Rama's tour of Kurti's politics

Writing for Kosovo Online: Dragan Bisenic, journalist

As could be seen, in this stage of the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama is taking over the baton of the first Balkan diplomat. Rama is almost the last instrument of a possible exit into which the Brussels dialogue fell before it closes into a pure security framework, the sole aim of which will be to maintain peace and stability and prevent the re-opening of the war hotbed in the south-east of Europe at a time when the eyes of Euro-Atlantic communities are directed towards Russia and Ukraine.

This morning, the Prime Minister of Albania left for Skopje, which is his first of five stops in the countries of the Western Balkans, which he will visit in two days. The road takes him further to Pristina, Podgorica, Belgrade, and Sarajevo. In Skopje, he will meet with his Macedonian colleague Dimitar Kovacevski, and then travel to Pristina, where he announced a meeting with Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti, which Kurti publicly rejected. On Friday, the Albanian Prime Minister will arrive in Belgrade, where he will meet with the President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic.

This tour is sudden and therefore it is appropriate to find the cause of its urgent implementation in the entire Western Balkans. The agencies reported that on the tour he was scheduled to discuss the crisis in Kosovo, the "Open Balkan" initiative, and the Berlin process. Albanian media, however, emphasize two topics in particular: the Kosovo crisis and the "Open Balkan".

Although they appear to be independent of each other, they are in fact complementary. Rama, it is noted, said these days that the "Open Balkan" "completed its mission and that now the six countries would continue their efforts under "one umbrella that brings them all together" - the European Union, through the Berlin process, which would have its next meeting in October".

What Rama said, Albin Kurti has been saying in his own way for years, so it would be more appropriate for him to be the one to read the obituary for the "Open Balkan". Although this attitude represents Kurti's political victory, it will not be a real victory because the fact that Rama appears as the bell ringer of Kurti's posthumous march for "Open Balkan" testifies to the fact that Rama was entrusted with the role of the new Balkan mediator in the new turn resulting from another change in the Balkan the strategy of the great powers and Europe's relations with the Balkan states.

The last month was a month of full and unexpected diplomatic affirmation of the Albanian Prime Minister. As a long-time leading politician of Albania, Rama has always played a secondary role in the affairs of Kosovo. Open paternalism began with his proposal for the Community of Serb-majority Municipalities, which he sent to Berlin, Paris, and Brussels. At that moment, Rama surely judged that consulting with the Kosovo Prime Minister was hopeless, so he neither informed him nor asked him about his initiative. Rama then openly said that at that time it was being decided whether the north of Kosovo would turn into a "NATO protectorate", something that was already announced by the American ambassador in Pristina, Jeff Hovenier, and whether Kosovo would remain on the same side with its Western allies.

Rama, synchronously with his stay in Brussels on June 27, announced two processes. First was the proposal to organize international conferences of Serbia and Kosovo with EU and US officials, and suggested that "they should not be allowed to leave without an agreement". Another idea is to end the "Open Balkan" and move to the Berlin process, concluding that this idea has exhausted its possibilities.

Edi Rama's ideas seem like a coherent initiative that constructively complements the European plan for the normalization of relations between Belgrade and Pristina. Therefore, it is insinuated from the beginning that Rama does not appear as an independent factor, but that he is an adequate frontman of plans that are created elsewhere. Rama's role in the overall Albanian corps in the Balkans as the only elected representative of the executive power, for now, the only Albanian state, is irreplaceable in relation to the Albanian national position in the region. If it was once thought that there could be two such centers, in Tirana and Pristina, now that has been abandoned and the election for the overall Albanian representation has been entrusted to Rama. Not only that, his will, energy, and persuasive capacity are necessary to get the affairs of Belgrade and Pristina out of the impasse. In truth, Rama is the only person suitable for such a role. Belgrade and Pristina are stuck in mutual accusations and endless tug-of-war in proving their own strength and correctness, and European and American mediators notice a gap between what they would like and what the institutions and bureaucratic mechanisms they represent allow them to do. Rama's leadership began to take shape when he openly confronted Kurti and when, due to the case of the "three policemen", he announced that he would "cut" relations with Serbia to "zero" if they were not released immediately.

Rama is leaving for the trip just two days after the end of the visit of former US President Bill Clinton to Tirana. Clinton and the bombing of Serbia in 1999 have a place that is above all other Albanian histories so far, and his visit at this moment had, for sure, no small political weight. However, Clinton did not visit Pristina, and Kurti was not at Clinton's reception in Tirana. This was the occasion for very inventive attacks on the Kosovo Prime Minister, which were essentially elaborations of Rama's recent assessment of Kurti as "the Prime Minister of Kosovo whom he does not understand". Rama used to say that when he and Kurti met, they "laugh a lot." There is no laughter anymore.

Rama symbolically gathered 13 children from Kosovo in front of Clinton, saying that the future of Kosovo is known. In Tirana, not in Pristina. With Rama, not Kurti. Clinton, of course, did not, at the age of 77, travel such a long way and see Tirana for the first time, where he had never been before, to meet these children and receive the badge of honor from Rama. During the two-day visit, Rama and Clinton talked for hours. Everyone heard what was important, "There is a dispute going on in Kosovo now that I wish had never happened. It is no longer my decision, but the Kosovars created those four cities in favor of the Serbs to give them four more mayors. So I don't think these elections should have been held," he said.

Clinton said that he thought it was easy for the Albanians, who were now in the majority, to try to use the moment to present their argument, but the real thing they should do was to "stop this nonsense", Clinton said in a speech in Tirana 3 July, the first day of the two-day visit.

"What a big political issue this tension can create, the citizens should be told that they have to vote. If you think about these four cities, they are far from any modern scientific laboratory, in which the world is modeled, because it is run by people who prefer domination over cooperation. I hope that the Albanians will be able to show the world what an inclusive future looks like," he explained.

Everyone can interpret Clinton's words in the best way, as they understood them since the translation is not entirely accurate, but it seems that at this moment the US is telling Kurti to give up the four municipalities in the north and leave it to European coordination with the Americans to solve the matter in accordance with the dynamics of the Brussels dialogue.

Rama celebrated his birthday on July 4 in the company of Clinton and Alexander Soros, one of the creators of the "Open Balkan".

Gloomy news about the "Open Balkan" will most likely be coldly received in Belgrade. But that's not all Rama will have to say. He also carries with him Clinton's edict with the keys to four municipalities in the north, in which Pristina is asked to give up and stop confronting the West, even if in the end those four municipalities were annexed to Serbia. It is believed that this should be sufficient satisfaction for Belgrade.

What worries all of them is the assessment that the region is facing a possible war and that this is a much more important issue than any municipal counter. “Not that Rama knows everything, but because he knows Kurti's dark plans against Kosovo and Albania in detail. That he announces a hot war in the summer and autumn means that the opponents of the West expect a war with the West, according to analyzes in Tirana. But, Albin Kurti has not said his last word yet.