Kosovo har i årevis ligget som en udetonert bombe i et hjørne av Europa. Valget 17.november kan komme til å markere starten på en eksplosiv utvikling med 10. desember som avgjørende dato dersom det nyvalgte parlamentet i Kosovo som forventet vil erklære området for selvstendig. Serbia har gjort det helt klart at en selvstendighetserklæring er uakseptabel. Den videre utvikling truer derfor med å komme ut av kontroll.

En slik opptrapping av en tilsynelatende uforsonlig konflikt truer også med å henvise den tidligere finske presidenten Ahtisaaris plan for løsning til historiens skraphaug. Målsettingen med Ahtsiaariplanen er å bygge opp multietnisk forsoning i Kosovo og derigjennom skape legitimitet både i regionen og i det brede internasjonale samfunn for den status for området som flertallet av innbyggerne ønsker. Planen har derfor innebygd en uvanlig sterk beskyttelse for det serbiske mindretallets rettigheter. Dette synes ikke å influere hverken på oppfatningen i Beograd som går ut på at Kosovo er en uatskillelig del av Serbia eller på det albanske befolkningsflertallet i Kosovo som ønsker uavhengighet.

Et alternativ er deling av området etter etniske skillelinjer. Det innebærer en åpenbar fare for etnisk rensing og kan lett danne presedens for andre områder på Balkan hvor etniske grupper deler samme territorium men lever i mistenksomhet til hverandre som lett kan utvikles til regelrett hat. Uenigheten mellom USA og EU på den ene siden og Russland på den andre om hvordan Kosovos framtid bør formes, har nærmest lammet FN i spørsmålet. En åpen konflikt i Kosovo med smitteeffekt til andre områder på Balkan vil bidra til ytterligere å forsure et allerede anstrengt forhold mellom Vesten og Russland og utgjøre en kraftig bremse på EUs planer om gradvis å innlemme hele det tidligere Jugoslavia i EU.

Vi gjengir sammendraget fra International Crisis Groups siste rapport om Kosovo i november 2007:

The debate on Kosovo's future status has reached a crucial point. The United Nations Security Council has failed to bring Kosovo to supervised independence, following Russia's declared intention to veto. With Kosovo Albanians increasingly restive and likely soon to declare unilateral independence in the absence of a credible alternative, Europe risks a new bloody and destabilising conflict. The best way of ensuring regional peace and stability and lifting Kosovo out of an eight-year long limbo is a timely resolution based squarely on the plan of UN Special Envoy Martti Ahtisaari. This would supersede the Security Council's stop-gap compromise Resolution 1244 of June 1999 (UNSCR 1244), define Kosovo's internal settlement and minority-protection mechanisms, mandate a new international presence, and allow for supervised independence.

Ahtisaari's plan comprises two documents: the four-page "Report of the Special Envoy of the Secretary-General on Kosovo's Future Status" and the 63-page "Comprehensive Proposal for the Kosovo Status Settlement". The Report includes the recommendation that "Kosovo's Status should be independence supervised by the international community" and justifications for this conclusion. Ahtisaari separated his recommendation on status from the much more technical Proposal, which includes a series of "general principles" and twelve annexes detailing measures to ensure a future Kosovo is "viable, sustainable and stable". The EU is to provide an International Civil Office (ICO) that will monitor and guide implementation of the settlement, and a European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) Rule of Law mission; NATO will provide an International Military Presence (IMP) to succeed its current Kosovo Force.

The six-nation Contact Group (France, Germany, Italy, Russia, the UK and U.S.) that has been guiding Kosovo policy has authorised a four-month period for new talks between Pristina and Belgrade. These started in the second week of August but, given entrenched positions, are highly unlikely to achieve a breakthrough. Serbia refuses to relinquish sovereignty over Kosovo; the Kosovo Albanians will accept nothing less than independence. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has requested that the Contact Group report back to him on the Belgrade-Pristina talks by 10 December.

Achieving multi-ethnic accommodation inside Kosovo itself is a long-term international community goal. The Ahtisaari plan is designed to achieve this. It represents maximum concessions that could be extracted from the Albanian 90 per cent majority, granting rights to a Serb minority that is roughly 7 per cent of the population which go far beyond European standards. They include the creation of more and expanded Serb-majority municipalities, with extended competencies and the right to link with one another and benefit from Serbian government assistance, special protection zones and prerogatives for the Serbian Orthodox Church; and additional parliamentary seats and double-majority rules to prevent Serbs from being outvoted on vital interest questions. 

The only real alternative to the multi-ethnic supervised independence of the Ahtisaari plan is the partition of Kosovo between its Albanian majority and Serbia. In this case, the former would declare independence regardless, their faith in international community promises destroyed. Serbia would reclaim part of Kosovo, north of the River Ibar.

Although Serbia favours partition, its first victims would be the 60 per cent of Kosovo's Serbs who live south of the River Ibar. It would destroy the principle of multi-ethnicity in Kosovo and the surrounding region, and thus defeat the strategic purpose of resolving Kosovo’s status: instead of completing the puzzle of a reconstructed and pacified Western Balkans that, as declared unanimously by EU members, has a future in the European Union, partition could easily create spill-over into surrounding territories and a new unravelling of borders along ethnic fault lines.

Following the stalemate in the United Nations Security council, the Contact Group is deeply split. Its "Quint", the U.S., UK, France, Germany and Italy, backs the Ahtisaari plan, while Russia rejects it. The EU members of the Contact Group must now act to prepare the organisation to meet its responsibilities. Inaction might lead Kosovo to fracture, destabilising neighbouring countries and boosting Balkan organised crime networks. This would discredit the EU's Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and its reputation as a credible international actor.

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