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July 1999
Who are the heroes of the attempt to aid refugees from Kosovo? Are they the aid agencies, the UN organisations, the ordinary people of Albania or even the military? Or are there no heroes, as the West considers its motives for helping and how little it does for those in need elsewhere?
When the dust clears and in the cool of hindsight analysts ponder the humanitarian response to the Kosovo conflict, one point will emerge very clearly: this was not humanitarianism’s finest hour. The international relief effort, despite attempts to professionalise and improve standards over the past few years, was pushed aside in a scramble for exposure.
David Shearer is a Research Associate at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. He is currently on assignment in the Balkans.
How can the worst effects of war or economic transition be avoided? The Marshall Plan rescued Europe but little was on offer for the former Soviet states. Will Western nations make the same costly mistake for the Balkans, or is there the will to carry out a second Marshall Plan?
The idea of a new marshall plan1 as part of the peace deal with Serbia is music to the ears of Balkan countries and could mark a new era both in terms of a dramatic political shift from the great powers towards the region and in dealing definitively with the Soviet economic legacy. With the plan approved on 10 May by twenty-eight foreign ministers and seventeen international organisations, the Balkans might emerge from the ashes of war into a new German or Japanese type miracle. The question, however, is whether the West has the political will to commit large financial resources to a region which is geographically far from the United States and which suffers from Western prejudice.
Brigitte Granville is Head of the International Economics Programme at Chatham House.
Has the West seriously misunderstood the break-up of the former Yugoslavia? In the process, has an opportunity been lost to integrate the region into a Europe where ethnic conflicts and segregation seem to be things of the past?
The crisis in Kosovo is without doubt one of the defining events in modern Europe. It is a confrontation comparable in nature—if not in scale—with World War Two. In many respects, it can also be seen as, hopefully, the last serious clash of the Cold War. Its origins are inevitably very complex, the crisis and its resolution are bound to generate a range of ramifications, defying any attempt to provide a clear-cut interpretation. Nevertheless, there is a strong rationale for identifying the single most important factor driving the West—the European Union and NATO—towards confrontation with Belgrade.
Dr Vlad Sobell is senior economist at the Daiwa Institute of Research, London.
When NATO’s air strikes against Serbia started in March, there were many dire predictions about the likely knock-on effect on neighbouring countries. Macedonia, whose official name is still the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), was seen by many as the first Balkan domino likely to fall as a result of the destabilisation ushered in by the Milosevic regime’s ethnic dumping of Kosovo’s Albanians in neighbouring countries.
As thousands of expelled Kosovo Albanians poured over the border daily and tension between the majority Macedonian population and the Albanian minority rose, with evidence of anti-Albanian and pro-Serb sentiment among Macedonians, it looked as if the worst fears about the future of Macedonia might indeed be fulfilled.
Christopher Cviic is an Associate Fellow of the European Programme at Chatham House, and is currently writing a book on post-1989 Central Europe.
Small events in international relations can have big, even defining consequences. To take a Yugoslavian example: the shooting of the Archduke in Sarajevo in 1914. A second instance, of course, is NATO’s bombing of China’s embassy in Belgrade. In the welter of blood which distinguishes the war against the Serbs, the embassy deaths, heartbreaking for the families of the three dead and humiliating for NATO aircontrollers and American cartographers, prepared the way for a giant Chinese step on the world stage. Indeed, there can be few who heard the news of the embassy bombing and failed to realise that though there had been much gorier NATO mistakes, the consequences of this one would be great.
China is now openly challenging what it sees as American ‘hegemonism’ and jockeying for leadership in a new multi-polar world. To the amazement of Brussels and Washington, Beijing immediately charged NATO with a deliberate attack and within a day mass protests erupted in front of the British and American embassies and consulates—the rest of NATO appeared to be blame-free. Buildings were stoned, diplomats trapped, and xenophobic slogans including ‘Kill Americans’ were heard for the first time in Chinese streets since the Cultural Revolution thirty-five years ago.
NATO, London, and Washington issued ‘regrets’ but insisted bombing would continue. US Ambassador Sasser stoutly refused to climb over his embassy walls to take a police car to the Foreign Ministry and within two days was referring to what happened as ‘a flap’.
Jonathan Mirsky, a writer on Chinese Affairs, was the Asia Editor of The Times.
India and Pakistan—both now openly nuclear powers—are caught in a new confrontation over the disputed territory of Kashmir. With an Indian election imminent, and suggestions of intelligence failures, do Pakistan’s guest militants threaten regional security in this most militarised area?
On 26 May, the Indian air force began bombing Pakistan-backed insurgents who had crossed the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir and entrenched themselves in the mountain ranges above the strategically important road that links Srinagar to Leh. It was a heavy response to what has become an annual event as summer arrives and the snows melt, allowing the porous LoC to be breached almost at will.
Dr Chris Smith is Director, North-South Defence and Security Programme at Centre for Defence Studies, Kings College, London.
Malaysia is once again absorbed by the struggle between the Prime Minister, Dr Mohamed Mahathir, and his former protege and deputy, Anwar Ibrahim. Anwar is on trial for a second time having already been jailed for corruption. The battle has moved to the printed word with supporters of both sides authoring shocking tracts. In this sleazy atmosphere a general election is on the cards.
Take a walk through central kuala lumpur and alongside the counterfeit designer watches and T-shirts you will find street traders selling copies of a thin brown paperback with the striking title ‘Shit’ in bold red letters. This novel by National Laureate, Professor Emeritus Shannon Ahmad, has become a best-seller, despite the open hostility of the government and mainstream media. In the tradition of political satire popular in 19th century France, it is a barely disguised allegory of the political struggle which resulted on 2 September last year in Anwar’s unceremonious dismissal from office, arrest and later conviction.
Dr Jason Abbott, Lecturer in International Relations at the Nottingham Trent University’s Centre for Asia-Pacific Studies, has just returned from a research trip to Malaysia.
Genetic engineering and its application in agriculture are at the centre of fierce public controversy in Britain and in continental Europe. Demands for stricter regulation of biotechnology are growing rapidly in the European Union. Meanwhile, recent efforts to reach international agreement on the safety of trade in genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have failed, largely because of American intransigence.
A transatlantic gulf is emerging over the risks and benefits of biotechnology—there is even talk of a potential future trade conflict between the United States and Europe. Considerable commercial interests as well as environmental concerns are at stake. The international biosafety controversy provides further indication that environmental and human health values are increasingly interfering with the international politics of trade liberalisation.
Robert Falkner, currently Lecturer in Politics at New College, Oxford, is about to take up a Lectureship in International Relations at the University of Kent’s London Centre of International Relations. He is developing a research project on the international politics of genetic engineering in the Energy and Environment Programme at Chatham House.