Viewing cable 10PRISTINA48, KOSOVO: STRATEGY FOR NORTHERN KOSOVO AN IMPORTANT

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C O N F I D E N T I A L PRISTINA 000048 

SIPDIS 

DEPT FOR ASSISTANT SECRETARY PHIL GORDON FROM THE AMBASSADOR 

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/14/2019 
TAGS: PGOV PINR PREL KV
SUBJECT: KOSOVO: STRATEGY FOR NORTHERN KOSOVO AN IMPORTANT 
STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION 

Classified By: Ambassador Christopher W. Dell for Reasons 1.4 (b), (d). 

¶1. (C) Phil - I know that you are seeing Robert Cooper on 
Tuesday, February 2, among other things, to discuss Kosovo 
and the strategy for northern Kosovo. Integrating Kosovo 
Serbs into Kosovo society and preserving the country's 
territorial integrity is central to Kosovo's and the region's 
long-term stability and has been a core U.S. policy objective 
since 1999. In November 2009, we had a breakthrough that 
ended ten years of Belgrade-imposed stalemate when thousands 
of Serbs in southern Kosovo took part in Kosovo municipal 
elections. We want to replicate that success in the north 
and end the stalemate that has left Kosovo's future 
uncertain. That fundamentally is what the so-called northern 
strategy is about. We want to coax the population into 
greater cooperation with Pristina, not to impose outcomes on 
them. 

¶2. (C) Currently, we have a growing, if still somewhat 
fragile, consensus within the international community in 
Pristina that the time is right to end the years of drift on 
the north and to alter the dynamic of a hardening partition 
between the north and the rest of Kosovo. In part, this is 
sparked by the new willingness among Kosovo Serbs to engage 
with Kosovo institutions. It also stems from Belgrade's 
increasingly aggressive actions in the north (e.g., seizure 
of the Valac electrical substation; unilateral appointment of 
Serb judges to illegal parallel courts) that have underscored 
to representatives of the international community on the 
ground the risks of continuing to do nothing. For ten years, 
we told the Kosovars to trust us -- "let us handle the 
situation, and we will protect you" -- and now the government 
of independent Kosovo is increasingly asking us when we are 
going to make good on that commitment. KFOR is drawing down 
(in six months NATO could take a decision to cut its forces 
in half). We need to take advantage of a unique opportunity 
that has crystallized and act now while we still have a KFOR 
presence capable of handling any contingency. 

¶3. (C) Belgrade has reacted vehemently to the northern 
strategy. I think this intensity is rooted in the concern 
that any positive momentum in the north will undermine 
Belgrade's likely post-ICJ strategy: push to reopen status 
talks and formalize the emerging de facto partition of 
Kosovo. Furthermore, Belgrade has shrewdly judged that 
raising the specter of confrontation rattles our EU partners 
and is an effective tactic for derailing the strategy 
altogether. Cooper will likely reflect this anxiety with 
you, but I do not sense that this concern is nearly as strong 
within the local Quint (with the exception of Italian 
Ambassador Michael Giffoni, who spent ten years on Javier 
Solana's staff, where the Brussels bureaucrats have long been 
anxious about taking any difficult decision on the north). 
With this in mind, I recommend that you stress three points 
with Cooper. First, the northern strategy is not radical. 
Much of it restates what the international community, in 
general, and the EU, in particular, are already committed to 
doing. Second, it provides a vehicle for constructively 
channeling the GOK's ambitions for the north and takes 
advantage of Prime Minister Hashim Thaci's readiness to offer 
inducements to northern Serbs who engage with Kosovo 
institutions. Third, we now have legitimate Serb partners 
(elected by fellow Serbs) who are ready to help us in the 
north. These are the elements of a soft approach, which is 
the northern strategy's leading edge. 

¶4. (C) We should expect Belgrade to challenge all elements of 
the strategy and to misportray the strategy as hard and 
confrontational. Serbian Ministry for Kosovo State Secretary 
Oliver Ivanovic has already declared that Pristina is 
promoting conflict. This is not the case. There is no 
interest here in conflict (not among the Quint and the ICO, 
nor within the GOK), but the current situation is untenable 
and deteriorating. The aim is to stop the rot in the north 
and create the positive momentum there that we need to secure 
our long-term policy objectives: a secure and stable Kosovo 
and a Serbia focused on its EU future, not old ambitions and 
grievances. We need to start the process now, and we should 
not allow Belgrade to use threats of confrontation as a veto 
to block progress. 

¶5. (C) You can tell Cooper that the northern strategy offers 
incremental, but fundamental, steps necessary to getting the 

north right. We know, however, that there will be difficult 
challenges that pose risks. For example, EULEX must get 
serious about rolling up organized crime networks in the 
north that feed the parallel structures and make the current 
situation unsustainable. The northern Serbs are the first 
victims of these thugs, and there is a growing body of 
reports that they would welcome a change if EULEX can deliver 
it. We must, also, deal with the blatant theft of Kosovo 
property that has allowed Serbia to, in effect, seize the 
northern power grid in Kosovo. Dealing with these issues 
will require hard choices and fortitude. Our message to 
Cooper should be that we want to coordinate and consult with 
Brussels every step of the way. This process, after all, 
only works if Brussels makes clear to Belgrade that its EU 
future depends on real cooperation on Kosovo. In recent 
meetings with Boris Tadic, both Angela Merkel and Nicolas 
Sarkozy reportedly emphasized that Serbia's path to Brussels 
runs, in part, through constructive relations with Pristina. 
This is the perfect message. Brussels needs to repeat it -- 
regularly. We, of course, are also ready to consult with 
Belgrade, as well, and to offer them the opportunity to 
engage constructively. Where we part company with some 
within the EU, however, is in not being willing to accept 
that we must have Belgrade's agreement before taking any 
steps. 

¶6. (C) I need to emphasize the importance of this moment. 
Failure to act soon means losing northern Kosovo and will 
re-open the Pandora's Box of ethnic conflict that defined the 
1990s. Fortunately, our European partners increasingly 
recognize this. My British colleague here confirms what Stu 
has also heard -- that there is a greater degree of 
commitment and resolve in member capitals than may be the 
case in the Commission and the Council officialdom in 
Brussels. Even there, though, initial anxieties over the 
strategy appear to be easing as they look more carefully at 
the content and less at the rhetoric. 
DELL