A few days before Donald Trump is formally nominated as the Republican presidential candidate, the 32 members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) will gather in Washington, DC to celebrate its 75th birthday. Even with a storm cloud of Trumpian scepticism looming over the military alliance, there will be plenty of cheering and self-congratulation.
NATO’s breadth and longevity are indeed remarkable. But the world is becoming increasingly fractious, with a mixture of old and new threats that range from nuclear sabre-rattling to hostile states targeting military research with cyber-attacks.
Maintaining support for Ukraine and countering Russia’s aggression will be top of the agenda at the summit on July 9th-11th. But to avoid another conflict in Europe, NATO leaders must also address the deteriorating situation in the western Balkans (which is made up of seven countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia). The region has seen a rise in violent ethnic clashes since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine and is threatening to become the world’s next flashpoint, a quarter of a century after conflict there last hogged headlines.
In 1999 NATO carried out a 78-day bombing campaign in Yugoslavia. It ended the ethnic cleansing of Albanians that had been set in motion by the then Yugoslav president, Slobodan Milosevic. Since then, NATO missions in Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the accession of Albania and Croatia into NATO in 2009, Montenegro in 2017 and North Macedonia in 2020, have all helped to stabilise the region.
However, on a visit to Albania in February, Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, warned that “Russia will do everything to destabilise the situation”. Chaos in the western Balkans would benefit Russia by distracting NATO and the EU from the war in Ukraine. Russia has provided financial support for political parties in the region, while also sowing ethnic divisions, interfering in elections and spreading disinformation.
Several western Balkan leaders have strengthened ties to Russia, and more recently China, since the start of the war—and none more so than Serbia’s president, Aleksandar Vucic. The Serbian government has refrained from imposing sanctions on Russia, while also signing up to President Xi Jinping’s vision of a “global community of shared future”—the new world order that China is seeking.
Serbia’s links to Russia run deep. It has signed new bilateral agreements on gas and foreign policy, and has allowed Russia to set up a “humanitarian centre” in Serbia that Western analysts say is a thinly disguised spy base. The government in Belgrade has also aided Russian efforts to destabilise Europe, for instance by providing an agent to spread pro-Russian talking points among members of the European Parliament.
NATO and EU leaders have yet to take Russia’s influence operations and other malign activities seriously enough. Nor have they fully grasped the implications of China’s growing standing in the western Balkans. The upcoming summit is a good opportunity to reassess NATO’s policy towards the region.
Mr Vucic presents Serbia’s position between the EU and Russia officially as neutral. And Serbia has provided some arms to Ukraine—a nod towards offsetting growing ties with Russia and China.
The EU and America have, to some extent, tolerated this fence-sitting, and the effects of this forgiving approach have been felt keenly in Serbia, where democratic standards have slipped in recent years. It has also emboldened Serbia to intensify its efforts to undermine the statehood of Kosovo, whose population of 1.8m is overwhelmingly ethnic-Albanian. A province of Serbia in Yugoslav times, Kosovo declared independence in 2008—a move that Serbian leaders argue it had no right to make, despite recognition of Kosovo’s sovereignty by more than 100 countries, including most of the West.
In September 2023 a group of 30 Serbian gunmen attacked the village of Banjska in northern Kosovo, killing a police officer and injuring a dozen more. Mr Vucic denied that Serbia had anything to do with the attack. He has placed the blame on Kosovo’s prime minister, Albin Kurti, for “persecuting” Kosovo’s ethnic Serbs (who make up less than 5% of its population). The man who led the attack, Milan Radoicic, is still walking free under government protection in Serbia, despite being the subject of an Interpol arrest warrant.
As conflict continues in Ukraine and the Middle East, Europe cannot afford more tension or instability in or around its neighbourhood. To avoid it, the West must move away from soft-pedalling on Serbia. Mr Vucic can no longer be allowed to pursue EU integration while at the same time strengthening bonds with Russia and China.
The pressure on Serbia’s president must be increased, as must efforts to address external interference and state capture that corrode the wider region’s institutions and rule of law. A good start would be to co-ordinate efforts between NATO and the EU to impose sanctions on those who actively enable Russia’s attempts to destabilise the region or seek to undermine democracy.
EU leaders should also recognise that NATO cannot keep the western Balkans stable alone. The EU must offer Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia realistic paths to join (Croatia joined in 2013). All six countries have applied for membership since 2004, and support among their populations for EU integration and democracy remains generally high. But they are finding progress towards starting accession talks frustratingly slow—especially when they see talks with Ukraine and Moldova fast-tracked.
The world is becoming increasingly fractured. Reaffirming the unity and shared aims of the EU and NATO in the western Balkans is thus critical to avoid the possibility of renewed conflict in a highly volatile part of Europe.
Lord George Robertson was NATO secretary-general from 1999 to 2003 and Britain’s defence secretary from 1997 to 1999. Dr Andi Hoxhaj is a lecturer at University College London.