Nor Is Abkhazia Unique
// The price of the question
Russian diplomats are waging a rear-guard battles over Kosovo in the UN Security Council. The goal of these actions are not entirely clear. It is not possible to reverse the situation by setting the Albanians down at the negotiating table – not because they have declared independence, but because they have received the recognition of 30 percent of the word's countries, including many of the most powerful. And each of them had the full right to do so. The Security Council does not figure in the situation. It cannot make the states that have recognized it annul their recognition. There is no precedent for that.
Under these new conditions, the Russian proposal of a “road map” is moot. It would have been right on time ten years ago, but now it has no grounds. The unpleasant associations suggested by the term, borrowed from the Middle East peace process, seems to have been chosen especially to underline the hopelessness of the situation. Settlement of the Kosovo situation is another question: developing a mechanism that will allow Serbia to coexist with its former autonomous area without formally recognizing it. That is not what Russia is proposing, however.
Maybe Russia is trying to save face, but it does not look like it. Making a proposal that it doomed to fail over and over again is more likely to lead to loss of face. China, another country that is not recognizing Kosovo, look more solid. It announced its position without making a scandal. Russia is spilling forth a wave of emotion. There is no denying that Serbia is taking the loss of Kosovo hard. But Russia seems to be suffering even worse. There has already been talk about how mighty the Serbian Army is, in comparison to which the NATO forces are prim little weaklings. Why are Russian hawks rattling Serbian sabers? They haven't told us.
For all of its puffery, the Russian position on Kosovo would be legally and morally unassailable, if it weren't for some annoying drawbacks. As it stern condemnation of the Kosovar separatists and their dishonorable accomplices, Russia takes an altogether paternal attitude toward Abkhazian separatists and is unilaterally withdrawing from CIS sanctions against the unrecognized state. The Russian ambassador to Georgia called that move “a good signal to begin a dialog between the sides.” But he was overreacting. Georgia should take the first step to life the sanctions. It has not done so because one of the key issues in the settlement, the return of hundreds of thousands of Georgian refugees to Abkhazia, is in a hopeless dead end. In that case, isn't Russia's lifting of the sanctions a form of encouragement for Abkhazia's separatist policies and a means of pressuring Georgia? The question is fitting, for, by a strange turn of circumstances, Russia's sympathy for Transdniestrian separatists was dampened as soon as relations with Moldova improved. Thus, it remains unclear whether principles or interests are more important.
Valery Kunadze, senior fellow of the Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences; former deputy foreign minister of the Russian Federation
All the Article in Russian as of Mar. 13, 2008
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