Kosovo conflict
The Kosovo conflict arose from deep-rooted historical and ethnic tensions between Serbs and Albanians in the region, which is considered sacred by Serbs due to the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. After World War II, the region became part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, where Albanians faced discrimination and were treated as second-class citizens. The disintegration of Yugoslavia in the 1990s saw rising nationalism and conflict, leading to the emergence of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and violent clashes with Serbian forces. In response to escalating violence, NATO intervened in 1999, resulting in a bombing campaign against Serbia and the establishment of a peacekeeping presence in Kosovo. In 2008, Kosovo unilaterally declared independence, a move that Serbia did not recognize but which has since gained significant international support. Tensions have persisted in the region despite a 2013 agreement aimed at normalizing relations between Kosovo and Serbia, with ongoing disputes and protests reflecting the fragile political landscape. As of 2023, the situation remains complex, with periodic confrontations and heightened military readiness along the border, underscoring the enduring challenges of reconciliation and coexistence.
Kosovo conflict
The Event Ethnic conflict between Serbs and Albanians in Kosovo
Date 1996–9
Place Kosovo, Serbia
The war in Kosovo was one of several in the breakup of Yugoslavia that led to North American diplomatic and military involvement.
Kosovo, particularly Kosovo field, is historically sacred ground for the Serbs, the site of a legendary battle against the Ottoman Turks in 1389. Over the centuries, however, the area became the homeland for Albanian Muslims. After World War II, the communist leader Tito (Josip Broz) reconstructed Yugoslavia along national lines into a federation of six republics, with the Serbian republic containing two autonomous regions—the Hungarian Banat and the Albanian Kosovo. The authorities treated the Albanians as second-class citizens, and the region was one of the poorest in the federation. In the 1980’s, after the death of Tito, Yugoslavia fractured as nationalism grew stronger among its various constituents. In the 1990’s, with the fall of communist governments throughout Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia separated into its constituent republics, and wars erupted between ethnic groups. In the middle of the decade, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces led by the United States intervened in Bosnia, where Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks (Slavic Muslims) fought among themselves.
Living in an autonomous region rather than a constituent republic, the Albanians in Kosovo were in a special category. Furthermore, there was an independent Albania next to Kosovo to which they could look for support. As ethnic tensions between the Serbs and Albanians increased, many Serbs fled under threat of Albanian terror raids, and rumors that radical Islamic fundamentalists were aiding the Albanians circulated. In 1987, Serbian nationalist Slobodan Milošević visited the region promising to defend Serbian interests. Two years later as president of the republic, he orchestrated changes in Serbia’s constitution limiting Kosovo’s autonomy and adopted measures causing Albanian unemployment and curtailing cultural activities. In 1991, Albanian nationalists proclaimed the Republic of Kosovo and elected Ibrahim Rugova, an Albanian writer and professor, as president of a shadow government in unsanctioned elections.
In 1996, the Albanians formed an army of its own, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which received arms from Albania and was able to launch attacks against Serbian police and army units in Kosovo. As they did in Bosnia, NATO countries once again attempted to mediate the crisis.
The United States Intervenes
Throughout the decade, US president Bill Clinton sent warnings to Milošević to stop aggression against the Albanian Kosovars. In March, 1998, US secretary of state Madeleine Albright condemned the Serb attacks. In the meantime, the so-called Contact Group (United States, Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and Russia) met in London to discuss the Kosovo crisis. The U.N. Security Council condemned Belgrade, imposed economic sanctions, and banned arms sales to Serbia. In May, Milošević and Rugova met without results. Rugova then traveled to the United States, where he met with Clinton, Albright, and U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan and requested U.N. and NATO intervention.
Rambouillet Meeting and Air Raids
On February 6, 1999, the Contact Group established peace talks between the warring parties in Rambouillet, France. Both Albanian and Serbian diplomats objected to the proposed accords, but the Albanians finally agreed to sign. Milošević agreed to diplomatic observers in the region. However, in the summer, his army began a new offensive, and thousands more Albanian refugees fled into the mountains. Russian president Boris Yeltsin and Clinton then met in Moscow and issued a joint statement calling for negotiations and for Serbia to end its attack, but on American initiative and over Russian objections NATO began a new bombing campaign in Serbia. Clinton ruled out American use of ground forces but indicated that four thousand American peacekeepers would go to Kosovo after the armistice.
NATO objectives in the air raids were to stop all military action, end violence and repression, withdraw the military and police as well as paramilitary forces from the region, establish an international military force and the return of refugees, and force Belgrade to adhere to the Rambouillet Accords. NATO troops including 31,600 Americans and 1,300 Canadians entered into neighboring Albania and Macedonia for protection. About 10,000 Albanian refugees came into the United States and 5,000 to Canada.
Finally, Milošević and NATO reached an agreement in June before a possible ground invasion, and NATO and Russian troops came to the province to supervise the area that was divided between the Albanian and Serb populations. About 600,000 Albanians returned to Kosovo, and 200,000 Serbs and Roma left Albanian areas. Twenty thousand Russian and NATO troops moved into Kosovo as peacekeepers, while the Serbian forces left the area and the KLA demilitarized.
Impact and Long-Term Prospects
The Kosovo conflict, along with the other wars in the Balkans during the 1990s, established US leadership in dealing with changes in the Balkans, especially Yugoslavia, in the 1990s. Although the US operated principally through NATO, tensions between the United States and the various European countries led to a number of rifts. The conflict also demonstrated that Washington was willing to use armed force to ensure its policies. Additionally, in 1999, Milošević was charged with war crimes; he died in a Dutch prison in 2006 while his trial was ongoing.
Despite the end of armed conflict in 1999, tensions persisted in the region in subsequent decades as the governments of both Kosovo and Serbia mostly continued to express firm nationalist beliefs. A major development occurred in 2008 when Kosovo unilaterally declared independence from Serbia; while Serbia did not recognize Kosovo's independence, by 2023 the nation had secured diplomatic recognition from over a hundred UN member states, including the US. A 2013 agreement brokered during two years of negotiations overseen by the European Union (EU) resulted in Serbia recognizing a limited degree of Kosovar independence and led to the establishment of some formal relations between the two countries.
Despite the 2013 deal, referred to as the Brussels Agreement, the status of Kosovo remained controversial, particularly within Serbia among hardline elements of the country's government. Throughout the 2010s the National Assembly of Serbia did not ratify the agreement and in 2022 Aleksandar Vučić, the president of Serbia, said that the agreement "no longer [existed]." Vučić and other members of the Serbian government cited a number of reasons for this decision, including Kosovo's alleged failure to protect the human rights of Serbs who resided in the territory.
Meanwhile, in Kosovo, tensions flared between police and Serbs living in the country over a number of issues. In April 2023 Serbs boycotted elections in Kosovo and staged a number of protests against the election of ethnic Albanian officials in Serb-majority communities across northern Kosovo; these protests led to a number of arrests and violent confrontations, with NATO peacekeepers and police on one side and Serb protesters on the other. In response to police raids conducted against a number of Serb-owned buildings in May 2023, Serbia mobilized military forces and stationed them along its border with Kosovo, leading to fears of renewed conflict between the two nations. Additionally, NATO deployed 700 additional soldiers in an effort to improve the security situation, and the EU planned to oversee continued negotiations between Kosovo and Serbia.
Bibliography
Brune, Lester H. The United States and the Balkan Crisis, 1990-2005: Conflict in Bosnia and Kosovo. Claremont, Calif.: Regina, 2005.
King, Iain, and Whit Mason. Peace at Any Price: How the World Failed Kosovo. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2006.
"Kosovo Profile—Timeline." BBC News, 25 Nov. 2022, www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-18331273. Accessed 21 Jun. 2023.
Norris, John. Collision Course: NATO, Russia, and Kosovo. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2005.
Ramet, Sabrina P. Thinking About Yugoslavia: Scholarly Debates About the Yugoslavia Breakup and the Wars in Bosnia and Kosovo. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Stojanovic, Dusan. "Why Do Kosovo-Serbia Tensions Persist?" AP News, 31 May 2023, apnews.com/article/kosovo-serbia-tensions-explained-ba6dd56730dc43e6637644afb5455fb8. Accessed 21 Jun. 2023.