By: Risto Karajkov

Recently, after a period of prolonged strife within the Islamic Religious Community (IVZ), its leader Sulejman Rexhepi publicly asked the government of Macedonia and representatives of the international community for protection from radical Islamic groups. He called in particular on the “embassy of the United States and the European Union to support the IVZ and take appropriate measures” against such groups. Rexhepi’s public cry for help echoed internationally. It was interpreted as one more sign of the rising influence of radical Islam in the Balkans.

Pressure within the IVZ has been mounting all summer. Rumors, hushed and denied, have gone on for years that the IVZ does not have effective control of all of its mosques in the capital city of Skopje, Macedonia. Late June, the Friday prayer at the Isa Beg Mosque was violently interrupted. A group of people, reportedly led by Ramadan Ramadani, attacked and chased away the Skopje mufti, Ibraim Shabani, and several other IVZ officials, preventing them from conducting the prayer. Only several days before the incident, Ramadani was revoked from his position of odza in the Isa Beg Mosque by IVZ on charges of organizing unauthorized lectures. IVZ said Ramadani was revoked after repeated warnings.

The public learned of the incident only a week later, after a tape was presented by the Democratic Party of the Albanians (DPA), one of the two major parties in the Albanian political block, currently in opposition. DPA accused its political opponent, the Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), part of the government coalition, of involvement in the incident.

The incident forced the IVZ, after practically years of denial, to admit that it does not have effective control over some of its mosques in Skopje. It also made it point a finger at “radical groups” that want to take control over the Islamic community in the country. The mosques most often mentioned as outside IVZ control are the Isa Beg, Aladza, Sultan Murat and Hatandzuk.

The dismissed Ramadani has denied accusations of spreading radicalism and has also disputed IVZ’s decision for his removal. “The decision is not valid. This is a first in IVZ’s history that someone is dismissed in such a non-transparent way,” said Ramadani. He argued that IVZ did not have a quorum when it made the decision. He accused the IVZ leader Sulejman Rexhepi of serious financial wrongdoings and said the rhetoric of radicalism was just an excuse. Ramadani started collecting signatures for the removal of Rexhepi from his position as leader of IVZ. He put on hold his initiative mid-August as Ramadan started, but was reported to have collected some 7,000 signatures.

Ramadani’s civic initiative cannot replace the chief mufti Rexhepi?the IVZ leader can only be revoked by the Riaset, the IVZ top body?but if the number of 7,000 signatures is accurate, it indicates a significant following.

After the June incident at the Isa Beg Mosque, IVZ asked the Ministry of Interior (MoI) for protection, that is, to help it restore its control over the mosque. The police said they can only intervene if ordered to by the court. Apparently, in legal terms, the administration of the mosque is a civil matter and the police cannot intervene without a court order (the violent incident is a separate matter and can be a simple misdemeanor). “The moment we are ordered by the court, we will intervene” said MoI spokesperson Ivo Kotevski. The ministry said its hands were tied also concerning the allegations of spreading radical teaching of Islam. As long as there is no direct incitement of racial or ethnic hatred, or direct calls for subversion of institutions of government, the police cannot intervene, was the reaction of the MoI.

Insiders explain the police’s inertia with the political interests involved. According to them, the two major Albanian political parties, DUI and DPA, are not without a stake in the entire affair. Also, according to some of those interpretations, the accusations of radical teachings are just the front for internal struggles over power and control within IVZ. Several years ago there was an even more serious, armed incident, involving known criminals, in a mosque in the village of Kondovo, apparently over who would have control over the mosque.

Institutions’ inertia can easily be explained with political backing in a country such as Macedonia. But it would be completely improbable to think that a major Albanian political party would in any way be supportive of radical Islamic elements. Politics is strongly secular in Macedonia. In addition, Albanian politicians would know better than to risk the support by the international community.

However, elements exist in support of IVZ’s claims over the spread of radical teaching. Citing the unauthorized lectures as the grounds for his dismissal, the Skopje mufti, Ibraim Shabani, in particular objected to the lectures by a local Islamic scholar, Bekir Halimi. In July, after the incident, IVZ directly brought Halimi’s name in connection with the spreading of Wahabism. Two years ago the police raided the premises of Halimi’s association called Bamsiera on suspicion of links with radical groups in the region and internationally. The suspicion was apparently caused by a small money transfers by an organization from Kuwait. Halimi was however neither detained nor charged. Some media subsequently reported the case as a mistake. Halimi himself has denied allegations of spreading radical ideas in the past. He has claimed that the local Muslim tradition is “immune to such influences” and that local priests know how to protect the believers. Ramadani, for his part, justified Halimi’s unauthorized lectures arguing that he was a recognized scholar and that it was a privilege to have him speak.

There have been no public reactions following the IVZ’s leader call upon Europe and the United States to defend moderate Islam in the country. However, after years of rumors and denials, the clash is now out in the open. Further unraveling seems imminent.

NOTE: This article was originally published in Italian by Osservatorio Balcani: http://www.balcanicaucaso.org/eng.

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by Risto Karajkov

Twenty years after the fall of the Wall, the controversial lustration process – the epuration of those who cooperated with the police of Communist regimes – is still in deep waters. And many wonder whether rummaging archives still makes sense.

As the summer ended, the Macedonian lustration commission finally opened its doors for politicians who rushed in to submit their statements swearing they had not collaborated with the communist secret services. The commission, the chief instrument created to implement the law on lustration, has to verify these statements against the old secret police files.

A year and half after the Macedonian lustration law was passed, and 18 years since the beginning of transition, lustration has finally commenced.

Time is still needed to see the actual effect on Macedonian society. Some experts argued that a loud bang is out of the question; perhaps even a hushed whimper would be too much to expect. Some believe that after all these years the powerful politicians have found ways to get their names out of the dusty files.

Even the initial steps, however, hinge on the constitutional court’s assessment of the lustration law. The court recently agreed to review several petitions made by citizens and NGOs that challenged the legitimacy of parts of the legislation. Some people would be surprised if the court finds the law to be in accord with the constitution. Throughout eastern Europe, constitutional courts have regularly reviewed lustration laws.

The start of lustration makes Macedonia a leader in the western Balkans region. Albania’s lustration law adopted in early 2009 was repealed by the Albanian constitutional court just months later. The court’s decision was preceded by strong criticism by the international community, which found the bill to be a potentially serious threat to human rights in the country.

Lustration laws regularly have difficulties withstanding constitutional scrutiny. Some of their features, such as retroactive effect, broad and ill-defined categories of offenders; and problems in differentiating between the public and the private sphere, have provided reasons for constitutional courts to repeal the law. In Bulgaria, the constitutional court annulled an early lustration attempts in 1992. (Sofia enacted its last lustration instrument at the very end of 2006, two weeks before it joined the European Union. Similarly, the constitutional court in the former Czechoslovakia ruled in November 1992 to reduce the scope of the law by restricting the category of “lustrati“. More recently (May 2007), the constitutional court in Poland rescinded most key provisions of the Kaczynski brothers’ mega-lustration bill. The Polish court had also reacted similarly with the bill in 2000, which expanded the scope of previous phases of lustration.

In view of this history, the Macedonian constitutional court may also follow suit. The Macedonian law is also broad in scope, both in categories of “lustrati”, as well as the period it covers.

However, Albania and Macedonia are not the only countries in the Balkans finding it difficult to start their lustrations.

The first country in the region to actually adopt lustration legislation was Serbia. Belgrade passed its law back in 2003. However, lustration has still not effectively begun, nor is there indication that it would begin anywhere in the near future. The 2003 legislation was “born dead”. The commission that was supposed to begin work by lustrating candidates for the 2003 snap elections, never started working, and later it simply dissolved. Commentators say the lustration law had no power because supplementary legislation on opening of secret police files, which was supposed to ensue within two months, never took place.

The other countries in the region are even further behind in the process. Croatia, Montenegro, and Bosnia and Herzegovina do not even have legislation.

Croatia had several attempts to enact lustration legislation. Lustration bills were on the agenda of parliament in 1998 and 1999, and they were voted down both times. Neither Montenegro nor Bosnia has a law, although Podgorica at least has a draft bill.

Twenty years after the end of communism, lustration is still an issue, and it has not even effectively commenced. Perhaps countries in the Balkans should really rethink if they want to “forgive and forget”. In 2000, Adam Michnik advocated the abandoning of lustration in Poland and said that states cannot move forward without having reconciled with the past, but that the challenge is how to achieve this and maintain balance between justice and stability. In 2007, Serbian President Boris Tadic said it was too late for lustration in Serbia. He probably (and rightfully) feared it would further antagonise the already polarised country.

In the Balkans, the overall problem is the delay. If 18 years after the beginning of transition, countries have not even started the lustration, when will they be able to complete it? The experience of the central and east European countries has shown that immediate and quick lustration was the best and least painful way. Subsequent waves of late lustration tended to broaden, protract, and become overly politicised processes. Both the theoretical and the expert community share the consensus that timeliness was a primary factor of effectiveness in the lustration process.

How meaningful can lustration be almost two decades later? Some answers to this dilemma should perhaps be expected from the Macedonian lustration commission members. As small, busy mice, they will be sniffing the dusty police files during the coming winter.

Osservatorio Balcani
www.osservatoriobalcani.org

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By Risto Karajkov

A “historic day,” the “fall of the wall,” the “end of visas” — these were some of the headlines in the Balkan media in response to the European Commission (E.C.) proposing visa liberalization for Macedonia, Serbia, and Montenegro. The visa-free travel could ideally be possible by the beginning of January 2010. Macedonia has already fulfilled all the technical conditions, while some benchmarks still remain to be met by Serbia and Montenegro.

The E.C. proposal would next be discussed in the European Parliament, and the final decision would be made by the European Council later in the year. “I trust that this proposal should be adopted by the E.U. member states by the end of this year after we have also consulted the European Parliament,” Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn said at the announcement of the Commission’s proposal yesterday in Brussels. Visa liberalization will bring an end to a costly, unpleasant, and sometimes humiliating ritual for people who need to travel abroad. “For the citizens of the Western Balkans, visa-free travel means no more queuing at embassies, no more visa fees, and no more collecting of supporting documents such as invitation letters, tickets and paying for their translation,” Rehn said. “In a nutshell,” he added, “this will mean a further Europeanization of the civil societies in the Western Balkans and it is an example that European integration is not only a matter of integrating nations, but also peoples and citizens.” The news was greeted with undivided enthusiasm in the three countries.

The issue of painful visa regime has made headlines and topped political agendas for some years. “Our citizens deserved this, and this is success of the European idea in Macedonia,” said Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, welcoming the news in Skopje. Montenegrin Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic received the news in Kotor where he was in a meeting with E.U.’s H.F.S.P. chief Javier Solana. Djukanovic said that Montenegro will meet the remaining conditions by October and expressed confidence that his country will be visa free on January 1, 2010. “We have fulfilled most of the conditions from the roadmap for visa liberalization and now we have a few more things to do,” Djukanovic said. “There is no doubt that our partners will be satisfied with our results.”

In response to the motion from Brussels, Serbian President Boris Tadic said that the Commission’s recommendation is an important thing for the citizens of Serbia. He added it was good that other countries in the region would also be visa free because that would improve the quality of life in the region overall. “Serbia is not responsible only for itself, but also for the cooperation in the region, given that it is the central country in Southeast Europe,” President Tadic said. Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic added that visa liberalization would restore people’s dignity. “From January 1, the citizens of Serbia will be able to travel without visas to Europe, and this will give them back their dignity,” Cvetkovic said. Serbian Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration Bozidar Djelic also welcomed the move but underscored that work had to continue. “The visa darkness has been lifted from the citizens of Serbia, but there is no time for relaxation. We have to continue the reforms.” Djelic was cited by Serbian media comparing the fall of the visa barrier with the national holiday celebrated by the French, the fall of the Bastille in 1789.

Some of the reactions in Serbia expressed concern over the fact that the visa liberalization will divide Serbs in Serbia from Serbs living in Kosovo. The visa-free travel will be a possibility for Serbian citizens with biometric passports, but because of security concerns, even with new biometric passports, residents of Kosovo will still need visas. Kosovo authorities accepted the decision as a further recognition of their separate independent status from Serbia. In addition to Kosovo, Bosnia, Herzegovina and Albania were excluded from the recommendation because they did not make sufficient progress with the needed reforms. Mr. Rehn, however, left the door open. “The ‘roadmaps’ that the E.U. gave them last year are still valid, and they are still perfectly doable if the authorities in these two countries put their full will into delivering now,” Rehn said. “If Albania and Bosnia and Herzegovina keep up the pace of reforms and thus meet the conditions, the Commission could envisage making a new proposal by mid-2010.” Bosnia greeted the news with expected disappointment, but Minister of Civilian Affairs Sredoje Novic said that the government could start issuing new biometric passports by mid-October. B.I.H. officials hope that could allow the country to join the first three countries by mid-2010.

Reactions in Albania also showed optimism. Albanian Interior Minister Bujar Nishani said that Albania needs only to meet a few technical conditions in to join the visa liberalization process, and that the country would come on target by the end of 2009. After a longer period of time, Brussels sent an encouraging message to the Balkans. For most people in the Balkans the European idea is by and large associated with the freedom of movement. This article was originally published at www.osservatoriobalcani.org

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By: Risto Karajkov
World Politics Review, 14 May 2009

SKOPJE, Macedonia — On May 1, the European Union celebrated the fifth anniversary of its “big bang,” the massive wave of enlargement in 2004 that saw it accept 10 new members — eight former communist countries from Eastern Europe, plus Malta and Cyprus. When Romania and Bulgaria joined two and a half years later, in 2007, the EU counted 27 member states, almost half a billion people and 30 percent of the world’s GDP.

In the years since, the EU’s enlargement policy has been considered an unequivocal success. It has brought jobs and growth to the new member states, and provided new markets for the old ones. It has spread stability and democracy, while creating an unprecedented area of free movement of people, capital, and ideas on the European mainland.

For the troubled Balkans, the EU enlargement policy has also been considered the principal instrument for maintaining stability and keeping the countries of the region on course for democratic reform. If these countries have made efforts to keep nationalists at bay, it has been in large part due to the endlessly repeated promise that one day, they, too, would join the club.

As recently as last November, EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn said that 2009 could potentially be a great year for the countries in the Western Balkans. Croatia was expected to complete negotiations, which meant formally joining the Union in 2010. Macedonia was supposed to get a date for the start of talks, advancing it to a higher level in the accession process. Serbia was to get candidate status, the level preceding the start of the negotiations phase.

Enter the global economic crisis. Five years after the “big bang,” the prospects for the enlargement process have never seemed gloomier, with some of the major EU member states expressing clear reservations about new accessions. In late March, German Chancellor Angela Merkel suggested “a consolidation phase” for enlargement, following Croatia’s formal accession. Similarly, France has been insisting that no new accessions take place until the Lisbon Treaty — the new EU constitution which should make decision-making in the Union more effective — has been ratified.

More concretely, Germany asked the European Commission (EC) — currently the EU executive — to delay its opinion on Montenegro’s membership application, which the government in Podgorica submitted in December 2008.

Meanwhile, Croatia whose accession seemed a foregone conclusion, has found itself blocked by neighboring Slovenia over a territorial dispute. (See Phil Cain’s WPR Briefing.) As an EU member state, Slovenia can exercise what amounts to a veto on new accessions. While neither the other EU member states nor the EC approve, there is little they can do outside of grumbling and trying to mediate the dispute. Croatia, which could have entered by next year, might now have to wait until 2012, and even that depends on resolving the dispute with Slovenia.

Most of the recent reservations regarding enlargement have to do with the economic crisis. As rich European countries shed jobs and their economies plunge, fears and animosity toward migrants — including workers from new member states — rise. That, in turn, puts pressure on politicians to respond to such fears, especially when elections are near, as they are in Germany, as well as in the European Union itself (the campaign for the EU parliament officially begins next month). Some experts explain recent German moves vis-à-vis enlargement in this light.

Fears and Animosity Toward Migrants, European Immigration, Migrants, Immigration, Economic Recession, Macedonia, Serbia, NATO, Serbs in Kosovo, Croats, Bosnia, Dayton Peace Deal,

That puts member states at odds with the EC, which has been tirelessly repeating to Western Balkan countries that progress on enlargement is entirely up to them, depending only on how well they do with reforms designed to harmonize national governance and policy with EU standards.

Voices have been raised against the anti-enlargement bandwagon. Enlargement Commissioner Rehn recently exhorted the European Parliament not to “make enlargement the scapegoat of economic recession.” Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, who in the past has played an active role in the Balkan crises, has also argued that the Western Balkan countries should “not be punished” in order to please the voters in some countries.

But given member states’ behavior, that now looks increasingly like empty talk.

Another casualty of the economic crisis may be the eagerly awaited visa liberalization that the Western Balkans, including Macedonia and Serbia, had been hoping would take place in 2009. With actual membership a distant prospect, the dropping of visas is the next best thing, and the Balkans has been desperate for it for quite some time. The EC is expected to recommend it over the next couple of months, after which the interior ministers of the EU member states could make a final decision towards the end of the year. But even on this count, the commission had to go against the will of some member states. Diplomatic activity is under way, and the final outcome is still not known.

The prospect of enlargement has played a stabilizing role in the Balkans, making its sudden removal a cause for concern. The timing is particularly unfavorable too. In Macedonia, nationalism is on the rise, in part due to obstacles to international integration, such as the Greek veto on entry to NATO last year. Serbs in Kosovo are increasingly anxious, Croats are increasingly embittered and Bosnia is, by many accounts, in the worst shape it has been in since the Dayton peace deal that ended the war in 1995.

The economic crisis threatens to push the Balkans into recession, but economies can rebound. And besides, poorly performing economies are business as usual in the region. Should the crisis also kill the region’s shiniest political hope, it could have a far deeper and more lasting impact.

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by Risto Karajkov
Osservatorio sui Balcani

Mid December Facebook shut down the group “Noz, zica, Srebrenica” [Knife, Barb Wire, Srebrenica]. The forum, which got its name after a Serb nationalist slogan, glorified the bloodiest massacre in Europe after the end of World War II and promoted hatred against Muslims.

The group rallied support for the former Serb general and war criminal at large Ratko Mladic who in 1995 led the genocide of 8,000 Muslim men and boys committed by the Serb forces in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica. It was calling all those who believed “Muslims are best on a barbeque or swimming in sulfuric acid” to join them. That was its ideological platform: killing of Muslims and praising war criminals.

Reports differed on the membership the group had managed to acquire before being shut down. According to Reuters, which first broke the story internationally, it was around 1,000 members, but other sources went with numbers as high as 8,000 – a number equivalent to the number of victims in Srebrenica.

A counter-group emerged quickly in response. The group “Close Group Noz, Zica, Srebrenica” managed to gather around 10,000 members, mostly Bosniak, within days of its creation and to have the former shut down by Facebook administrators.

Likely the shutting down was also propelled by the interest of international media, such as Reuters, or the Financial Times, both of which reported the story.

Facebook’s statement on the issue as reported by media reads that the site “supports the free flow of information, and groups provide a forum for discussing important issues. However, Facebook will remove any groups which are violent or threatening.”

Reactions on the affair echoed internationally and covered the entire left-right spectrum. From the position that that this was censorship and act against free speech – comparison has been made to Columbus Day in the US which is in some views also about celebration of a genocide – to pointing out that in some countries similar talk (such as for example praising Nazism) is a crime.

Reactions varied also concerning the potential significance of such behavior. They ranged from comments that this only indicates how fragile and seeming peace in the Balkans is, to saying that this is nothing more than, yet sad and uneducated, teenage anger.

If according to some, such adolescent rage is no different than the rage of young people in Greece or the Netherlands; others disagree by saying that recent history in the Balkans opened the door for hatred the West is not capable of.

According to Boshko Obradovic, member of the board of the magazine “Dveri srpske,” in coverage by Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Kill a Serb, Imam noz od srebra, zaricu ga Srbinu u jedra, Fuck the group ‘Srbe na vrbe’,

“We have a generation which has been growing up in a very difficult transition period; we have huge national frustrations; war traumas; a generation which has grown up without any real spiritual or national education.”

Yet, in his view “such adolescent behavior can be found anywhere in Europe.” “For example we see Greece these days,” says Obradovic, “and over the last years we saw it in France, Germany, or the Netherlands. Our teenagers are not more radical or socially aggressive than teenagers across Europe.”

In the words of Serbian writer Marko Vidojkovic, quoted by the same RFE/RL report , Balkan extremism can still not be equated with what is going on elsewhere:

“Any form of fascism is completely normal around here because under Milosevic’s and Tudjman’s leadership we had incitement of hatred so strong that it simply cannot be eliminated that easily. In such situation, the easiest thing is to hate someone without any reason…”

Nevertheless, Vidojkovic believes that after all the Facebook affair is a work of deluded kids and that a decent mode should be found to straighten them up:

“Kids have always been the victims, without any intention to justify any Nazi. Yet these kids need to be understood and brought back to their senses in some normal way. When I was young, I may have been worse than this.”

Speech hate or incitement of ethnic or religious is a crime around the Balkans, as in many other countries, but many national legislations have still not caught up with the pace of the web. In reaction to the affair, Serbian prosecution authorities said they did not have any mandate to pursue the issue as the legal possibility to prosecute for hate speech on the Internet did not yet exist.

Nevertheless, Serbs are not the only ones talking hatred on Facebook. At the time of writing this text a couple of groups by the name “Srbe na vrbe” [Serbs on Willows; a slang calling for hanging of Serbs], are still active on the site. One opens with the large slogan “Kill a Serb,” the other, which reports its office to be Jasenovac starts with the ghastly slogan “Imam noz od srebra, zaricu ga Srbinu u jedra” [I have a silver knife; I will stab it between a Serb's ribs]. The counter-organizations are also there. One is called “Close the group ‘Srbe na vrbe’” and it counts 5,588 members. There is also a smaller group called “Fuck the group ‘Srbe na vrbe’.”

Some of the chats and comments on these forums are nothing but blind rage and hatred and they are simply too graphic to convey. And indeed, only to state a fact and not debate its appropriateness, such talk would be a criminal offense if used in conventional media in any country in the Balkans.

Some of the comments sighed with the well known feeling of Serbian victimhood. Facebook shut down the Serb nationalists but not the anti-Serb ones, they went.

That would likely be a messy affair – if Facebook was to monitor all such forums that is – and potentially open jobs for thousands of lawyers who should decide where to draw the line. Given national circumstances and sensitivities, what is a crime in one country, can be freely said in another one.

Obradovic says that the “Internet has opened an enormous space for freedom of speech, but it has not yet offered a solution concerning the responsibility for what is being said.” That much is true.

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