The EU is united on Kosovo

BRUSSELS, Feb. 29 (UPI) -- Is Europe divided over Kosovo or not? Most people would not even stop to think of this. Of course Europe's divided. While France and Germany have recognized Kosovo's independence, other EU countries like Spain, Romania and Cyprus have held back. The Scandinavians took the plunge, but only hesitantly. The headlines wrote themselves. "European disunity" blared the newspapers. "What consequences will the divide have?" asked the concerned-looking anchormen.

But almost two weeks after the event, things look less straightforward. One the one hand, the EU took 11 months from when former Finish President Martti Ahtisaari presented his plan -- which all 27 endorsed -- to its implementation. In the process, EU dithering has emboldened Serb radicals, encouraged Russian bullies and disheartened true democrats and reformers, not only in Kosovo but throughout Southeast Europe.

The last go-round was nail-biting drama over whether things would be slowed down to improve the Socialist Party's chances in the upcoming Spanish elections. This holdup came after other delays, which included making the Kosovars wait two weeks to declare independence because EU ministers could not organize a meeting outside their regular schedule. As a U.S. official noted: "If that's progress in European security and defense policy, I would hate to see regression."

On the other hand, the 27 EU countries largely stuck together, more or less agreed on a line to take, and have now begun the orderly deployment of a new ESDP mission. As Elizabeth Pond, a Balkan analyst, has written, "partly to atone for Europe's failure to stop the Srebrenica massacre in the 1990s, partly to fill the Balkan policy vacuum at a time when Washington was focused on Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and China," the EU took the lead.

Led by veteran German diplomat Wolfgang Ischinger, and with the United Kingdom and Germany pushing ahead, the EU decided to solve Kosovo's status after half a decade of dithering. They seized upon Ahtisaari's plan -- with its idea of conditional independence -- as the only way forward, and fashioned a legal argument to support it. When the talks between Serbs and Kosovars broke down in December 2007, the EU began preparing a police-and-justice mission to take up the United Nations' duties in Kosovo as soon as the new government in Pristina declared independence.

True, once Kosovo declared independence, a number of European countries -- Spain, Cyprus and Romania -- were quick to say they would not recognize the new country. But it was always going to be the case that some countries, mainly for domestic reasons, would be reluctant to recognize Kosovo. Spain faces an election in early March. Cyprus cannot -- for existential reasons -- accept Kosovo's secession. True, the United States pushed the EU all the way.

But what matters is whether the EU 27 could agree on a joint statement -- which they did -- and whether the naysayers would block the EU from deploying the EU mission, a de facto recognition of Kosovo's new status. With Cyprus and Spain allowing the mission to go ahead, Pieter Feith, the new EU envoy, flew into Pristina to assume his duties. In three months' time, away from the headlines, more than 20 EU states will have recognized Kosovo.

Complete EU unity is an ideal worth aspiring to, which can probably never be reached in practice. Over Kosovo, however, the EU has largely been in accord. Compared to past disagreements over Iraq -- or even Iran's nuclear program -- this is probably as good as it gets.

The EU's accord will become all the more important in the months to come. Lessons from the EU's missions elsewhere in the Balkans are clear: To succeed in putting Kosovo on the pathway to sustainable statehood, the EU has to act with a single purpose, coordinated in theater, not in Brussels. Wily Balkan politicians know a policy difference when they see one. Months from now, away from the glare of the media, they will rush to exploit it. To avoid this, the EU's differences need to become more real than apparent.

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(Daniel Korski is a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. Until earlier this year, he was a senior British official and head of the U.K. Provincial Reconstruction Team in Basra, Iraq.)

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(United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of important issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.)