British Professor: Martti Ahtisaari made a major “misspelled” regarding Kosovo

COMM SOVA declared independence from Serbia in February 2008, but 15 years later, UN membership is still just a dream for the country. Only about half of the world's countries recognise Kosovo's independence.

This year, the EU brokered the normalisation agreement between Kosovo and Serbia, which could pave the way for Kosovo for international organisations.

However, implementation of the agreement has not progressed, and in May there were clashes between Serb residents and NATO forces in northern Kosovo.

It [the agreement] is going nowhere,” says British Balkan expert James Ker-Lindsay for STT.

According to Ker-Lindsey, a good solution could be found, but it would require that all sides leave their shells.

Visiting Professor Ker-Lindsey of the LAND School of Economics stresses that there is no person to blame for the impasse, but that all sides have made mistakes during the peace process.

The Western mistake with Kosovo has been that they only try to force Serbia to accept Kosovo's independence, even though the issue was once dealt with contrary to international law.

According to Ker-Lindsey, Serbia's mistake is to focus only on mistakes that have occurred since 1999 and not realize that granting Kosovo independence when Yugoslavia was disbanded would always have been the most logical option.

According to him, the Kosovo mistake was their obsession with independence as quickly as possible instead of a more permanent solution.

K ER-LINDSAY finds one guilty even in Finland. Former President Martti Ahtisaari has worked as UN peace negotiator in Kosovo from 2005 to 2008. After the negotiations, Kosovo unilaterally declared independence.

I think he handled negotiations very badly. He made a big mistake in the way he operated”, Ker-Lindsay says.

In Ker-Lindsay's opinion, Ahtisaari should have brought an alternative to the table that would have eventually led to Kosovo's independence, but to offer Serbia an opportunity to save the face.

He sets South Sudan independence from Sudan as a model. The 2011 independence referendum preceded a six-year period of autonomy.

A similar agreement could have worked on Kosovo as well.

However, the Ahtisaari line from the start was for Kosovo to be granted independence. Ker-Lindsay says he asked Ahtisaari why he did not offer Serbs an option to save his face.

“told me: they did not deserve”, says Ker-Lindsay. Because he thought he didn't deserve it, he condemned everyone to live in this purgatory instead of looking for a feasible solution”.

CMI, the organisation for resolving the conflicts founded by Ahtisaari, has declined to comment on the criticism of STT.

Then WHAT might open the deadlock?

According to Ker-Lindsey, the most logical solution would be for Kosovo and Serbia to renegotiate their borders so that the majority Serb areas of northern Kosovo can be transferred to Serbia and Kosovo can take certain Albanian majority areas from Serbia.

Britain and Germany in particular have opposed the transition to the path of regional changes, but backstage, according to Ker-Lindsay, the idea has many supporters.

According to him, the Serbian leadership understands that Kosovo has lost forever.

And most importantly, they realize that losing it is for the better of”. /Periscopi