t. What is shocking is that the new generation of politicians in Croatia and Serbia exhibits the same propensity for irrational, selfish and arrogant behaviour that would be shameful in most societies.

The war is over, go home!

A serious peace action against the militaristic marking of “Victory Day” in Croatia was conducted by putting signs on posters advertising the army parade saying “The war is over, go home”. The Centre for Peace Studies (CMS) implemented this action and made it visible that there is resistance towards the spirit of militarism and triumphalism fostered in Croatia with great care and under threat of force since the war until today. News of the action was carried by numerous media in Serbia, which significantly contributed to dispelling the image of “All Croats being the same”. Julija Kranjec from the Centre for Peace Studies explained the action as follows:

“The Centre for Peace Studies has issued public statements on a number of occasions to remind the Government and the President that it is absolutely unacceptable and unnecessary to have the army march in the streets of a society that recently went through the horrors of war. Croatian society does not need militarisation, it needs dealing with the past and peacebuilding. It is unacceptable to commemorate in this way Operation Storm, where hundreds of people lost their lives, were deported, disappeared…”[2]

Bravo for CMS!

Whose terror is this?

Last year was also eventful in Macedonia where in the spring, the opposition started disclosing intercepted conversations between government officials that uncover corruption and abuse of authority on a shocking scale. Still, the government stood firm for months and kept dallying with resignations, accusing the opposition of unauthorised data gathering, without denying the content of the intercepted conversations. The political clientelism present in Macedonia naturally sought to preserve the status quo, but the daily protests by citizens exerted tremendous pressure and the regime gave way, new elections were announced, as well as an interim government. An important detail of the process of competing pressures was the large-scale armed incident that occurred at the beginning of May in Kumanovo, a town on the border with Kosovo and Serbia, where 22 people were killed and 37 were wounded, and where the government accused terrorist groups from Kosovo for the attack and clashes with the police. Citizens quickly saw through this attempt to divert public attention to fear of inter-ethnic conflict and were soon convinced that the incident was most likely staged by the government. The Gordian knot of a dispute with Greece over the name of the country has remained, and the Macedonian government has devoted its mandate to deepening the dispute by producing “Macedonian history” complete with Hellenic cultural heritage.

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The Weight of Srebrenica

The assembly entitled “Seven Thousand” organised by a citizens’ group that wanted to symbolically commemorate the Srebrenica genocide by having a large number of people (up to 7000) lie down in front of the parliament, was banned in Belgrade in July.

Only a day later, the Serbian premier, with the baggage of a transformed former member of a fascist ideology, attended the commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide. This gesture of good will, excellently received by the families of victims and the mayor of Srebrenica, was overshadowed in the media by the attack against him that almost turned into a lynch. Instead of a gesture of reconciliation, in Serbia, many, and especially the aggressive and provocative minister in the Serbian Government, Vulin, exaggerated and talked about an assassination attempt and a conspiracy. Still, mostly due to the calm reaction of premier Vučić himself, efforts were made to demonstrate the political will for cooperation and commitment to the process of reconciliation. Unfortunately, within BiH, the conflict of the President of Republika Srpska, Dodik, who rules autocratically and persists in provoking discord and spreading distrust and fear, continues unabated. The Bosnian knot thus remains unresolved, and instead of seeking desperately needed constructive ways to overcome these problems, the old matrices of generalisation, hatred and fear remain intact.

Non-interference

At the end of August 2015 in Vienna, an agreement was signed between Albania, BiH, Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia and Serbia, whereby they committed to refrain from interfering with each other’s EU accession paths. This is an important agreement and it can pre-empt the kind of obstruction put up by Greece with respect to Macedonia, or the kind that will almost certainly be put up by Croatia with respect to Serbia. The invitation to two neighbouring EU countries (meaning Croatia and Greece) to join the agreement has as yet received no response.

Romeo and Juliet in Albanian/Serbian

Directed by Miki Manojlović, a two-language Romeo and Juliet with both Serbian and Albanian actors and actresses was staged in Belgrade and Prishtina. With police presence, the play was put on at the National Theatre, and it sent an important signal to the stereotype-laden public in both societies that cooperation is not only possible but direly needed, and furthermore, that cooperation is the natural state of normality, and not the other way around. As limited as the reach and impact of a theatre play may be, Serbia and Kosovo are in particularly desperate need of good will gestures, cooperation, dialogue. After the deluge of hatred that came to the surface during and after the suspended football match in Belgrade between Albania and Serbia, every little step leading to reigning in that hatred matters.

Nenad Vukosavljević

 

[1] Without going into the accuracy of the statements, it should be noted that such an insulting tone constitutes hate speech and is unacceptable for the media. Still, in the overall climate of hatred, the authorities in Serbia had no intention of sanctioning such behaviour.

[2] As quoted on Index.hr http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/rat-je-gotov-puhovski-preskupo-placamo-milanovicevo-bjezanje-od-zvizduka-u-kninu/833958.aspx


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Bosnia-Herzegovina: Three Paths from Dayton

One of the perspectives from which we can view the social context in BiH is the perspective of the international community. For the international community, the “project” called Bosnia and Herzegovina is a relative success story, where the Dayton Agreement stopped a brutal war, similar to what is currently going in in the Middle East.

We should bear in mind the continuity of the presence of international institutions in the form of the OHR[1], PIC[2], foreign judges at the Court of BIH, EUFOR[3], etc. , which symbolise a kind of “training wheels” for what is called the state of BiH. And it is interesting that no one is able to estimate whether that state could maintain a balance without the “training wheels”. In that sense, we could say that the political organisation of BiH, being a type of long-term protectorate, still shows no sign of independent action. Very often, the Office of the OHR, EU institutions and embassies of influential countries intervene, launch initiatives and make judgements about fundamental issues and problems of this society. And the lack of confidence in local political leaders, that they could independently govern such a complex state apparatus, is quite understandable given the various kinds of problems they create or fail to resolve. We should also bear in mind the intermittent unpredictability of political action, from lovely pandering humane calls for co-existence and harmony in the morning to blatant chauvinism sometime in the afternoon.

This process of taking on full sovereignty is referred to in international political circles as transitioning from the Dayton to the Brussels stage of the BiH state.

For most of the local population, the agony of economic and general instability continues, but in contrast to last year’s rebellion in the streets of cities, we are again seeing only the directly endangered workers of rundown state enterprises going on strike.

Generally speaking, the expected economic development is not forthcoming, and neither are essential social changes, while Constitutional reforms, a key problem of the state according to many, suffer from a lack of political will and capacity.

Inter-national contention and conflict over political solutions, stemming from diverse attitudes towards the past and future of this country, are almost a daily occurrence in the public sphere. There are, however, sporadic attempts of constructive agreement, encouraged by the international community, such as the Prud Agreement or the most recent German-British initiative, but these have not yielded results. Our politicians like to say that difficult questions we do not agree on should be “frozen”, and processes of economic development and EU integration should be initiated. However, already in the first attempt, when they endeavour to establish a government, the whole system is “frozen”.

A series of events in the past year, related to the divergent attitudes and sentiments about the wartime past, shows how the demarcation lines are still sharply drawn.

We had parliamentary elections in 2014. The long process of establishing the government has come to be expected. We again have the situation that the governments formed at the state and at the entity level are not comprised of the same parties, which makes it more difficult to adopt and implement decisions. For example, parties in power at the entity or cantonal level sometimes choose to boycott programmes and decisions form higher levels of government where they are the opposition.

A few months ago, a coalition partner withdrew from the Federal government, and they are now in search of a new partner. We are again left without a stable government and a host of necessary processes has been put on hold, but this does not seem to concern anyone too much. It seems that it is only important to satisfy the national “quotas”, to ensure the next tranche from the IMF and adopt the numerous budgets dependent on IMF loans.

The Government of Republika Srpska has announced its plans to organise a referendum that may have political impact on justice reform. It contains a suggestive question for citizens of RS:  “Do you support the unconstitutional and unauthorised imposition of laws by the High Representative of the international community in BiH, especially the imposed laws on the Court and Prosecutor’s Office of BiH and the applicability of their decisions in the territory of Republika Srpska?”

The proposal has already been forwarded into system procedure, and after being vetoed by the Bosniaks in the Council of Peoples of RS, the Constitutional Court approved its implementation, but under pressure from OHR, the whole endeavour was pushed back into the framework of the so-called systemic dialogue on the BiH justice system, which is currently under way and organised by the OSCE. The Government of Republika Srpska has also announced its plans for a second referendum:  a referendum on secession, scheduled for 2017, if there are no changes to the relations within BiH and the attitude of the international community towards RS whose integrity is constantly under threat. The media have relatively ignored this referendum, considering it politicking and spinning, while the opposition in RS practically ridiculed it.

Meanwhile, in real life, there was an attack on a police station in Zvornik in April, where police officer Dragan Đurić was killed and two other police officers were wounded. The attacker, Nerdin Ibrić, was also killed. He was born in 1991 and his father was killed in Zvornik in 1992. It is sad, tragic and symbolic that the father of the killed police officer was also killed in the war.

As for the motivation behind the attack, it was suspected that Ibrić had been indoctrinated by members of an Islamist group, some of whom were arrested on suspicion of inciting the attack. Some believed that part of the motivation for the attack was a desire to avenge the death of his father.

It is important to mention the example of very reasonable action by the municipal mayor, Zoran Stevanović, who tried to disperse the tension after the attack and encouraged Bosniaks to return to their jobs because they had begun to fear for their safety on account of potential acts of vengeance.

The attack was characterised as an act of terrorism, or rather as an attack against state institutions. Subsequently, the Republika Srpska police arrested and then released dozens of Bosniaks under suspicion that they were connected to terrorist organisations.

The next cold shower came in July this year during the commemoration of 20 years since the genocide in Srebrenica. The event was attended by a large number of officials from the region and the world. Unfortunately, it will be remembered for the attack against the Serbian premier, Aleksandar Vučić, who had come to pay his respects to the victims. The situation almost turned into a lynching when a crowd of peoples started hurling stones, and the security grappled to get the premier into a car and literally escape from Potočari. Failures in the organisation and security for the commemoration were evident and proceedings against those responsible, as well as the ringleaders of the attack are under way. One of the possible motives for the attack is Vučić’s role in the war, that is, his political activities in the war and postwar period that were based on radical Serb nationalism from which he did not clearly distance himself during his term as premier. However, this attack undermined the benefit that Vučić’s attendance and the welcome he received from the Mothers of Srebrenica could have contributed to reconciliation. Namely, it is symbolically significant when a man who supported the ideology that indirectly led to the genocide comes to pay his respects to the victims. His personal motives cannot and should not be at issue. It is comforting that afterwards, political representatives of the Bosniaks, as well as individual associations of people from Srebrenica and the organisers of the commemoration sent an apology to the Serbian premier for the attack.

The UN Security Council not adopting the resolution on the Srebrenica Genocide because of Russia’s veto, preceded by intensive lobbying by Serbia and Republika Srpska, certainly contributed to the tense atmosphere.

This was also around the time that Naser Orić was arrested in Switzerland on an Interpol warrant based on an indictment by Serbia for war crimes committed against Serbs in the vicinity of Srebrenica. Orić, the wartime commander of the Army of BiH in Srebrenica, was extradited to judicial authorities of Bosnia and Herzegovina, but the arrest also contributed to tensions surrounding the commemoration. There was even talk of cancelling the commemoration if Orić were to be extradited to Serbia. This case has caused a fair amount of controversy given that there are suspicions that Orić’s units committed war crimes against the Serb population, while at the same time, for many Bosniaks, he is a war hero acquitted by the ICTY. An indictment was raised against Orić before the Court of BiH, so there will probably be many more discussions about this case. The whole series of events surrounding the commemoration in Srebrenica, as well as the attack in Zvornik, clearly show that dealing with the past and working for reconciliation are still vital for the region. Under current circumstances, parts of the public easily slip back into their positions and conflicts from the war period and that tells us that we have our work cut out for us to build a more peaceful future in the region. It is important that a lot of people are aware of this and that there were many calming reactions, both among ordinary people, municipal mayors, and even among political leaders who made an effort to address the public with messages of reconciliation. It would be good if we could draw lessons from this and similar cases so as to initiate dialogue instead of unconditionally supporting “our” heroes and seeking justice only for “our” victims.

The visit of Pope Francis to Sarajevo in June 2015 was a pleasant and important event. It was a pleasure to see and hear this man who has been sending different messages to the world than what we are used to hearing from religious leaders. From criticism of materialism and neo-liberal capitalism and advocating for the poor, the weak and vulnerable to openly calling for an end to hatred because of differences and all types of wars and violence. For the people of BiH, the Pope had similar messages, reminding us that the difficult times are past and that peacebuilding is our way ahead. It was important to hear the Pope speak clearly about the path to peace, which we aim to stay on in our work.

I would like to emphasise a quote from the Pope’s speech that illustrates the essence of his message:  “In this country, peace and harmony among Croats, Serbs and Bosniaks, and the incentives fostering that harmony as of late, as well as the heartfelt fraternal relations between Muslims, Jews and Christians have a significance that far surpasses the borders of Bosnia and Herzegovina… We should all recognise our fundamental human values in order to withstand the barbarity of those who would use every difference as an opportunity for violence. In the name of these values, we can and must cooperate, build and nurture dialogue, forgive and grow with them.”

Unfortunately, in the past period, there were a number of attacks against returnees and religious buildings in Livno, Sarajevo, Tomislavgrad. In Bosnian crime and accident reports, cases related to inter-ethnic violence are still quite frequent. When a returnee in Prijedor was recently killed, and when it later came to light that he was killed in a criminal showdown, many said:  “It’s good that it wasn’t ethnically motivated.” And they are right, at least when it comes to Bosnia.

In peaceful Bosnia, there is progress, both visible and invisible. People are changing, some for the better, some for the worse, transition is under way and there is a lot of construction work going on, but always with a pinch of gunpowder in the mortar.

Adnan Hasanbegović

 

[1] OHR – Office of High Representative

[2] PIC – Peace Implementation Council. PIC is made up of 55 countries and organisations that provide support to the peace process in various ways – by ensuring financial resources, by contributing troops to EUFOR, or by directly carrying out operations in Bosnia and Herzegovina. PIC gives policy guidelines to the High Representative.

[3]  EUFOR – NATO military operation in BiH, launched on 2 December  2004 and since then contributing to maintaining a secure and stable environment in BiH.


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Croatia: The Postman Knows Them

Two decades after the end of the war Croatian society is still radicalised and deeply divided. Political circumstances are the dominant factors determining everyday life. From September 2014 to September 2015, life was measured by election rounds. One gets the impression that almost every action of the government and the opposition is always premeditated by a good outcome on election night. Both the so-called left and right similarly assessed that insisting on nationalist rhetoric, pandering or at the least refraining from standing up to the church and veterans would win them votes. Judging by the conduct of most political structures, the average voter in Croatia is primarily interested in the final outcome of the past, especially from the Second World War to date, and much less in maintaining at least a minimum of human dignity.

Once the public had been warmed up by the violent anti-Cyrillic campaign, in 2015 it truly became the arena of a merciless political battle in which even entirely marginal individuals got the best spots, either on national television or the presidential inauguration. Broadcasting reports where professed fascists such as Dražen Keleminac, president of the Autochthonous Croatian Party of Rights, are given the opportunity to threaten and incite violence and intolerance towards members of the Serb minority have become commonplace ways of reporting from all events designated as antifascist. Here, democracy is primarily understood as the right to publicly express fascist views. We will also remember the show “Piramida” hosted by Željka Ogresta and broadcast on national television by such views. Actually, an analysis of hate speech in 2015 shows that even those common sense nuances between mainstream media and obscure and uncontrolled portals have all but disappeared. Professionalism in the media is hardly worth mentioning in a year when excellent writers such as Boris Pavelić (Novi list) and Davor Krila (Slobodna Dalmacija) were threatened with dismissals and where such threats were put into practice in the case of Boris Dežulović. On the other side, the traditional fascist contamination of Croatian sports has become recognisable even beyond Croatia’s borders. The swastika at Poljud stadium in July was surprising only to the rare few.

The key actors in the Croatian justice system were practically competing over who would issue more acquittals and releases. As if in some nightmarish cabaret, we saw a procession of mitigating circumstances, successful hunger strikes, procedural errors. Branimir Glavaš was thus released after the panel of judges at the County Court accepted the argumentation of the defence. A good part of the Croatian public sided with the convicted war criminal, while his victims were entirely forgotten. Those tortured and killed in the territory of Pakračka Poljana and Zagreb in 1991 were also forgotten when the indictment of Tomislav Merčep was substantially reduced. But it is quite certain that the title of most unexpected turnabout in 2015 goes to the acquittal of Josip Miljak, president of the Croatian Pure Party of Rights, who had been charged for death threats made against the director of the Jasenovac Memorial. Compelled to file the charges herself due to the inaction of the Kutina Prosecutor’s Office, the director had to face not just the acquittal, but a history lesson from the judge questioning not just the list of names of the victims, but the very nature of the camp in Jasenovac.

The twenty-year-long process of revising history culminated in 2015 with the establishment of the Society for Investigating the Tripartite Camp in Jasenovac. Under the leadership of Stjepan Razum, director of the Archdiocese Archives in Zagreb, the Society quite openly and without the bare minimum of ethical and scientific standards, publishes and promotes a series of untruths in seminaries and spiritual centres of the Catholic Church throughout Croatia. Most of the Society’s activities rely on the social capacities of parishes, although cooperation with local and county authorities is also frequent. For example, members of the Society spoke at a public lecture in Glina, at the very site of what was once a Christian Orthodox church where in 1941 about a thousand people were detained and from where all traces of them have disappeared. We can only imagine the atmosphere in a town where the Serb council is punished by drastic funding cuts for commemorating the victims of the Ustasha regime, where there is only a single Jewish inhabitant today, and where the Independent State of Croatia is spoken of in affirmative terms in public.

Given that a return to the rhetoric of the 1990s has been on-going for a few years now, 2015 brought a fatigue and saturation point. The need to intervene or at least react to hate speech, human rights violations and discrimination has become almost a daily occurrence. All those expressing different opinions or views on the Croatian past become targets of anonymous threats and obscure petitions. It is interesting that this wave of disparaging different opinions started in early October 2014 with the dismissal of Dejan Jović from the post of advisor to the then president Ivo Josipović. In the manner of most left-wing politicians, president Josipović could not withstand the pressure of the Croatian public, which condemned the possibility of a scholarly, or in any case different interpretation of the referendum on independence. Apart from a few lone associations, practically no one from the University dared condemn the abuse and anonymous threats. The public has remained not just mute, but has added to the pressure with various op-eds. Perhaps the clearest picture of the mentality of the majority and the capacity for intolerance is provided by the status of theatre director Oliver Frljić in the public eye in Croatia. His efforts to return the theatre to the people at HNK Ivana pl. Zajca in Rijeka is constantly under attack by the extreme right and veterans groups in Rijeka. The scene of police securing the theatre performance “Trilogija o hrvatskom fašizmu” [Trilogy on Croatian Fascism] or the public discussion “Drugi rat” [Second War] indicates the absence of a process to deal with the past and a discourse of exclusion.

The disorientation of civil society has somewhat been mitigated by the formation of broad platforms and their actions. The Antifascist League of the Republic of Croatia and the initiative All of us for a Croatia for us all aim to equally distribute the burden of dealing with fascist phenomena, human rights violations and all other forms of structural violence against Croatian citizens. In 2015, the activities of these platforms ranged from marking Human Rights Day in places such as Glina where the Ustasha movement is openly and unrestrainedly glorified while the true nature of NDH is negated to commemorating the anniversary of Kristallnacht in Zagreb and Vukovar. Additional optimism came from the spontaneous reaction of a large number of citizens to the humanitarian refugee crisis. Solidarity akin to that when aid was being collected for flood-affected areas shows that despite negative trends, there is still potential for civic participation and perhaps even for civic courage.

And although a large number of events marked the end of 2014 and most of 2015, it is quite certain that this period will be remembered for the escalation of grievances on the part of war veterans and the severely disabled. Their rebellion culminated sometime around the beginning of the presidential campaign and the arrest of Milan Bandić, formerly mayor of Zagreb. Led by Josip Klemm and Đuro Glogoški, they occupied the plateau in front of the Ministry for Veterans and set up the by now famous tent from which they regularly sent messages to what they called the “non-popular” authorities, threatened violence and suicide. It is difficult not to recall the statements of a parish priest who spoke in that same tent during Christmas mass about how the war was not yet over. Among other things, the war veterans demanded the dismissal of Minister Matić and his team. However, despite tremendous pressure, the Croatian government stood by its minister. However, it is also a fact that failure to sanction the illegally erected tent, violations of a number of provisions of the Law on Public Assembly, and Art. 325 of the Criminal Code on incitement to violence and hatred and the use of hate speech have shown the radical limits of those in power with respect to right-wing or rather extreme right-wing politicians and their extra-parliamentary and even nominally apolitical branches. Finally, the so-called Tent-dwellers regularly received their mail at the address of the tent and this is irresistibly reminiscent of the far more benign joke where the sender addresses a letter to THE POSTMAN KNOWS THEM. In this case, it was not funny in the least.

The extended protests by veterans hampered the presidential campaign in which today’s president demonstrated unexpected political affinities, given that, among other things, she managed to form a coalition with Josip Miljak, mentioned above. The campaign completely rehabilitated the exclusionary rhetoric of the Split Riva from 2001 when the gathered masses breathed as one for war criminal Mirko Norac. In this campaign, Sanader’s era of political correctness was reduced to minimising potential for court charges, demonstrated already during the election night by Božidar Alić celebrating the victory of the HDZ candidate as the final victor over the “Serbophile and Chetnik currents”. The pious movement along the scale of Croathood, togetherness and anti-intellectual trivialising of civic status corresponded to the sensibility of most candidates, so it was to be expected that the invitees to the inauguration would include persons convicted for drug abuse, professed fascists, as well as persons being tried for war crimes.

As usual, this type of political logic has a number of very concrete financial outcomes. The amounts spent on the preparation and implementation of the military parade to mark the anniversary of Operation Storm are staggering, as are the subsequent costs of repairing the roads in the capital, especially when compared with the strict requirements for the reconstruction of homes in Gunja damaged during the floods. Fiscalising nationalist zeal is also difficult when it comes to collecting value added tax from the revenues of the concert by Marko Perković Thompson organised on the anniversary of Operation Storm in Knin. An excess of emotion and production of irrationality is particularly striking in the relationship between the Office of the President and the Government of Croatia. Compromising the candidacy of the Vice-President of the Croatian Government, Vesna Pusić, for the post of UN Secretary General is one of the clearest examples of how far partisan interests are placed before those that go beyond the party, i.e. national interests. However, despite this neuralgic relationship, it seems they are quite harmonious when it comes to militarising Croatian society at various levels, from renting German howitzers for the parade to introducing a programme of the Ministry of Defence that the Education Agency has recommended to all schools.

The start of the school year is marked by religious ceremonies in public, state schools where during this 2015/2016 school year, some children will once again sit out in the school corridors while their classmates attend religious education classes. The Ministry of Science, Education and Sports sees no coercion or discrimination in this, much like it sees no problem with “Moj tata spava s anđelima” [My Daddy Sleeps with the Angels] by Stjepan Tomaš being included on the mandatory reading list for sixth grade in primary schools. This is a work of questionable literary value with frequent appearances of the Ustasha salute and certainly does not shape young people in the direction of respecting differences and understanding civil rights and duties as would be characteristic for democratic societies, of which Croatia most certainly is not a member.

A dogmatic approach to the 1991-1995 war in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, social-democratic conformism and ideological vacancy as opposed to the party discipline and intelligence networks on the right do not provide much motive or reason for optimism. Rows of unfortunate refugees from war-torn Syria and other countries of the Middle East have inspired citizens to solidarity. Unfortunately, the militaristic impulse to protect national borders opened another area of political confrontation. Instead of the unhelpful hysteria around the humanitarian disaster suffered by countless refugees, we should be thinking about the causes for the increasing numbers of Croatian migrants looking for societies of greater social sensitivity and economic imagination.

We should, but there’s no one around to do it.

Aneta Lalić


 

 

Kosovo: Rumelia, a story in transition

Rumelia is the naming used by the Ottoman Empire for the Balkans. The usage of this term is a principal objection to one-sided narratives…

We live in an intertwined and constantly altering world. Yet, Balkans remains in its contagious ‘status-quo’, although being in ‘transition’.

Fifteen years after the war and seven since the declaration of independence, Kosovo is still struggling to witness its existence. Not only to the state of Serbia, or to internationally established structures, but even to its own citizens.

‘International community’, is failing to create a country, let alone a society, that is capable of standing on its feet. As in Bosnia.

Thus Kosovars, together with others in the Balkans, continue living an outward ‘status-quo’, a ‘status’ that is inwardly nurturing some quite dynamic and not so positive streams. These streams need to be facilitated, so their manifestation is not violent (think Kumanovo, May 2015).

Fear from ‘the other’ (accompanied by wounds, same from ‘the other’) is still marking the days, and economic situation is worse than during the nineties. At least for the folk. As for the politicians and their affiliates, both local and international, they see the fear from ‘the other’ as a useful tool to crap something publicly. While they remain immune to the crisis. Of course they do. We have certified criminals cherished as success stories of ‘new democracies’…

Could it be that a ‘transitional status-quo’ is in fact desirable? Someone from Serbia I met recently was saying that maybe we are not in ‘transition’ at all; maybe ‘transition’ is our continuous state of mind… If a transition is desired, than a vision is needed.

And, there is no vision about Kosovo. Nor Balkans. ‘Euro-Atlantic integrations’ became an expression one has to say in certain context. Like, ‘break your leg’ – in English, or something. It is not a vision.

In such a situation of not knowing where next, Kosovo decision-makers (of any identities) fail to meet the demands of their own positions. As part of ‘transition’. In February this year, 40% of attempted illegal entries to European Union came from Kosovo…

Decision-makers keep inventing ‘enemies’ to blame and ‘successes’ to cherish. ‘Prishtina-Belgrade Dialogue’ is producing friendly grimaces in Brussels but ugly insults in New York, and a deteriorating situation in the ground…

As long as we do not obey to – at least – some ethics, since clearly, obedience to law is failing – the only transition we will see will be this ‘status-quo’ becoming more unbearable. I am even being optimistic here.

Also, as long as we don’t look back to our own past(s) and ’add something better to it’, we will have no good place to transit to. Here, I’m just being realistic.

. . .

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I have recently discovered a poem titled O alithis pothos ton Skipetaron (The real desire of Albanians), by Albanian Renaissance figure – Naim Frashëri, published in Greek language, Bucharest 1886:

… Us, Slavs, Greeks – all our neighbours,

We want to live in harmony, with respect…

…Let’s breathe and enjoy the freedom,

Together.

During my schooldays, I have not come across this poem in the narratives that are shaping us. Be them official or parallel, ‘ours’ or ‘theirs’. And it should be there. Because, this reality existed, and it is part of us, as much is the suffering we have lived through…

Here’s another poem, this time by the Albanian-Italian poet, Ernest Koliqi (1903-1975)

Let us collect legends through the centuries,

together.

Let us enter histories

and unfold chronicles, together

. . .

Indeed, what are our histories? How do they sound inside the limitations of our self-perceived identities, but also outside – in that field beyond right and wrong? Do we dare deconstructing our own (made) histories?

Whoever we are, or we think we are – without trying to answer such questions we will continue to fail finding our own space, in this amazingly intertwined and constantly altering world.

Abdullah B. Ferizi


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Macedonia: Së bashku. Заедно.[1]

A while ago, an acquaintance from Novi Sad and me found ourselves in the midst of a group of special police running to cordon off a section of downtown Skopje. Loud shouting could be heard from the direction of downtown, and a bit later we see mostly young people with Albanian flags. We get out of the crowd, there was no going forward, so we go back over the Stone Bridge. Boro, he says to me, Macedonia is falling apart! What are you on about, man, this is how Macedonia survives, I retort. I can’t remember whether/to what extent we discussed it further, it was a while ago, but I kept going back to this as a kind of test of my perceptive abilities, he was an intelligent and well-intentioned man.

I still think the problem is in the perception of symbols and political issues of “others” in public space (in this concrete case, Albanian symbols and issues). For too long, a civic façade concealed a majority (Macedonian) national agenda, and every instance of other symbols and politics in public space was presented as a threat. Parliamentary democracy was understood (and gladly accepted by the majority national group) as a way to always have the possibility of outvoting minority issues in Parliament and getting them off the public scene. This, of course, causes ripples on both sides. Fear on one, anger on the other. I am no fan of anyone’s national symbols, but at this stage in Macedonia, I see their introduction into public space as deconstructing a decade-long unjust politics and, therefore, a way for Macedonia to “survive”. Because all this ethnic hatred is the result of a more profound deterioration that actually holds the cause of possible bloody ethnic denouement. I will try to illustrate this later on in the text.

In that sense, Macedonia really had to go through a lot in the past year in order to survive. We’ve had a very tumultuous year, and it would be impossible in a text like this to cover all the events in a way that would be understood by someone who has not kept up closely with the developments in Macedonia. Given the multilingual nature of this report, I would recommend for basic coverage of the events. In this text, I will pick out some of the relevant events.

Autumn of 2014 started out optimistically. University students rebelled against the reforms of the Ministry of Education. The Ministry responded to their objections in the standard manner – with salvoes of discrediting and disparaging throughout the state controlled media. This, finally, irritated the students, so they took to the streets. The Student Plenum was set up as a horizontal organisation of students. Faculties were occupied. Secondary school pupils also rebelled (after some minor concessions from the Government, their struggle is still on-going). Citizens joined the student protests in their thousands. The Professor Plenum was also set up. Following close behind was the mobilisation around the law for additional taxation of part-time workers (evidently, the state needs more funds for monuments), then rallying for the freedom of the arrested reporter Tomislav Kežarovski and the generally catastrophic situation in the media (ranked 33rd on the freedom of the media index by Reporters without Borders in 2006, Macedonia has fallen to being 117th, for instance), the demise of the healthcare system… We took to the streets many times from autumn 2014 to spring 2015. The government turned a deaf ear to all of it, but nevertheless, this time a slightly different Macedonia took to the streets. What was new was the much more visible ethnic mixing. For the Macedonia I know, this is no small feat. Some of the events saw the organised arrival of people acting from expressly authentic ethnic positions. This gave me (and still gives me) faith that it was possible to deconstruct the public political space. Of course, it was not always like this, many things could have been done differently, there was a lack of clearly stated support from “others” in some places, there were more ethnic clashes in the streets and on public transport… But I have a strong feeling that a powerful breakthrough has been made. It is no longer strange and it is increasingly less unacceptable. I am not naive and I am quite aware that this acceptance is not the end, but just a step in the right direction, that we need to invest a lot more effort and mostly into places that are not publicly visible. A few months ago, a dear friend told me how she felt very bad for having thrown away a brochure I had given her in a crowded cafe, so that everyone could see, some 15 (!) years ago. I don’t remember this particular event, but I do remember all sorts of similar reactions to our materials, among other things because they come in two languages. And I can clearly see how this, now publicly visible, community was constructed over the years by various people on the margins of society, at alternative cafes, concerts, hang-outs at faculties…. Now we can add to that the joint struggles at the protests and a few other new spaces. It’s still the margins, but now it’s the margins going beyond their boundaries.

But the following process shook Macedonia to its foundations and brought it to the brink of complete collapse, and it is perhaps the best illustration of the demise I mentioned at the beginning of this text. In February 2015, the opposition (Social Democrats) held a press conference where they announced they were in possession of evidence that the state leadership had intercepted the communications of over 20,000 citizens over a number of years. They claimed this was organised by premier Nikola Gruevski himself and his cousin, head of the secret police, Sašo Mijalkov. The premier reacted immediately, claiming that the material was concocted by foreign intelligence services, and that it was part of a plan to bring down the government and consequently the state. Criminal charges were quickly filed against the head of the opposition and a number of other people. The opposition started selectively publishing the intercepts through separate press conferences, so-called Bombs, where we had much to hear: judges being arranged and selected by telephone, the minister arranging for someone from the secret police to discretely open the bag with voting materials, how the MVR[2] was later transformed into MVR-VMRO[3], how voters ID cards are used, the head of the Albanian opposition party telling the head of the secret service that he will be “loyal to him to his death”, TV news being dictated directly by the government, then various taxes on businesses… A staggering range of crimes. We followed the news on YouTube, because all the television networks boycotted these press conferences. This went on for months, until finally Brussels and Washington got involved and started the process of dialogue between the government and the opposition. This process is still under way. What we have now is a Special Public Prosecutor’s Office that should spend the next few years dealing with crime allegations from the intercepted communications and from additional agreements including those that involve: the premier and some key ministries that were involved in manipulating the elections, they are to resign by the new year, after which the opposition would get those ministries, reviewing the lists of registered voters, etc. New elections have been announced for April 2016. Throughout this whole long and trying process, the Albanian parties were practically decorative. Never in the history of this country, as far as I remember, were they better positioned and stronger and at the same time so side-lined on the crucial issues of democracy for this country. Macedonian nationalists would say that Gruevski has finally learned how to deal with Albanians: he gave them part of the cake and now they are pacified. Seriously, though, I would expect a great crisis of representation. For years, people have been angry, especially with Brussels for having sacrificed Macedonian democracy in the name of ethnic stability. As long as Macedonians and Albanians are not at war, everything is OK. This has directly contributed to the collapse of society, because the main nationalist figures from both of the majority nations divided it amongst themselves as if it were a private estate, and robbed without hindrance each his own. Now, the foreigners have finally got involved, and I’m not sure whether they understand what the essential problem is or whether they just got scared seeing the old well-known situation developing.

Namely, in April 2015, one hitherto unknown Albanian group attacked the poorly guarded border post of Gošnice near the three-way border between Macedonia, Kosovo and Serbia. There were no casualties, some of the soldiers were beaten, and a considerable amount of weapons was stolen. Part of the public was incredulous at this news, and there were also public outcries that this was an attempt to divert public attention from the process of publishing the intercepted communications. At that time, the president of the opposition said in an interview for a small local TV station that he had information that a certain guerrilla group from Kosovo has been in the villages in the Lipovski region for months, unsuccessfully trying to find shelter. Namely, the local population, disappointed by the developments since 2001 to date, refuses to give them support. Larger media completely ignored this. For a while now, the Macedonian public has been incredulously watching waves of ethnically motivated violence that have been shaking us for years, and increasingly we hear voices that a lot of it is staged and arranged for ulterior motives. This was the context that surrounded the bloody clashes in Kumanovo on 9 May 2015. On that day, in a few streets of Divo naselje /Lagja e trimavë[4], a real war was being waged. The police said they had gone on a raid against a larger group of terrorists dug in in a number of houses. The bloody clash that lasted for almost 24 hours left a tragic balance of 22 dead (including 8 police officers) and 37 wounded police officers, some of them severely wounded! This number of casualties shocked us all, even in the 2001 war, there were rarely days with so many killed and wounded. And this was supposed to be a prepared police intervention. Events kept piling on: the Macedonian Ministry of Internal Affairs sent a letter to the Kosovo Embassy with a list of 23 Kosovo nationals apprehended in the raid. The list included the names of two well-known commanders who were later found to be among those killed. Mistakes happen in such chaotic situations, no? Then one of the prisoners managed to escape while handcuffed and without shoes, outwitting a group of 20 special police who had been walking him into the field so that he could show them the bunker with the weapons. Then through the Kosovo media information reaches us that the two commanders had met with an agent of the Macedonian secret police on a number of occasions and that they had been arranging attacks in Macedonia with him, for which they had been promised money. It was claimed that they did not trust him and therefore recorded all their meetings. And after one meeting at the US Embassy in Skopje, we had the resignations of the Chief of the Secret Police, Sašo Mijalkov, the Minister of Internal Affairs, Gordana Jankulovska, and the president of the Albanian DUI, Ali Ahmeti, gave a long interview on TV that evening, explaining that on the day of the raid, he was in telephone contact with a member of the group who kept calling him to ask for help in arranging a surrender or to get them out of the encirclement. I don’t want to draw any conclusions, except that we desperately need an independent investigation and that this magnitude of victims and stress for the local population, as well as the whole country, deserves some sort of justice. I visited Divo naselje / Lagja e trimave a month after the conflict. The photo gallery we made can be found at http://mirovnaakcija.org/ Диво насеље / Lagja e trimave, месец дена потоа (фото галерија). I have never in my life seen such a high degree of destruction caused by a 24-hour intervention and without the use of heavy artillery.

What was absolutely incredible were the reactions of the people, especially from Kumanovo. The people, although very frightened, demonstrated a degree of unprecedented soberness, there was not a single incident in those days. They called each other, it was important for them to be seen together, to respond together, without ethnic divisions. A video of a man from Kumanovo, filmed on the day of the raid, became the most watched video in Macedonian on YouTube. The video with English translation is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOX9kJRj54I[5]. It was a terrible conflict, but this time they did not manage to make it ethnic. And we are still waiting for an investigation.

I am not naive at all and I don’t think we are strong enough to keep resisting the provocations that are meant to lead us into ethnic conflict, or that we are strong enough to handle all the problems of a multi-ethnic society with this kind of history. But I am sure that we are stronger than ever. And that this is all still very frail, but it is a step in the direction I like taking. I have a feeling that we stand a chance.

Boro Kitanoski, Mirovna akcija / Aksioni Paqësor [Peace Action], Macedonia

 

[1] Popular hashtags during and after the conflicts in Kumanovo in May 2015.

[2] Ministry of Internal Affairs

[3] VMRO-DPMNE – ruling centre right party

[4] Even the different names for the same place speak for themselves. The name in Albanian means Settlement of the Courageous.

[5] The video on youtube.com is titled “United Citizens after shootings in Kumanovo – Macedonia”


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Serbia: Liberté, égalité, fraternité, 2015

At a time when the world as we know it and whose processes we have learned to understand is changing rapidly, from moment to moment, events in a single country have been pushed to the background. With globalisation, which is approach or has already reached its apex, drawing boundaries and talking about processes within them is increasingly difficult, because everything is mutually intertwined.

Whatever we choose to call the situation where hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing war in the Middle East and heading towards Europe, this is an on-going event, and it has marked the past year. I don’t know what would be a good name for it. We most often hear it called the “refugee crisis”, but a crisis is by definition an unforeseen negative event that seriously endangers the status quo. For years, refugees have been trying to find ways to reach the “promised land” – the European Union, which has been set up as a community of countries with respect for human rights and democracy. And at the first great test that united Europe has faced, the principles upon which it was founded were trampled. The brutal attitude towards people trying to save their lives, razor wire fences, mounting army and police presence, closing border crossings, lack of understanding for others, all of this has put Europe, as we thought we knew it, to the test of its basic values. So much so that the term “refugee crisis” could already be interpreted as the “crisis of the European Union”. Freedom, equality, fraternity (Fr. Liberté, égalité, fraternité), the motto of the French Revolution, is understood today in many EU countries as: yes, but only for white Christians born in its territory.

In that whole situation, the behaviour of the authorities in Serbia is used as a positive example – because the domestic authorities did not order the police and the army to abuse these people, and after a long time spent trying to ignore the problem, did manage to set up a few refugee centres and provide water, food and medical assistance to those in need. Still, the authorities in Serbia did most by not spreading xenophobic messages like the governments of some countries in the region and in Europe.

To sum up the various processes, this was a very complex year: the year in which the premier of Serbia, once ultra-right-wing, visited Srebrenica, and only a day after a gathering to commemorate the victims of Srebrenica was banned in Belgrade. The reconciliation processes in the region, the visit of the Serbian premier Aleksandar Vučić to Srebrenica and the moment when one of the Mothers of Srebrenica attaches the Srebrenica flower to his lapel would have been a symbol of forgiveness were it not for the attack against Vučić by a crowd of visitors that followed. After that, why he had come and the magnitude of the gesture of that Mother of Srebrenica, all of that was overshadowed by a new attack, new hatred, new divisions. It was as if everyone was just waiting for a reason, and any reason was good enough to resurrect the hatred and pour new resentment onto old wounds. The atmosphere that ensued was not dissipated either by the quick-to-follow visit of the BiH presidency to Belgrade, or the walk and game of chess with the Serbian premier at Kalemegdan. It all looked like a play, too banal, too unequivocal, too staged.

From this distance, it seems that Vučić, acting from his official position, and with a long political history that was not always “reconciliatory” like today, it seems he has focused on the objective – becoming “leader of regional reconciliation” – than on the process itself, which has to come from the personal. All these statements lacked a personal reference to himself in the past, to the change he has undergone – in order to be properly understood by the ordinary man who to this day does not understand why he had gone off to war, but if need be, he would be prepared to go off again.

Since 1995 was the year of the most horrific events in the wars on the territory of former Yugoslavia, but also the year when these wars ended in the “Dayton triangle”, commemorating the twentieth anniversaries of Srebrenica and Operation Storm was a new reason to bring up old grievances. We can safely say that relations with Croatia reached a record low this year. (At the time of writing of this article, the borders are closed and the premiers of both countries fling barbs at each other, which hurt deeper than the reasons for closing the borders and unearth old wounds.) This is quite discouraging for all of us who have worked on reconciliation processes for years. However, various governments had set reconciliation as the objective, but tried to reach it by short-cuts, most often by avoiding dealing with their own past, so it turned out that their short-cuts were, in fact, dead-ends.

In a similar fashion, after the unrest at the football match between Serbia and Albania, when one of the fans sent a drone bearing the flag of Greater Albania onto the pitch, harsh words, threats and hate speech were heard once again, both in the media and from government officials in both countries. And just as in the case of the BiH presidency, the premiers met and demonstrated how they can socialise and talk (again foregrounding socialising), but all these events leave a deep imprint among the peoples, and among those people we call “ordinary”. Especially because relations with Albania are directly linked to relations with Kosovo – with which, under the watchful eye of the European Union, agreements and negotiations are still on-going, always followed by politicians shaking hands. In the real world, a step forward is facilitated travel (of Kosovar Albanians through Serbia), the fact if Serb representatives being included in the Kosovo government, albeit with a lot of tension and with almost daily protests from the opposition. In Serbia itself, Kosovo is discussed less and less, as if the problem were resolved and there was no need to go back to it.

This year, the Pride Parade, which has been in the works since 2001, was held in Belgrade without any violence in the streets. But with, to paraphrase Radovan Treći “a hundred thousand policemen in the city…” providing security to the parade. Daily discrimination against members of the LGBT community is still visible, but there is increasing condemnation in the public of violence against LGBT.

An increase in violence against women is worrying, because statistically one woman was killed per week since the start of the year. Only in two days in May this year, seven women were killed by domestic violence, and in the first six months of 2015 the number of women killed (23) was equal to the figure for the whole of 2014. In most cases, the victims had already reported the offenders to the police, their neighbours knew what was happening, but these women paid with their lives for the sluggishness and inefficiency of the state, as well as the habit of the community “not to pry into other people’s business”.

With the cancelling of the most influential political programmes and the transition of information media to the commercial sphere, there is less and less space for public criticism of the status quo. Although everything that happened this year in the realm of media can be understood as the consequence of a long-term situation, it is still concerning that apart from a few independent portals and networks, there is practically no media space for critical and different opinions. At the same time, that media space is given to reality shows, which are not subject to control and are not sanctioned by state regulatory bodies as they promote problematic and sometimes very violent content.

Living under the pressures of a poor economic situation as a permanent state of affairs, in a climate of various forms of violence, fear, apprehension, every event that ventures outside the framework of the commonplace echoes through the days that follow. While on the one hand, processes are being guided towards accession to the European Union, on the other hand, rule of law is still being avoided. Living in constant apprehension, the citizens themselves fees powerless and react only to the strongest of messages: the solidarity of large swathes of society with the refugees is touching and wonderful, but we must not neglect the voices of those desperate to join these groups and walk over obstacles to the “promised land”. “And who will help me?” is not the question of a selfish, well-off man blind to the suffering of others, but the desperation of a tortured soul, struggling in vain to see hope in a better future where he lives. A man who would most like to leave that area, tired of waiting and broken promises.

Katarina Milićević

 

 

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