Kosovo's status, the last piece of the bloody Balkans puzzle

In the coming months, a fundamental decision will be made that will challenge the capacity of the international community, particularly Europe, for conflict resolution. The issue is Kosovo's status - the last unresolved piece of the bloodstained Balkans puzzle. For Serbs and Albanians alike, Kosovo is a place haunted by history. But the world must not allow their freighted narratives about the past to cloud our actions to build a better future. In the 1990s, following its atrocities in Bosnia, Slobodan Milosevic's Serb regime abolished Kosovo's long-standing autonomy, suppressing the rights of the province's overwhelming Albanian majority. Instead of simply watching in horror, as it did at the start of the Bosnian war, Nato decided to intervene before Milosevic's forces could again devastate one of the constituent ethnic groups of the former Yugoslavia. Security of the European Union and Europe's moral responsibility after the crimes of World War II were at stake. Following Nato's intervention, the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1244, placing Kosovo under UN administration. Since 1999, the international community's policies with regard to Kosovo have had wide international support, including from Russia. Now the time has come to resolve Kosovo's status permanently. Otherwise, the stability that the UN has brought to Kosovo, and the region, will not last. Unemployment is now running at over 40 percent in Kosovo and breeds political volatility. Without access to sovereign lending from the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund, Kosovo's economy will continue to stagnate. Resolving Kosovo's status is also a necessity for the province's Serb minority, which continues to live in uncertainty, not knowing whether to look to Belgrade or Pristina for protection of its rights. It would free both Serbia and the EU to move forward on Serbia's domestic reforms and international integration. The UN Special Envoy for the Kosovo Future Status Process, former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, has now, after 14 months of intensive negotiations with Belgrade and Pristina, presented his settlement proposal to the Security Council. Ahtisaari's bold proposal, which recommends Kosovo's independence with initial supervision by a strong international civilian and military presence, is the only viable option for the international community, and for Europe in particular. Reintegrating Kosovo into Serbia is not tenable. Since the end of the conflict in June 1999, Serbia has not exercised any governing authority over Kosovo. Under UN administration, legitimate Kosovar institutions for managing domestic affairs have been created. With these institutions in place, Kosovo's people expect greater self-government. Sadly, Belgrade's vision of Kosovo returning to Serbian rule - albeit with autonomy -ignores these realities. Indeed, Serbia has no viable strategy for integrating Kosovo's two million people into Serbian political institutions and public life. The UN simply cannot solve Kosovo's structural problems, namely the need to develop a viable economy and to begin engagement with the EU - the most powerful motor for reform and economic development in the region. But this does not mean that the international community and the EU should now leave Kosovo to its own devices. Relations between Kosovo's Albanian majority and Serb minority remain uneasy. So it is imperative that strong safeguards are put in place to protect minorities, particularly the Serbs. International supervision of Kosovo's independence by a strong international civilian and military presence will be critical to ensure that it fulfills its obligations under the settlement proposal. What is now required is the will to adopt and implement Ahtisaari's plan. In the coming weeks, the Security Council will decide Kosovo's status, but it is the EU that will have to coexist with both Kosovo and Serbia. In fact, Kosovo's fate is intertwined with the EU's own. A strong and stable Kosovo will require a cohesive and united Europe. If the EU is divided on an issue lying at its geographic heart - and at the heart of its interests - its credibility as a foreign policy actor on matters beyond its borders will suffer dramatically. And only a united EU can bring Russia on board for a harmonized policy towards the Balkans. This means that the EU cannot leave Serbia to its own devices, either. The EU must make it clear that it is ready to support Serbia - and the region as a whole - in realizing its European aspirations. European security is hinged on Serbian integration, just as Serbian aspirations hinge on the EU. But the price of the EU's support cannot be changed: the major war criminals Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic must be delivered to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. Today, as yesterday, the first step towards Serbia's European integration is full cooperation with the ICTY. Serbia has a bright future with the EU, but getting there requires that it break with its own past - on both Kosovo and the atrocities of the Milosevic era. Joschka Fischerwas Germany's foreign minister and vice chancellor from 1998 to 2005. A leader in the Green Party for nearly 20 years, he is now a visiting professor at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School. THE DAILY STAR publishes this in collaboration with Project Syndicate-Institute of Human Sciences © 2007 (www.project-syndicate.org).