Stratfor: Radicals’ win may spell war in Kosovo

Stratfor: Radicals’ win may spell war in Kosovo

The November 28 unrest by Kosovo’s Albanians is likely to be repeated until the province is granted independence, the report says, adding that it expects the situation to deteriorate from that point on, as it believes the Serb Radical Party is set to emerge the winner of the January 21 parliamentary elections in Serbia.

“Armed with the tools of state, it would be, well, radical for the Radicals to not take radical steps to address and compensate for these [Slovenia, Croatia, Kosovo] defeats”, Stratford analysis says.

The agency reminds that Serbia’s preferred tool in the conflicts of the past decade has been the use of informal militias, “a tool that certainly remains within the toolbox”. Kosovo’s independence is likely to bring about the “Belgrade supported, or even initiated” bid by Bosnian Serbs to redraw the map of Bosnia, seeking to unite with Serbia. A similar scenario is predicted regarding the Serb minority in Montenegro.

According to the report, while the number of Serbs in Kosovo rules out any attempt of paramilitary action, Radicals- led Serbia could still decide to send in the army.

Even though the EU and U.S. maintain a military presence in Kosovo and Bosnia, their numbers are not seen as a serious deterrent to possible military actions by Serbia.

“The last time conflict wracked the region, in the 1990s, the carnage persisted for four years before the West managed to intervene and impose the Dayton Accords. This time around - with most of the West\'s deployable forces bogged down in Afghanistan and Iraq - the question is much starker: Can NATO and/or the United States even attempt to counter what will likely be near-simultaneous Serbian moves in Bosnia, Montenegro and Kosovo?”, the report concludes.