Thirty years ago, the breakup of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia set off a wave of independence claims and a proliferation of new states. For some, though, the process remains far from complete.
It’s a point the Kremlin makes obsessively; President Vladimir Putin reiterated it when UN Secretary-General António Guterres visited Moscow in late April: the ‘Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics’ have just as much right to declare their independence as Kosovo did in 2008.
Russia invoked this Balkan ‘precedent’ to justify recognising the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia (the UN and most states consider them still part of Georgia) in 2008 and annexing Crimea in 2014. In a world governed by power relations, where all the tools of multilateralism seem ineffective, invocations of international law have never been more audible.
But what exactly does the UN Charter say? It’s based on two potentially contradictory principles: respect for states’ sovereignty and territorial integrity, and peoples’ right to self-determination. The UN helped steer the decolonisation process from the 1960s and chapter XI of its Charter defines a special category of ‘Trust and Non-Self-Governing Territories’; today there are 17 of these, including Western Sahara, Gibraltar and some British dominions, New Caledonia and French Polynesia — the last of which was restored to the list in 2013 after a long absence, in response to a campaign by the pro-independence party Tavini Huiraatira.
Things changed with the breakup of the federal communist states of Czechoslovakia, the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, leading to a proliferation of newly independent states that continued into this century and spread to other regions, including Eritrea, East Timor and South Sudan (1). Slovakia and the Czech Republic agreed a swift, amicable divorce, but the other two breakups proved tougher. In Yugoslavia, some claims to the right to secede, guaranteed under the 1974 constitution, were contested; and in the USSR, competing claims led to problems: if the Soviet Republics of Armenia and Azerbaijan gained independence, what was to be done about the autonomous region of Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave within Azerbaijan claimed by Armenia?
Who can claim independence?
In December 1991 the Arbitration Commission of the Conference on Yugoslavia chaired by former French justice minister Robert Badinter set out two principles: only former federal republics could claim independence — not smaller subdivisions such as regions, provinces or autonomous territories, which was precisely the case for Kosovo, Abkhazia and South Ossetia — and former federal republics’ borders were to be preserved unchanged when they became international borders. Kosovo’s declaration of independence in February 2008, which was supported by most Western countries, including the US and France, broke the commission’s first principle, but Badinter explained at the time that Kosovo was a special case (2).
Five EU member states have not recognised Kosovo's independence: Cyprus and Greece, out of ‘Orthodox solidarity' with Serbia; Romania and Slovakia, which have large Hungarian minorities; and Spain
What made Kosovo special? The Serbian government’s violent repression in the 1990s? That was hardly unique. NATO’s aerial bombing campaign in spring 1999? That would be an admission that the use of force can be the basis of the law. The demographic argument? Given that almost all of the population was ethnically Albanian, a referendum would have been pointless; the results would have been a foregone conclusion.
To explain Kosovo’s particular status, it’s necessary to understand the founding principles of Yugoslav federalism, which distinguished between the country’s ‘constituent peoples’ and ‘national minorities’. Constituent peoples had no ‘reference state’ outside Yugoslavia’s borders. This was the case for the Croats, Macedonians, Montenegrins, Serbs and Slovenes (Bosnia-Herzegovina’s Muslims also gained this status in 1971). By contrast, Yugoslavia’s Albanian, Bulgarian, Hungarian and Italian populations were considered ‘national minorities’, regardless of their numbers.
Only constituent peoples could have an eponymous republic; they also enjoyed the status of ‘peoples’ in Yugoslavia’s other republics, such as Serbs who lived in Croatia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina’s Croats and Serbs. Yugoslavia’s 1974 constitution recognised federal republics’ and constituent peoples’ right to self-determination, and in 1981 the Kosovar Albanians organised large-scale demonstrations, which were violently repressed, to obtain the status of constituent people, and the reclassification of Kosovo as a federal republic.
The recognition of sovereignty in 1974 gave Croatia the right to declare independence, but also meant its Serbian minority had the right to oppose it: though Serbs represented just 12% of the Croatia’s population according to the 1991 census, this contradiction was used to justify the declaration of ‘Serb Autonomous Regions’ and later the ‘Serbian republics’ of Krajina and Eastern Slavonia. Croatia retook Krajina in Operation Storm in early August 1995 without resistance from Belgrade, and the former ‘Serbian Autonomous Oblast of Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Syrmia’ was ‘reincorporated’ into the Croatian state between 1995 and 1998.
A three-tier system
The USSR’s passion for bureaucracy led to a three-tier system there, since federal republics could contain autonomous republics and simple autonomous regions (oblasts), which had fewer powers. This theoretical difference in status has had little practical impact: South Ossetia, the former autonomous oblast of the federal republic of Georgia, declared its independence, as did the former autonomous republic of Abkhazia, while Adjara remains an autonomous republic of Georgia. Transnistria, officially the ‘Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic’, had no administrative status in the Soviet Union, but that did not stop it declaring independence from Moldova in 1991.
Slovenia held an independence referendum in December 1990, requiring its parliament to declare independence within six months, which it did in June 1991. Croatia, which held its own referendum in May 1991, followed suit. Under strong international pressure, these declarations of independence were put on hold on 25 June: neither the European Economic Community (EEC) nor the US supported them, preferring to back the reform agenda of federal prime minister Ante Marković. On the 30th anniversary of the 1991 declaration, former president Milan Kucan told me that independence was ‘Slovenia’s last remaining option’, as Croatia’s Franjo Tuđman and Serbia’s Slobodan Milošević were secretly negotiating the partition of Yugoslavia, but the then US secretary of state James Baker assured him that his country would never recognise it (3).
These declarations of independence came into effect on 15 December 1991, by which time the war had spread to the whole of Croatia. The summer of 1991 had seen intense but unsuccessful negotiations to come up with an ‘asymmetric federation’. Macedonia declared independence in September 1991, Bosnia-Herzegovina in March 1992, following a referendum boycotted by the nationalists of the Serb Democratic Party (SDS). Only Montenegro, Serbia and its autonomous provinces of Kosovo and Vojvodina refrained from doing so.
Milo Đukanović, Montenegro’s strongman for over three decades, organised two independence referendums. In 1992 Montenegrins were asked, ‘Do you agree that Montenegro, as a sovereign republic, should continue to exist within the common state, Yugoslavia, totally equal in rights with other republics that might wish the same?’ (Serbian citizens were not consulted.) Đukanović, then Slobodan Milošević’s close ally, campaigned for a yes vote, which won 95%, but national minorities and independence supporters boycotted the poll. This vote for continuing unity paved the way for the declaration of a new Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on 27 April 1992.
Serbia independent by default
Fourteen years later, in May 2006, Montenegrins were asked, ‘Do you wish the Republic of Montenegro to become an independent state with full legal and international recognition?’ Đukanović, who had in the meantime parted ways with Milošević and moved closer to the West, now campaigned for independence, which won 55.4% on a turnout of 86.5%. The EU, a longtime opponent of Montenegrin independence, had stipulated that, to put the result beyond challenge, the pro-independence vote had to win over 55% to be valid. Montenegrin independence led to the breakup of the third Yugoslavia, and Serbia became independent by default.
Montenegro’s referendum result was announced in Cetinje, its historic capital, amid an incongruous forest of Catalan flags. Catalan independence campaigners were there to support Montenegrin independence, which they saw as an example of peaceful, democratic secession. They organised a referendum of their own in October 2017, in which yes won more than 90%, though turnout was just 42%. The Spanish courts declared this referendum illegal and its organisers were imprisoned for sedition, despite their entitlement to immunity as parliamentarians. This referendum provoked fierce debate in the Balkans, especially Slovenia, where many politicians on both left and right considered Catalonia’s aspirations legitimate. It took strong European pressure to ensure that Slovenia (which had joined the EU in 2006) did not break ranks and become only EU member to recognise the Catalan vote.
Catalan (and Basque) independence aspirations explain Madrid’s current intransigence over Kosovo. Five EU member states have not recognised its independence: Cyprus and Greece, out of ‘Orthodox solidarity’ with Serbia; Romania and Slovakia, which fear a contagion effect among their large Hungarian minorities; and Spain, the staunchest of the naysayers. In Serbian nationalists’ demonstrations against Kosovo’s independence in February 2008, Spanish flags were even more visible than Russian ones. The EU has not recognised Kosovo, as such decisions are a sovereign matter for individual states. (Some ‘micro-states’ have turned granting recognition into a cash generator, such as the island of Nauru, the only state in the world that recognises Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Kosovo.)
Belgrade was alarmed in summer 2008 when Moscow justified its recognition of Abkhazia’s and South Ossetia’s independence by citing the ‘precedent’ of Kosovo (4). Serbia counted on Russia’s support in the UN Security Council, but what principled objection could Russia then make against recognising Kosovo’s independence? The same fears arose in 2014 after the annexation of Crimea, and in February 2022 with the recognition of the ‘Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics’.
Fears of a grand geopolitical deal involving Russia’s recognition of Kosovo also resurfaced after the meeting between Presidents Trump and Putin in Helsinki in July 2018. Since the start of the war in Ukraine, Serbia has been in a tricky position: it has refused to implement European sanctions against Russia, but has backed UN General Assembly resolutions that ‘deplore in the strongest terms’ Russia’s aggression and reaffirm the organisation’s commitment to Ukraine’s ‘sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity’.
In reality, rather than relying on Moscow, Belgrade believes it can count on ‘principled support’ from China, which is worried about the secession of Tibet and Xinjiang. Serbia has also conducted an active campaign among African, Asian and Latin American countries (5), most of which still refuse to recognise Kosovo’s independence. These states want to cast themselves as defenders of international law in the face of the cynicism of the great powers, which only invoke the law when it suits their own current interests. The ‘precedent’ of Kosovo may partly explain why countries in the global South have reacted so cautiously to the war in Ukraine (6).
(1) See Pascal Boniface, ‘Pandora’s box’, Le Monde Diplomatique, English edition, January 1999.
(2) Badinter expressed this position in particular during a meeting organised by the Franco-Austrian Centre and IFRI in October 2017. In 2006, when he was a senator, he still thought it preferable to ‘postpone’ the question of Kosovo’s independence.
(3) ‘1991, dernier été de la Yougoslavie (2/10). Milan Kučan: “Nous voulions la démocratie” ’ (1991, Yugoslavia’s last summer (2/10). Milan Kučan: ‘We wanted democracy’), interview with Jean-Arnault Dérens and Simon Rico, Le Courrier des Balkans, 25 June 2021.
(4) ‘La Russie reconnait l’Abkhazie et l’Ossétie du Sud: un coup de poignard dans le dos pour la Serbie ?’ (Russia recognises Abkhazia and South Ossetia: a stab in the back for Serbia?), Le Courrier des Balkans, 27 August 2008.
(5) See Jean-Arnault Dérens, ‘Serbia won’t let go’, Le Monde diplomatique, English edition, September 2010.
(6) See Alain Gresh, ‘The global South defies the West on Ukraine’, Le Monde diplomatique, English edition, May 2022.
