20 Mar Kosovo Independence is a “Defeat for International Law”
Or so says Professor (and sometime-guest blogger) Eugene Kontorovich in a recent op-ed.
As a result, NATO and America have become parties to the carve-up a sovereign state that they subdued by force. To say that this goes against the core principles of the U.N. Charter is an understatement. For international law, the entire process is a string of humiliations. The Security Council comes out looking like a joke; the right of self-determination looks like it depends on the product of a group’s ruthlessness and proximity to Europe; peacekeepers are hostages; and sovereignty is trumped by the threat of terror.
I am very sympathetic to Eugene’s critique here. At the very least, Kosovo is as much of, or even more, of a “defeat” for international law as the invasion of Iraq. Few people (Eugene excluded) seem willing to point that out.
Julian: If you think Kosovo’s secession is “as much of, or even more, of a ‘defeat’ for international law as the invasion of Iraq” then I think you need to make that case. Eugene doesn’t. He does seem to have two main points: Kosovo’s secession wasn’t approved by the Security Council and the West seems to generally be against accepting secessions, but they are not so here, and that seems inconsistent. The Security Council argument is a straw man. You do not need Security Council approval to secede. Although, if an attempted secession is clearly illegal, the Security Council may say as much–as was done regarding Northern Cyprus, but is not the case here. A people may attempt to secede but, depending on how clear their case is, it often becomes an issue of how many states recognize them. This decision to recognize may, for some states, be a proxy for whether or not a particular secession is considered justified or not. Kosovo is being recognized by more and more states each day. Speaking of the Security Council, though, SC approval is needed to invade another country, unless acting in self-defense. The U.S. clearly had neother a resolution nor a… Read more »
Those, like Chris, who don’t see it problematic regard it as a secession, which I agree is an “internal” matter not much regulated by international law. I see it as a conquest (by NATO). If there were not NATO troops there, I would have no problem with this. Any other example I can think of is different on this score. Chris is surely right that attacking w/out SC approval is worse than seceding w/out such approval (which is not bad at all). But that’s exactly how we got into Kosovo in the first place, as I recall, and then it was retroactively papered over by the UN. Obviously legal labels matter, and to me it looks much more like an external power taking part of a country and handing it over to rebels it sympathizes with. I’m not looking to excuse the Bush administration anything: they’re big supporters and facilitators of Kosovo! I’m criticizing them! If Kurdistan declared independence while U.S. troops were there, and they held Iraqi forces back, I’d see it the same way. Let me suggest something else, beside the conquest/secession question, that may account for different reactions to Kosovo. The analogy would be to the “non-aggrandizement”… Read more »
Eugene: Thanks for yourt reply. Here are some further thoughts stemming from your comments, which I have italicized and put in block quotes. “I see it as a conquest (by NATO). If there were not NATO troops there, I would have no problem with this.” Others have also queried whether the (probable) illegality of NATO’s 1999 bombing campaign affects Kosovar sovereignty. I do not think that it would. It does not directly affect the criteria that the international community has used in responding to secessionist claims (whether the secessionists are a “people”; that they have been—and perhaps will continue to be—subject to serious human rights violations; and that there is no other reasonable solution.) Moreover, even if NATO’s bombing was illegal, then the responsibility—and legal consequences—for that act would rest with the NATO member states, not with the Kosovars. However, it is also important to note that, regardless of one’s views of the legality of the NATO bombing campaign, the subsequent international administration of Kosovo was via the UN pursuant to a Security Council resolution (meaning Russia at least acquiesced). That Chapter VII resolution itself recognized the status of a humanitarian crisis and a threat to international peace and security,… Read more »