There it is: the declaration of independence by Kosovo. How many countries will recognize it? And the UN? Will it? Or not?
My country should stick to the UN resolution, nothing else. If we disregard legality, we'll be forever under the diktat of the big countries.
What will happen now to the Serbians there? What will Russia do? And Serbia herself? (I pity them). Everybody has forgotten that for much less than this the Great War started in 1914. According to international law, today Serbia has the right to declare war to protect her territorial integrity.
And the separatists all over Europe: the Corsicans in France; the Northern Irish, Scots and Welsh in the UK; the Basques and Catalans in Spain; the Turks in Cyprus, etc.? What will they do now? Why is given to the Albanians in Kosovo rights of independence that are not given to those other peoples?
The Pandora box is open. It started in 1999. This is the 9th year after that, the year of completion of that movement. An independent Kosovo will be worst than East Timor (also an affair of 1999) for two main reasons:
First, East Timor was a colony of Portugal occupied by Indonesia, so the problem had to be solved. Kosovo is part of Serbia, even if the majority of its population came from Albania. It wasn't pretty to see the UN forcing Indonesia to leave East Timor, but the international law prevailed. Yet, Serbia was bombed by NATO to let Kosovo go, in the name of humanitarian causes, a hypocritical justification, to say the least. If NATO bombed every country with humanitarian problems, they would have no time to refuel the jets, I'm sure.
Secondly, East Timor is rich in natural gas and oil; all they need is brains to know how to invest and distribute the money. Kosovo has no resources whatsoever; so, the EU will have to support the new country from top to bottom; otherwise, it will be the perfect sanctuary for the underworld.
As we watch the problems East Timor has got, even with all the money and help it receives from abroad and with UN troops there, and the utopia of a young and healthy country is fading, just imagine what will cost us to keep Kosovo under control. The EU is to blame, as it should never have allowed the NATO bombings, but the USA is the most responsible party. They wanted to have a foot near the Russian borders and now they have it. And I remind you it was Clinton, not Bush, who did it. Only time will tell if the foot in Kosovo will be more costly to the West than the foot in Iraq, or not.
