COMMENT: Kosovo proposal: is Åland next in line?
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By Kari Huhta
Those who are seeking a solution in Kosovo do not have many options. They are taking Kosovo away from Serbia and turning it into an independent state. This has been inevitable for some time now. It would be pointless to try for any other solutions.
However, inevitable does not mean effortless. Few countries would want to try to do the same at home.
There are plenty of little places around the world that want to become independent. The result of one process can be seen clearly in the map on the side.
The Balkans, where Yugoslavia used to be, now has seven new states, if Kosovo is included - slightly ahead of time. In terms of degree of disintegration, Yugoslavia even beats the former Soviet Union, considering that Yugoslavia never was all that big.
The final result resembles something of a crazy quilt. The result does not appear to be completely stable, even tough success stories like Slovenia are included.
One gets a sneaking suspicion that in a few decades the map of the Balkans may have changed once again. The peacemakers of today may have sown the seeds of the wars of coming generations.
Furthermore, an independent Kosovo will not be just a new spot on a quilt, but rather a much bigger factor of instability with its Albanian and Serb populations. Efforts to guide a stable Balkan region into the EU are constantly becoming more demanding.
Why then Kosovo and not the others? That is the question that is being asked from Quebec to the Basque Country. And what about an independent Åland Islands?
The Åland question might be revisited if anyone there ever seriously makes such a proposal, but otherwise these questions are taken very seriously in many places.
Spain has taken a somewhat guarded attitude toward independence for Kosovo specifically because of the Basque region. China always has Tibet on its mind. The United Kingdom does not want any notional paralells with Northern Ireland or Scotland.
Russia has taken the opposite view, by linking the future of Kosovo with the future of the pro-Russian elements in the splinter areas of the former Soviet Union. Russia says that they should be allowed to become independent, if Kosovo is granted independence, but it does not grant the same right to Chechnya.
It is difficult to say what the difference is, except that the splinter areas want to become independent of Russia's neighbouring countries, but Chechnya wants to become independent of Russia itself. From Russia's point of view, this is a big difference.
It is quite obvious that the right to independence is determined, not by any local court, but rather by rather cold power politics. Several conditions need to link up just right, just like what happened in this part of the world 90 years ago.
Yugoslavia was allowed to fall apart because the central power - Serbia - was no longer able to hold it together. At the same time, in the eyes of the rest of the world, it lost the entitlement to its territories with problematic nationalist violence, and the independence of Kosovo is the final phase of this disintegration.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 27.1.2007
KARI HUHTA / Helsingin Sanomat
kari.huhta@hs.fi
