"Look before you leap" is as sound a principle in foreign policy as it is in life. Yet, once again, the Bush administration is preparing to leap into the unknown. Even though lack of foresight is universally viewed as a leading cause of its Iraq debacle, the US (with British backing probable) is now preparing to recognize Kosovo's independence unilaterally -- irrespective of the consequences for Europe and the world.
Kosovo has been administered since 1999 by a UN mission guarded by NATO troops, although it remains formally a part of Serbia. But with Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority demanding its own state, and with Russia refusing to recognize UN mediator Martti Ahtisaari's plan for conditional independence, the US is preparing to go it alone.
Instead of thinking what Ahtisaari deemed unthinkable -- a partition of Kosovo with a small part of the north going to Serbia and the rest linked to the Kosovars' ethnic brethren in Albania or a separate state -- the US plans to act without the UN's blessing, arguing that only an independent Kosovo will bring stability to the Western Balkans.
That argument is debatable -- and the record of the Kosovar government suggests that it is wrong. But the US position is unambiguously misguided in not foreseeing that the "Kosovo precedent" will incite instability and potentially even violence elsewhere.
Why the rush to give Kosovo independence? Many serious disputes have gone unresolved for decades: the Kashmir question since 1947, the Turkish occupation of Northern Cyprus since 1974 and Israel's occupation of the West Bank from 1967. Yet no one is suggesting that unilateral solutions be imposed in these potential flashpoints.
Nevertheless, the US -- and most EU members -- argue that Kosovo's situation is sui generis and will set no legally binding international precedent. But Russia sees things very differently. Indeed, it may seek to use this precedent to re-establish its authority over the nations and territories that were once part of the Soviet Union.
Spain and Cyprus, with their worries over secessionist-minded regions, are worried by any possible precedent. Romania fears the fallout from Kosovo unilaterally gaining independence on neighboring Moldova. The worry is that Russia will unilaterally recognize the breakaway Moldovan territory of Transdnistria, which Russian troops and criminal gangs have been propping up for 16 years.
Ukraine -- the great prize in Russia's bid to recapture its former sphere of influence -- is also deeply anxious. It fears that Russia will encourage separatist tendencies in Crimea, where the ethnic Russian population forms a majority (Crimea was ceded to Ukraine by Nikita Khrushchev only in 1954). Russia may decide to abuse the Kosovo precedent further to divide Ukraine's population between Russian speakers and Ukrainian speakers.
But the biggest risks posed by unilateral recognition of Kosovo's independence are in the South Caucasus, a region that abuts the tinderbox of today's Middle East. Here, there is a real danger that Russia may recognize breakaway regions in the South Caucasus, and back them more strongly than it does now.
Even before Vladimir Putin became Russian president, the Kremlin was making mischief in Georgia, issuing Russian passports to citizens of Abkhazia (the largest breakaway region) and pouring money into its economy. Russia's supposed "peacekeeping troops" in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Georgia's other secession-minded region, have in fact protected their rebel governments.
Russia has also been enforcing a complete trade embargo on Georgia in the hope of weakening the resolve of its pro-Western president, Mikhail Saakashvili.
Should Russia recognize Abkhazia's independence, Saakashvili might be tempted to respond militarily to prevent his country from unraveling. Renewed conflict in Abkhazia would not only bring the risk of open warfare with Russia, but strain relations with Armenia, as there are near to 50,000 Armenians in Abkhazia who support the breakaway government.
Another risk in the South Caucasus is that Russia (with Armenian support) will recognize Nagorno-Karabakh's self-proclaimed independence from Azerbaijan. Nagorno-Karabakh, historically Armenian, endured a bloody secessionist war between 1988 and 1994, with 30,000 killed and 14 percent of Azerbaijan's territory occupied by Russian-backed Armenian forces.
Since then, oil has fueled an Azeri military buildup. So the government in Baku is far more prepared to respond to renewed warfare than it was in the 1990s. Moreover, it has neighboring Turkey on its side. Turkey is already enforcing a punitive economic embargo on Armenia, including closure of its border.
Military projections by the US have repeatedly suggested that Azerbaijan would lose such a battle, even with newly purchased equipment and Turkish military support. Armenian forces are well dug in and have received a significant boost from Russia's diversion of heavy weaponry to Armenia from some recently closed Georgian military bases.
Iran must also be factored into this equation, as it is becoming a strategic investor by building an oil refinery just across its border in Armenia, partly as a security measure in case of a US attack and partly to relieve its petrol shortages. Moreover, Iran remains eager to contain Azerbaijani revanchist claims over the large Azeri minority in northern Iran.
The conflicts in Transdnistria and the South Caucasus are usually called "frozen conflicts" because not much has happened since they began in the early 1990s. Any unilateral move to give Kosovo its independence is likely to unfreeze them -- fast and bloodily. And such potential bloodshed on Russia's border may give Putin the pretext he may desire to extend his rule beyond its constitutionally mandated end next March.
Charles Tannock is a member of the European Parliament, where he is spokesman on foreign affairs for the British Conservative Party.
Copyright: Project Syndicate
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) challenges and ignores the international rules-based order by violating Taiwanese airspace using a high-flying drone: This incident is a multi-layered challenge, including a lawfare challenge against the First Island Chain, the US, and the world. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) defines lawfare as “controlling the enemy through the law or using the law to constrain the enemy.” Chen Yu-cheng (陳育正), an associate professor at the Graduate Institute of China Military Affairs Studies, at Taiwan’s Fu Hsing Kang College (National Defense University), argues the PLA uses lawfare to create a precedent and a new de facto legal
In the first year of his second term, US President Donald Trump continued to shake the foundations of the liberal international order to realize his “America first” policy. However, amid an atmosphere of uncertainty and unpredictability, the Trump administration brought some clarity to its policy toward Taiwan. As expected, bilateral trade emerged as a major priority for the new Trump administration. To secure a favorable trade deal with Taiwan, it adopted a two-pronged strategy: First, Trump accused Taiwan of “stealing” chip business from the US, indicating that if Taipei did not address Washington’s concerns in this strategic sector, it could revisit its Taiwan
Chile has elected a new government that has the opportunity to take a fresh look at some key aspects of foreign economic policy, mainly a greater focus on Asia, including Taiwan. Still, in the great scheme of things, Chile is a small nation in Latin America, compared with giants such as Brazil and Mexico, or other major markets such as Colombia and Argentina. So why should Taiwan pay much attention to the new administration? Because the victory of Chilean president-elect Jose Antonio Kast, a right-of-center politician, can be seen as confirming that the continent is undergoing one of its periodic political shifts,
Taiwan’s long-term care system has fallen into a structural paradox. Staffing shortages have led to a situation in which almost 20 percent of the about 110,000 beds in the care system are vacant, but new patient admissions remain closed. Although the government’s “Long-term Care 3.0” program has increased subsidies and sought to integrate medical and elderly care systems, strict staff-to-patient ratios, a narrow labor pipeline and rising inflation-driven costs have left many small to medium-sized care centers struggling. With nearly 20,000 beds forced to remain empty as a consequence, the issue is not isolated management failures, but a far more
RSS