TIRANA, Nov. 2 – Three years after an ice-breaking visit Prime Minister Edi Rama paid to Belgrade, the first by an Albanian Prime Minister in 68 years, relations between Albania and Serbia have marked tangible progress with the civil society playing a key role in promoting normalization between the two key EU aspirant Western Balkan countries.
“Things are moving, meeting groups of Albanians in Serbia and Serbians in Albania is becoming quite normal,” Jelena Minic, the head of the Belgrade-based European Movement in Serbia, EMinS, said a Tirana forum discussing new challenges ahead toward a common EU future for the two countries.
The comments came at a two-day forum organized last weekend by the Albanian Institute for International Studies, AIIS, one of the country’s top think tanks, as part of its Center for Albania-Serbia Relation, a joint AIIS-EMinS initiative now on its third year of operation helping to normalize relations between two regional key players which until late 2014 were in a rather Cold War era status quo.
In several forums in Tirana and Belgrade during the past three years, the two think tanks have engaged young researchers in exchanges and brought together experts from both countries to discuss challenges in EU integration, political, economic and cultural cooperation in a bid to break historical barriers and stereotypes holding back normalization of relations.
AIIS head Albert Rakipi says the joint Center for Albania-Serbia Relations is a strategic project for the normalization of relations between two key countries in the region which due to the historical context will take some time.
“It’s an investment for the stability of the region, building strategic relations and a common future. Of course that is not going to happen tomorrow,” said Rakipi.
Gordana Comic, Serbia’s deputy Speaker of Parliament and a women rights promoter, said it is politicians that hold back cooperation between the two countries and that mainly happens on electoral grounds.
“Cooperation between the two countries currently works with only two networks, organized crime and women across the region. Politicians are afraid of losing votes to work for peace and cooperation because of perceptions,” Comic said.
Albania and Serbia had a three-year honeymoon soon after World War II when the communists came to power in both countries but later parted ways on ideological grounds. Relations between the two countries in the past 25 years of transition have remained tense especially after the late 1990s Kosovo war leading to its independence from Serbia in 2008. Ties are now on track to improve as Serbia and the majority ethnic Albanian-inhabited Kosovo are also holding continuous EU-mediated talks to normalize their relations and Albania has offered an ‘agree to disagree’ approach on Kosovo.
Relations between the two countries temporarily entered a Cold War era status quo in October 2014 following a drone incident with Albanian nationalistic and patriotic symbols flying over the Partizan stadium in Belgrade in the midst of a Serbia-Albania Euro 2016.
Fears of crowd trouble in football matches still persist as fans were not allowed to support their teams in this month’s UEFA Europa League group stage ties between Albania’s Skenderbeu and Serbia’s Partizan Belgrade.
Mimi Kodheli, a former defense minister who currently chairs Albania’s parliamentary foreign affairs committee, said it’s the historical past that prevents relations between the two countries.
“Albanians and Serbs have written much history. We continue to see the future based on history. Politicians also predict the future based on history. Kosovo’s independence is something we cannot change. That should be a bridge, not a wall,” she said.
“We shouldn’t forget that we should resolve our problems on our own. Albania and Serbia are the core of the Western Balkans and if this relationship is fragile, all of us will suffer,” Kodheli added.
When it comes to EU integration, the picture currently remains mixed both for Albania which is hopeful of launching accession talks and Serbia which has been holding negotiations for the past three years as the block struggles with internal problems such as the Brexit, the migrant and financial crises as well as rising populism and most recently developments in Spain where Catalonia is seeking independence.
“It is obvious that there will be no change until Brexit talks but there could be a new window of opportunity by 2019,” said Dusko Lopandic, Serbia’s former ambassador to the EU.
Currently, only Serbia and Montenegro are in the negotiation stage with the European Commission among six Western Balkans countries, most of which have been striving for membership since more than a decade.
NATO member Albania, through Prime Minister Edi Rama has expressed repeated frustration that its application to join the European Union is being dragged in time on purpose as the bloc deals with its internal problems relating to Brexit and the economic crisis.
European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker’s has made it clear there will be no EU enlargement until 2019, but reiterated eventual membership is needed for the Western Balkans to prevent conflict in the region.
Albania’s former European Integration Minister Klajda Gjosha described negotiation talks Serbia and Montenegro are holding as a positive signal for the region despite the slow progress with the accession chapters.
“The EU integration process is vital to build institutions and consolidate them as well as strengthen rule of law no matter when Albania joins,” said Gjosha.
Discussing economy, MP and economy professor Fatbardha Kadiu said the low level of trade exchanges and FDI in both countries hints “Albania and Serbia live in a non-positive peace environment.”
Albania-Serbia trade exchanges are currently stuck at an annual modest level of about €170 million annually and dominated by what experts have previously called medieval era agricultural imports and exports.
Serbian foreign direct investment have in the past three years climbed to a modest stock of 20 million euros while Albanian investment in Serbia is almost non-existent.
In late 2016, a Tirana-based joint Albania-Serbia Chamber of Commerce was launched to give a boost to current sluggish trade exchanges and investment ties.
Prospects seem optimistic as the two leading EU aspirant Western Balkans countries have already improved access with the launch of the direct Belgrade-Tirana flights by Air Serbia carrier and are on track to be linked through a shorter distance through the extension of the Albania-Kosovo highway to Nis, south-eastern Serbia.
Sanja Nikolin, a private entrepreneur and women activist, said barriers of growth at home, with both Albanian and Serbian businesses being overwhelming SMEs, prevent cross-border cooperation.
“We have to remove barriers at home. When you are in a survival mode, with SMEs accounting for 99 percent of businesses and facing hostility, this prevents cooperation,” she said.
The media picture in both countries is similar with government pressure, lack of professionalism and sporadic coverage mainly focused on politics but not human stories, journalists from both countries said.
When it comes to culture, cooperation has been constantly growing over the past few years, but lack of sufficient exchanges and funding remain a barrier.
Monika Maric, a Serbian, a Serbian fellow of the Centre for Albania-Serbia Relations at the AIIS, says cultural cooperation between Serbia and Albania have been constantly growing in the past decade but remains mostly sporadic and on individual initiative.
“Although political relations often cast a shadow on cultural cooperation, cultural exchanges between Serbia and Albania have been in constant growth. Cooperation is primarily based on individual initiatives, where networks of civil society represent the main communication channel,” says Maric, a fluent speaker of Albanian who graduated from the department of Albanology of the University of Belgrade.
Maric, who researched into Serbia-Albania cultural relations during her three-month AIIS fellowship, was the third Serbian fellow of the Centre for Albania-Serbia Relations at the Albanian Institute for International Studies in Tirana.
Minja Mardjonovic, a feminist activist who directed the newly released “Kismet” documentary showcasing the challenges facing young women both in Serbia and Albania says Albanians and Serbs are quite similar when it comes to stereotypes.
“Conservative and patriarchal structures of our societies make us so similar, too. So, from my point of view, the treatment of women is the best indicator of the level of social and political progress within one society. In that regard, we can really maintain how much Albanians and Serbs are so similar in their differences,” she told Tirana Times in a recent interview.
An AIIS survey has found a plurality of residents of Albania believe relations between this country and Serbia are normal and likely to improve in the future and such improvements are in the best interest of both countries.
