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Russia, Serbia and the New Balkan Geopolitics
2014-01-07
Author:
Tony Rinna
A great deal of discussion regarding current European geopolitics
between Russia and the West has centred on recent events in Ukraine,
with warnings and forecasts about Georgia and Moldova as well. In the
strategically critical Balkan peninsula, however, Russia is quietly
but rapidly making headway in shoring up ties with a major regional
power ` Serbia. Throughout 2013, Serbia made a series of pivotal steps
towards closer integration with Russia in a variety of spheres, a fact
that has not garnered the attention that events in the other
aforementioned Eastern European states have.
Photo by Shutterstock: Kosovska Mitrovica, Serbia - Circa September 2011
One thing that distinguishes this geopolitics from the situation in
Ukraine is that Serbia is not being badgered or bullied into closer
ties with Russia. Russian overtures toward Serbia have been in many
ways more subtle and lacking the political divisiveness witnessed in
Ukraine. This is not to say that Serbia has been wholly willing and
compliant to Russia, but that Russian encroachment on Serbia has been
quieter and a lot less controversial.
This more favourable inclination toward Russia, however, should not
come as a surprise, given a shared Eastern Orthodox religious culture.
In addition to this, the Balkans, according to the late Samuel
Huntington, have been a staging ground where the West, Russia and the
Islamic World have converged in a clash for control of the region via
proxy countries. Russia had traditionally supported Orthodox Serbia,
while Bosnia and Croatia had tended to receive support from Catholic
Austria and the Muslim Ottoman Empire, respectively (Huntington points
to, in the more recent Balkan crisis in the 1990's, German support for
Croatia and Turkish support for Bosnia, while Orthodox Russian and
Greek volunteers came to the aid of the Serbs).
Since the collapse of Yugoslavia, Serbia's territory has slowly been
whittled away, to the point that it is not only a rump state of the
former Yugoslav Federation, but is even a much-reduced version of its
post-Yugoslavia self. Yet Serbia today remains an important power in
the Western Balkans, with the largest military and one of the
strongest economies in the region. The strengthening of Russian ties
with Serbia has occurred on three major fronts: military, economic and
political.
Militarily, Serbia has cast its defence lot with Russia. In early 2013
Serbia became a permanent observer at the Russia-led defence alliance,
the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). In November, 2013,
Russia and Serbia have signed a bilateral agreement on military
cooperation which was fifteen years in the making. NATO has expanded
its membership deeply into the Balkans, and has three more
countries'Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and the Republic of
Macedonia (FYROM)'as candidates. If these three countries end up
joining the Atlantic Alliance, Serbia will be completely surrounded on
all sides by NATO states. This means Serbia may become an Eastern
island surrounded by a Western defence alliance. The likelihood of
Serbia becoming a NATO member is rather remote, seeing as the alliance
will not allow members that have any types of territorial disputes,
and despite Åtefan Füle's praise for the progress achieved between
Serbia and Kosovo, the disagreement is far from over.
Serbia's economy is now predominantly a market economy (although the
state still controls much of the country's economic activity), and is
presently the strongest in the region. The country's Gini coefficient
has averaged at 28.9 since 2006. Although its real GDP growth for 2012
was 0.5 per cent (down 1.3 per cent from the year before), this is
still more than Bosnia and Croatia. Thus, Serbia is relatively healthy
and stable. In terms of trade, Serbia presently balances fairly well
between Europe and Russia. Serbia's main trading partner for exports
is Italy, while Russia is Serbia's main trading partner for imports,
although Germany is only slightly behind Russia in this regard. But
Russia has gained an edge over Europe vis-Ã-vis its ties with Serbia
on two fronts- the Serbian liberalisation of trade with the Russian
Customs Union and the construction of the South Stream pipeline.
The recent victory of the Russia-backed South Stream pipeline against
the EU-supported Nabucco pipeline represents the economic encroachment
by Russia on Serbia. According to Gazprom, the South Stream pipeline
will create 2.5 thousand jobs and lead to a direct investment of 0.5
billion euros in the country. The South Stream pipeline will indeed
continue into the heart of the EU ` Alexei Miller, Gazprom's CEO,
stated that the next portion of the project will be undertaken in
Hungary, but seeing as Serbia is not already a member of the EU or
NATO it represents a major victory for Russia in this particular
aspect of new Balkan geopolitics.
While much of the Balkans has gravitated toward greater integration
with the West since the end of the Cold War, Serbia has been a notable
exception. To be sure, Serbia is set to begin talks with the EU on
accession starting January 21st 2014. But while Serbia is, at present,
a candidate for EU membership, the truth of the matter is that this
can be a rather hollow state of affairs. Turkey is also an EU
candidate but membership seems increasingly elusive. This has prompted
Turkey to search for alterative foreign policy orientations. Croatia
acceded to the EU in July 2013, but this should not be taken as a
reliable metric for gauging the possibility or likelihood of Serbian
accession to the EU. Croatia has had a notable history of closer ties
with the West as exemplified by its historic ties with
Austria-Hungary, and its Catholic religion which, in line with
Huntington's thesis on the `Clash of Civilizations', helped strengthen
its ties to the West. As many observers and analysts state, the EU is
experiencing `expansion fatigue' with regard to its eastward candidate
states, Russia may continue to ramp up its efforts at courting Serbia
politically, which it has done thus far using methods of soft power.
Aside from this, Russia has fomented territorial divisions within
states on its periphery (namely Georgia and Moldova) as it hopes to
prevent them from joining the West militarily and politically. A great
deal of Serbia's progress in relations with the EU has stemmed from
greater flexibility on the Kosovo issue. The West should therefore
take care to monitor any Russian attempts at undoing the progress and
rapprochement thus far achieved between Kosovo and Serbia to prevent
the latter from closer ties to the EU.
Serbia has been demonised to an extent in the West because of the
actions carried out by Serbs in the Homeland War in the early 1990's.
According to Edward S. Herman of the University of Pennsylvania's
Wharton School, the Western demonization of the Serbs has aided NATO's
eastward expansion, and if the Serbs know that they have been
demonized by the Western media, it is not likely that they will want
to become integrated with the West, but rather sidle closer to their
traditional Russian protector. Russia has seized upon the traditional
ties and affinity Serbia has had with Russia and has invested in aid
for Serbia. In 2011, Russia opened an emergency centre in the city of
NiÅ?, a prime example of Russian soft power appeal.
Serbia's increasing of its ties and integration with Russia has been
swift, relatively uncontroversial and seems to have been lost in the
West's geopolitical conscientiousness. In some ways similar to
Armenia, which is a close ally of Russia surrounded by NATO member
Turkey and the generally more pro-Western states of Azerbaijan and
Georgia, Serbia appears to be becoming an important strategic lever
for Russia in the Balkans, one that does not border Russia directly,
but which nonetheless represents an access point for Russia in this
geopolitically critical region. The West should therefore not ignore
or discount the risks to its interests inherent in this grand
development.
Tony Rinna is a contributing geopolitical analyst at the US-based
Center for World Conflict and Peace. His areas of focus include
Russia, Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
http://www.neweasterneurope.eu/node/1094
2014-01-07
Author:
Tony Rinna
A great deal of discussion regarding current European geopolitics
between Russia and the West has centred on recent events in Ukraine,
with warnings and forecasts about Georgia and Moldova as well. In the
strategically critical Balkan peninsula, however, Russia is quietly
but rapidly making headway in shoring up ties with a major regional
power ` Serbia. Throughout 2013, Serbia made a series of pivotal steps
towards closer integration with Russia in a variety of spheres, a fact
that has not garnered the attention that events in the other
aforementioned Eastern European states have.
Photo by Shutterstock: Kosovska Mitrovica, Serbia - Circa September 2011
One thing that distinguishes this geopolitics from the situation in
Ukraine is that Serbia is not being badgered or bullied into closer
ties with Russia. Russian overtures toward Serbia have been in many
ways more subtle and lacking the political divisiveness witnessed in
Ukraine. This is not to say that Serbia has been wholly willing and
compliant to Russia, but that Russian encroachment on Serbia has been
quieter and a lot less controversial.
This more favourable inclination toward Russia, however, should not
come as a surprise, given a shared Eastern Orthodox religious culture.
In addition to this, the Balkans, according to the late Samuel
Huntington, have been a staging ground where the West, Russia and the
Islamic World have converged in a clash for control of the region via
proxy countries. Russia had traditionally supported Orthodox Serbia,
while Bosnia and Croatia had tended to receive support from Catholic
Austria and the Muslim Ottoman Empire, respectively (Huntington points
to, in the more recent Balkan crisis in the 1990's, German support for
Croatia and Turkish support for Bosnia, while Orthodox Russian and
Greek volunteers came to the aid of the Serbs).
Since the collapse of Yugoslavia, Serbia's territory has slowly been
whittled away, to the point that it is not only a rump state of the
former Yugoslav Federation, but is even a much-reduced version of its
post-Yugoslavia self. Yet Serbia today remains an important power in
the Western Balkans, with the largest military and one of the
strongest economies in the region. The strengthening of Russian ties
with Serbia has occurred on three major fronts: military, economic and
political.
Militarily, Serbia has cast its defence lot with Russia. In early 2013
Serbia became a permanent observer at the Russia-led defence alliance,
the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). In November, 2013,
Russia and Serbia have signed a bilateral agreement on military
cooperation which was fifteen years in the making. NATO has expanded
its membership deeply into the Balkans, and has three more
countries'Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and the Republic of
Macedonia (FYROM)'as candidates. If these three countries end up
joining the Atlantic Alliance, Serbia will be completely surrounded on
all sides by NATO states. This means Serbia may become an Eastern
island surrounded by a Western defence alliance. The likelihood of
Serbia becoming a NATO member is rather remote, seeing as the alliance
will not allow members that have any types of territorial disputes,
and despite Åtefan Füle's praise for the progress achieved between
Serbia and Kosovo, the disagreement is far from over.
Serbia's economy is now predominantly a market economy (although the
state still controls much of the country's economic activity), and is
presently the strongest in the region. The country's Gini coefficient
has averaged at 28.9 since 2006. Although its real GDP growth for 2012
was 0.5 per cent (down 1.3 per cent from the year before), this is
still more than Bosnia and Croatia. Thus, Serbia is relatively healthy
and stable. In terms of trade, Serbia presently balances fairly well
between Europe and Russia. Serbia's main trading partner for exports
is Italy, while Russia is Serbia's main trading partner for imports,
although Germany is only slightly behind Russia in this regard. But
Russia has gained an edge over Europe vis-Ã-vis its ties with Serbia
on two fronts- the Serbian liberalisation of trade with the Russian
Customs Union and the construction of the South Stream pipeline.
The recent victory of the Russia-backed South Stream pipeline against
the EU-supported Nabucco pipeline represents the economic encroachment
by Russia on Serbia. According to Gazprom, the South Stream pipeline
will create 2.5 thousand jobs and lead to a direct investment of 0.5
billion euros in the country. The South Stream pipeline will indeed
continue into the heart of the EU ` Alexei Miller, Gazprom's CEO,
stated that the next portion of the project will be undertaken in
Hungary, but seeing as Serbia is not already a member of the EU or
NATO it represents a major victory for Russia in this particular
aspect of new Balkan geopolitics.
While much of the Balkans has gravitated toward greater integration
with the West since the end of the Cold War, Serbia has been a notable
exception. To be sure, Serbia is set to begin talks with the EU on
accession starting January 21st 2014. But while Serbia is, at present,
a candidate for EU membership, the truth of the matter is that this
can be a rather hollow state of affairs. Turkey is also an EU
candidate but membership seems increasingly elusive. This has prompted
Turkey to search for alterative foreign policy orientations. Croatia
acceded to the EU in July 2013, but this should not be taken as a
reliable metric for gauging the possibility or likelihood of Serbian
accession to the EU. Croatia has had a notable history of closer ties
with the West as exemplified by its historic ties with
Austria-Hungary, and its Catholic religion which, in line with
Huntington's thesis on the `Clash of Civilizations', helped strengthen
its ties to the West. As many observers and analysts state, the EU is
experiencing `expansion fatigue' with regard to its eastward candidate
states, Russia may continue to ramp up its efforts at courting Serbia
politically, which it has done thus far using methods of soft power.
Aside from this, Russia has fomented territorial divisions within
states on its periphery (namely Georgia and Moldova) as it hopes to
prevent them from joining the West militarily and politically. A great
deal of Serbia's progress in relations with the EU has stemmed from
greater flexibility on the Kosovo issue. The West should therefore
take care to monitor any Russian attempts at undoing the progress and
rapprochement thus far achieved between Kosovo and Serbia to prevent
the latter from closer ties to the EU.
Serbia has been demonised to an extent in the West because of the
actions carried out by Serbs in the Homeland War in the early 1990's.
According to Edward S. Herman of the University of Pennsylvania's
Wharton School, the Western demonization of the Serbs has aided NATO's
eastward expansion, and if the Serbs know that they have been
demonized by the Western media, it is not likely that they will want
to become integrated with the West, but rather sidle closer to their
traditional Russian protector. Russia has seized upon the traditional
ties and affinity Serbia has had with Russia and has invested in aid
for Serbia. In 2011, Russia opened an emergency centre in the city of
NiÅ?, a prime example of Russian soft power appeal.
Serbia's increasing of its ties and integration with Russia has been
swift, relatively uncontroversial and seems to have been lost in the
West's geopolitical conscientiousness. In some ways similar to
Armenia, which is a close ally of Russia surrounded by NATO member
Turkey and the generally more pro-Western states of Azerbaijan and
Georgia, Serbia appears to be becoming an important strategic lever
for Russia in the Balkans, one that does not border Russia directly,
but which nonetheless represents an access point for Russia in this
geopolitically critical region. The West should therefore not ignore
or discount the risks to its interests inherent in this grand
development.
Tony Rinna is a contributing geopolitical analyst at the US-based
Center for World Conflict and Peace. His areas of focus include
Russia, Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
http://www.neweasterneurope.eu/node/1094