BERLIN, May 22 (UPI) -- Voters in Montenegro chose to end ties with neighboring Serbia -- albeit by a razor-thin margin -- placing the final touches in what could be seen as the nails in the coffin of former communist Yugoslavia.
Latest exit polls have 55.4 percent of the Sunday ballot choosing to end ties with Serbia, only .4 points above the 55 percent required by rules set forth between the country and the European Union.
"I want to congratulate the Montenegrin people for the successful referendum," EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said Monday, adding Brussels will "fully respect the result."
Serbia and Montenegro teamed up in 1992 after the breakup of former communist Yugoslavia. In 2003, the country changed into a loose federation of two republics, a union doomed to diverge, with different tax, anti-corruption and monetary policies (Montenegro dropped the dinar for the euro) in each region.
Montenegro's Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, who in past years has steered a course away from Belgrade and campaigned for independence, on Monday joined in the jubilations that had gripped his region by late Sunday.
"The independence of the country has been renewed... We've got our state," he said, according to the BBC.
Serbia, under the leadership of Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, had until the last minute spoke out against the breakup, arguing Montenegro, with its roughly 650,000 inhabitants, was too small to succeed on its own.
The referendum marks a psychological turning point in the region, said Dušan Reljic, a Balkans expert with the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, a Berlin-based think tank.
"Kostunica is seriously weakened by the outcome," he told United Press International in a telephone interview on Monday. "All his reactions show that he was not prepared for such a result."
But before Montenegro becomes its own state, there are a few more hurdles to overcome: Two-thirds of its lawmakers will have to vote in parliament in support of the referendum, and change the constitution, a move expected to be uncontroversial. The Montenegrin leadership will then await international recognition, which is virtually guaranteed, and apply for a United Nations seat.
Observers fear that the Serbian leadership in Belgrade will disturb the process and contest the referendum's result.
Klaus Segbers, international security policy expert and head of the East Europe Institute, a political think tank at Berlin's Free University, on Monday told UPI he thinks sangfroid will prevail in Belgrade.
"There are other issues that Belgrade has problems with at the moment," he said, citing independence movements in the Kosovo, another province linked to Serbia.
"I would hope the Serbian minority in Montenegro also stays calm, but of that, I am not so sure."
Serbians make up one in three people in Montenegro, a cultural minority likely to protest the referendum in the coming weeks; after all, 44.6 percent voted to keep the two regions united.
As for independence movements, Montenegro may only be the beginning: Kosovo, with an estimated population of 1.9 million, is bidding to cut ties with Serbia and its leaders are expected to be encouraged by the Montenegrin success.
Since the breakup of former communist Yugoslavia nearly 15 years ago because of ethnic conflicts, the Balkans have steered continuously toward calmer days; however, Kosovo remains one last unresolved hotspot; the autonomous province within Serbia is administered by the United Nations and its several thousand peacekeepers. Kosovar Albanians overwhelmingly support independence, while the Serbian leadership in Belgrade opposes it.
But the Kosovar case is quite different from the Montenegrin. Some observers in Eastern Europe fear that independence for the Kosovo could set off an avalanche of separatism, with a multitude of minorities in the region claiming they have a right to become independent as well.
Finding a solution that will please the big players in the greater region (Russia and China) as well as countries with ethnic minorities (such as Romania, Moldavia, Bulgaria and Bosnia-Herzegovina), is like "squaring the circle," Reljic said. "At the moment, they are very far away from a solution."
While the United Nations would like to see the issue settled by the end of the year, the many different interests in the region may slow down the process. And with a number of elections scheduled in the region over the next year, the coming months "will likely be turbulent, rather than peaceful," Reljic said.
Maybe the separation of Serbia's last partner in the former Yugoslavia will set the pace for the restoration of stability in the Balkans.
