A discovery from the archival excavations of Bejtë Destani and President Clinton’s instructions on what to do next with liberated Kosovo
By Veton Surroi
1.
It is the first autumn of liberated Kosovo and I am in Paris.
Paris, in any season and from wherever you arrive, is always the same in its singularity — yet even more so for me, having left behind, for a few days, the daily violence of Prishtina: the traffic jams caused by the sudden influx of UNMIK vehicles and returning Kosovars, the noise of generators, the political tensions…
I am in Paris at the invitation of the Aspen Strategy Group, a body within the Aspen Institute, chaired jointly by two eminent figures — one close to or part of the Democratic Party and the other from the Republican Party. Only months after liberation and Kosovo’s placement under international administration, the Strategy Group wants to examine the future of the entire region through open conversations with personalities from global, American, and European politics.
To ensure candor, the discussions follow strict non-attribution rules and any documents produced are for internal use only.
2.
Among the invitees is Jim Hoagland, the Washington Post columnist — a writer and a respected figure throughout political Washington, across party lines.
During breakfast he asks whether he may quote my remarks. I immediately agree.
He publishes the piece on November 4, 1999, under the title “Kosovo in Limbo.”
He writes:
PARIS — Five months after being freed from Serbian rule by NATO bombing, Kosovo lives in a state of deliberate political and economic limbo…
The United Nations, he explains, is avoiding long-term decisions beyond urgent humanitarian needs as winter approaches. Kosovo’s future, he suggests, will emerge gradually from developments on the ground rather than from any grand diplomatic blueprint drafted around a conference table.
UN officials — including the Secretary-General — acknowledge the contradiction: Kosovo’s Albanian majority formally remains part of Milosevic’s Yugoslavia while living in virtual independence. The Security Council resolution itself embeds this paradox.
But it is not only Kosovars who remain suspended. NATO peacekeeping forces will find it difficult to withdraw from a territory existing in legal no-man’s land, still vulnerable to Serbian return.
Even the journalist’s mind, he writes, dislikes gray ambiguity, preferring clarity and facts. Yet after conversations with Annan and two days at the Aspen discussions, he becomes less certain that grand diplomatic solutions are better. Waiting, he concludes, may be the least bad option — if the waiting is managed well.
Annan warns of the danger:
“If we are not careful, we may be seen as an occupying force. That cannot be allowed to happen.”
To prevent that, Hoagland quotes me:
Kosovars must see that the UN is not blocking their eventual path to independence. And the interim administration must function effectively — paying salaries, reopening power plants, rebuilding infrastructure, preparing for winter.
If these tasks are fulfilled, a long-term international presence could be sustainable.
But, I argued, the comforting idea that time would somehow produce democratic forces that overthrow Milosevic and make Yugoslavia attractive again to Kosovars was fantasy.
“It will not happen,” I said, “not even if Václav Havel were president of Serbia.”
The reference carried irony — and a clear message: the best Serbia could hope for was a peaceful separation through referendum, like the Czech-Slovak split.
3.
President Bill Clinton read Hoagland’s article.
In the margin, he wrote by hand:
“Sandy, what’s going on here?”
“Sandy” was Sandy Berger, the National Security Advisor — one of three senior U.S. officials present when, led by Dr. Rugova, our Kosovo delegation (Bujar Bukoshi, Fehmi Agani, and myself) met President Clinton at the White House in May 1998.
Berger received the president’s note on November 8. His office requested a two- to three-page report analyzing the issue — Kosovo’s future.
Through the chain of command, the request went to “Chris” (presumably Christopher Hill at the State Department) and Tina Kaidanow (later the first U.S. ambassador to the Republic of Kosovo).
The report was due November 11.
And that was that.
4.
The story ends here.
It ends because this account comes from a document uncovered by Bejtullah Destani — the tireless excavator of archives and a Kosovar diplomat — to testify to a time when columnists carried weight, when a president read newspapers, when newspapers were standards of credibility.
A fortunate time for Kosovo.
Now it remains for Bejtë Destani to bring us the continuation of the story — if for nothing else, then to remind us how wide and deep Kosovo’s story truly is, and how every narrative of the past is, in fact, always retold in the future.