The European Union as International Mediator: Brokering Stability and Peace in the Neighbourhood [1st ed. 2020] 978-3-030-25563-3, 978-3-030-25564-0

Table of contents :
Front Matter ....Pages i-xiii
Introduction (Julian Bergmann)....Pages 1-24
EU Mediation Effectiveness: An Analytical Framework (Julian Bergmann)....Pages 25-52
The EU as a Mediator in the Conflict over Montenegro’s Independence (Julian Bergmann)....Pages 53-107
The EU as a Mediator in the Kosovo–Serbia Conflict (Julian Bergmann)....Pages 109-172
The EU as a Co-mediator in the Geneva International Discussions on South Ossetia and Abkhazia (Julian Bergmann)....Pages 173-230
Conclusions (Julian Bergmann)....Pages 231-253
Back Matter ....Pages 255-270

Citation preview

PALGRAVE STUDIES IN EUROPEAN UNION POLITICS SERIES EDITORS: MICHELLE EGAN · NEILL NUGENT · WILLIAM E. PATERSON

The European Union as International Mediator Brokering Stability and Peace in the Neighbourhood

Julian Bergmann

Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics Series Editors Michelle Egan American University Washington, USA Neill Nugent Manchester Metropolitan University Manchester, UK William E. Paterson Aston University Birmingham, UK

Following on the sustained success of the acclaimed European Union Series, which essentially publishes research-based textbooks, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics publishes cutting edge research-driven monographs. The remit of the series is broadly defined, both in terms of subject and academic discipline. All topics of significance concerning the nature and operation of the European Union potentially fall within the scope of the series. The series is multidisciplinary to reflect the growing importance of the EU as a political, economic and social phenomenon. Editorial Board Laurie Buonanno (SUNY Buffalo State, USA) Kenneth Dyson (Cardiff University, UK) Brigid Laffan (European University Institute, Italy) Claudio Radaelli (University College London, UK) Mark Rhinard (Stockholm University, Sweden) Ariadna Ripoll Servent (University of Bamberg, Germany) Frank Schimmelfennig (ETH Zurich, Switzerland) Claudia Sternberg (University College London, UK) Nathalie Tocci (Istituto Affari Internazionali, Italy) More information about this series at http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14629

Julian Bergmann

The European Union as International Mediator Brokering Stability and Peace in the Neighbourhood

Julian Bergmann German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE) Bonn, Germany

Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics ISBN 978-3-030-25563-3 ISBN 978-3-030-25564-0  (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover credit: Magic Lens/Shutterstock This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Acknowledgements

The idea to write a book about the European Union (EU) as an international mediator first emerged in 2011 when I started my academic career as a research fellow at the Department of Political Science of the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz. Having an academic background in peace and conflict studies, it struck me at that time that there was relatively little scholarly engagement with the EU’s involvement as a mediator in conflicts, particularly from a mediation research perspective. Bridging the fields of EU foreign policy studies and mediation research, I started to explore how the effectiveness of EU mediation, and its conditions, can be conceptualised and empirically investigated. Several years—and numerous hours of field research and interviews with policy-makers—later, this book is the final result of this endeavour. This book would not exist without the great support of a number of individuals. First of all, I would like to thank Arne Niemann who has supported this project from the beginning and has provided insightful comments on various drafts of this book. His advice and encouragement—often coupled with a good dose of humour—as well as his own work on various facets of European integration inspired and shaped my ideas for this project to a great extent. I would also like to thank Wolfgang Wagner, Kai Arzheimer, and Wolfgang Muno for providing important feedback that helped me a lot to further improve my theoretical arguments and empirical analysis. In addition, I am indebted to Hans Joachim Giessmann for his advice on the project and for providing me with the unique opportunity to discuss my empirical v

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Acknowledgements

results with his colleagues and mediation practitioners at the Berghof Foundation, whose helpful comments and suggestions are also gratefully acknowledged. Mediation is a conflict management instrument which requires some degree of secrecy and is often conducted ‘behind closed doors’. Consequently, a substantial part of the empirical data had to be gathered from interviews with policy-makers and practitioners. While they remain anonymous in the book, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to the 79 individuals working at various EU institutions, permanent representations and embassies, national ministries, international organisations, think tanks and civil society organisations in Belgrade, Brussels, Berlin, London, Paris, Podgorica, Pristina and Tbilisi. Their willingness to share their views and stories with me was vital for this project. I would also like to express my sincere gratitude to the German Foundation for Peace Research, the Ernst Haas Fellowship Fund of the European Union Studies Association and the Gutenberg Academy for Young Researchers for their generous financial support at various stages of this project that allowed me to do the fieldwork and present my results on international conferences and workshops. In particular, working as a staff member of the project “A Peacemaker in the Making? The European Union as an Actor in International Mediation” funded by the German Foundation for Peace Research provided me with an ideal environment for implementing this project and laid an important foundation for this study. Since May 2017, the German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE) has provided me with an ideal research environment that allowed me to finalise this book. The support of the institute, and my colleagues in the research programme “Interand Transnational cooperation with the Global South” in particular, is gratefully acknowledged. I would also like to thank my former colleagues at the Department of Political Science at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz for their support. Special words of thanks deserve Alexander Brand, Petra Guasti, Johannes Muntschick, Simone Ndongala, and Friedrich Plank for their moral support and taking the time to discuss several parts of the book. Kathrin Bank, Clara Föller, Lukas Prinz, Jonas Schwendler, and Anna Hörter provided valuable research assistance at different stages of the project. The editorial team at Palgrave has provided great professional assistance throughout the publication process. In addition, I would also like to thank the series editors and the

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reviewers for insightful comments. Conversations with Felix Haaß about this book and related themes have always been a great source of inspiration and I am grateful for his support. I would also like to thank Tengiz Dalalishvili for his valuable support and the numerous enriching conversations we had about the EU, Georgia and the South Caucasus region. For their help in organising my stay in Kosovo and their great hospitality, I am deeply grateful to Tanja, Afrim, Lulzim, Ramiz, and their family. My final words of thanks go to my family who has supported me through all the years. My dear Karola showed great patience and understanding, even at times when I had to spend another weekend at my desk working on this book. Her love kept me confident and balanced during the final stages of this project. My brothers Daniel and Sebastian have always been there for me and I feel grateful to call them true friends. Above all, my deepest gratitude goes to my parents Gina and Rainer. Without their loving support and encouragement, many great things in my life would not have been possible. I dedicate this book to them. Bonn June 2019

Contents

1 Introduction 1 2 EU Mediation Effectiveness: An Analytical Framework 25 3 The EU as a Mediator in the Conflict over Montenegro’s Independence 53 4 The EU as a Mediator in the Kosovo–Serbia Conflict 109 5 The EU as a Co-mediator in the Geneva International Discussions on South Ossetia and Abkhazia 173 6 Conclusions 231 Annex A 255 Annex B 259 Index 263

ix

Abbreviations

ABL Administrative Boundary/Border Line CFSP Common Foreign and Security Policy COBERM Confidence Building Early Response Mechanism COWEB Working Party on the Western Balkans Region CPC Civil Protection Corps CSCE Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe CSDP Common Security and Defence Policy DPS Democratic Party of Socialists/Demokratska partija socijalista Crne Gore (Montenegro) DS Democratic Party/Demokratska stranka (Serbia) DSS Democratic Party of Serbia/Demokratska stranka Srbije EC European Community EEAS European External Action Service ESDP European Security and Defence Policy ESS European Security Strategy EU European Union EULEX European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo EUMM Georgia European Union Monitoring Mission in Georgia FRY Federal Republic of Yugoslavia GID Geneva International Discussions IBM Integrated Border/Boundary Management ICJ International Court of Justice IDP Internally Displaced Person IPRM Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism ITU International Telecommunications Union

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Abbreviations

LDK Liberal Democratic Party/Liberalno demokratska partija (Kosovo) LSCG Liberal Alliance of Montenegro/Liberalni savez Crne Gore LVV Movement for Self-Determination/Levizja Vetevendosje (Kosovo) MEP Member of the European Parliament NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization NGO Non-Governmental Organisation NS New Serbia/Nova Srbija OSCE Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe PSC Political and Security Committee SAA Stabilisation and Association Agreement SAP Stabilisation and Association Process SDP Social Democratic Party of Montenegro/Socijaldemokratska partija Crne Gore SNP Serbian People’s Party/Srpska narodna partija SNS Serbian Progressive Party/Srpska napredna stranka SPS Socialist Party of Serbia/Socijalistička Partija Srbije UDI Unilateral Declaration of Independence UN United Nations UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNHCR Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees UNMIK United Nations Interim Administration in Kosovo UNOMIG United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia ZOA Zone of Agreement

List of Tables

Table 1.1 Key research design decisions 14 Table 3.1 Overview of conflict settlement in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence 64 Table 3.2 EU mediation goals and degrees of goal-attainment in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence 68 Table 3.3 Conditions of EU mediation effectiveness in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence 99 Table 4.1 Chronology of major events in Kosovo–Serbia conflict 1999–2010 113 Table 4.2 Conflict settlement in the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue 116 Table 4.3 EU goals and degrees of goal-attainment in Belgrade–Pristina dialogue 127 Table 4.4 Conditions of EU mediation effectiveness in the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue 157 Table 5.1 Chronology of major events in the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia 1991–2008 179 Table 5.2 EU goals and degrees of goal-attainment in the GID 188 Table 5.3 Summarising the findings on conditions of EU mediation effectiveness in the GID 219 Table 6.1 Comparing EU mediation effectiveness across cases 232 Table 6.2 Comparing the conditions of EU mediation effectiveness across cases 235

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CHAPTER 1

Introduction

On 12 October 2012, the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Thorbjorn Jagland, announced the European Union (EU) as the recipient of the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize. In his announcement speech, Jagland pointed to what the Committee saw as one of the EU’s most important achievements: “The stabilizing part played by the EU has helped to transform most of Europe from a continent of war to a continent of peace” (Norwegian Nobel Committee 2012). The Nobel Peace Prize highlighted two main contributions that the EU has made to peacemaking in Europe. Created as a major peace project on its own, the EU and its preceding organisations (the European Coal and Steel Community, the European Community) have been guarantors of stability and prosperity within and among its member states, which had fiercely fought each other in two world wars. Moreover, the European Union has played an important role in stabilising Europe beyond the borders of its member states, particularly in the Western Balkans, but also in many other parts of the globe. Often overshadowed by the visibility of the EU’s military operations and civilian missions in the framework of the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP), the Union has also engaged in less publicly ­visible peacemaking endeavours such as shuttle diplomacy and mediation. In fact, the EU had numerous experiences as a mediator in various conflict settings throughout the 2000s, including the Western Balkans and the Eastern Neighbourhood (Ukraine, Georgia). © The Author(s) 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0_1

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In 2009, the same year that the Lisbon Treaty came into force and reformed the EU’s foreign and security policy architecture, the Union adopted its first-ever strategic concept on mediation. The Concept on Strengthening EU Mediation and Dialogue Capacities (hereafter: the Concept), reflected the EU’s growing experience as a mediator and demonstrated the EU’s ambition to adopt a more systematic approach to mediation, including the strengthening of its capacities (Council of the European Union 2009). Moreover, the Concept makes a self-confident assessment of the EU’s added value and potential effectiveness as mediator in international conflicts: The EU has a lot to offer as an actor in mediation. It brings value added and creates new entry points for peace initiatives through its political and financial weight and its comprehensive approach to conflict prevention and resolution, involving CFSP/ESDP [Common Foreign and Security Policy / European Security and Defence Policy] and Community instruments. The EU is in an excellent position to provide incentives to the conflict parties and can rely on its wide field presence. (Council of the European Union 2009, p. 4)

However, despite the EU’s increasing engagement as a mediator in conflicts, the EU’s role as an actor in international mediation—and its effectiveness in particular—is considerably under-researched. This book provides the first comparative analysis of the EU’s effectiveness as an international mediator. The main purpose of the book is threefold. First, it puts forward an analytical framework for investigating the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator in peace negotiations, compiled from theoretical insights derived both from mediation research and EU foreign policy studies. Second, it evaluates the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator within and across three cases: (1) EU mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, (2) EU mediation between Kosovo and Serbia in the framework of the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue, and (3) EU co-mediation in the Geneva International Discussions (GID) about the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Third, it explains different degrees of EU mediation effectiveness within and across these cases and situates the findings both in mediation research and EU foreign policy studies. The main finding of the book is that EU mediation has a positive, stabilising effect on conflict situations in all three cases, making renewed escalation less likely and contributing to the settlement of conflict issues. This is what I call the stabilising effect of EU mediation. Although

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the degree of mediation effectiveness differs across cases, this effect is traceable in all case studies. At the same time, the three case ­studies demonstrate that EU mediation does not automatically lead to a ­transformation of the relationship between conflict parties. Processes of socialisation and learning in terms of increased levels of trust and confidence-building have largely been absent. There exist significant gaps in terms of the implementation of concluded agreements, suggesting a dilemma for EU mediation effectiveness in the long term. The empirical findings point to the centrality of mediation strategy and the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise in understanding the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator. The EU’s mediation strategy, which is often based on positive incentives and rewards, is a key instrument to influence the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise. Both factors are necessary conditions of EU mediation effectiveness. EU mediator leverage, policy coherence, mediator coordination, and the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness all turn out to be conducive to EU mediation effectiveness, but their significance varies across the three cases. Another key conclusion to be drawn from the empirical analysis is that the conflict context has a significant influence on the effectiveness of the EU’s mediation involvement and should not be underestimated. This assessment thus reiterates calls in the literature for EU foreign policy studies to focus more explicitly on the contextual factors for understanding the EU’s effectiveness in the international realm.1

1.1  The EU’s Emergence as an International Mediator Given the secrecy in which mediation efforts often take place and the small amount of information that is publicly available, it is not ­surprising that the history of the EU’s engagement in mediation activities has not yet been systematically described in EU foreign policy research. In essence, I argue in this book that the story of the EU’s emergence as an actor in international mediation can be divided into four phases—each of them displaying different EU mediation activities, both in terms of geographical and thematic focuses. The first phase of mediation activities occurred between 1991 and 1994, when the European Community (EC) and later the EU played an active mediation role in the Yugoslavian civil wars. In June 1991, an EC Troika mission to Yugoslavia—composed of the foreign ministers of

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Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands—supported Austria’s initiative within the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) to step up the CSCE’s involvement in the Yugoslav conflicts. The EC Troika mission achieved brokering the Brioni Agreement between ­representatives of Slovenia, Croatia, and the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on 7 July 1991. The agreement comprised cease-fire arrangements that resulted in the withdrawal of the Yugoslav People’s Army from Slovenia (Lucarelli 2000, pp. 18–23). When the implementation of the Brioni Agreement stalled and the situation in Bosnia-Herzegovina began to seriously deteriorate, the EU and the United Nations (UN) jointly called the conflict parties to the ‘International Conference on the Former Yugoslavia’ in London on 26 August 1992. Although the negotiations lasted for more than two years, they did not result in a comprehensive peace agreement, as the so-called Vance-Owen Peace Plan, proposed by the mediators David Owen (EC/ EU) and Cyrus Vance (UN), was finally rejected by the Bosnian Serbs. The breakdown in negotiations in April 1994 marked the end of EU efforts to mediate in the Yugoslav conflict (Lucarelli 2000, pp. 37–62). After this period, the EU almost completely withdrew from international conflict management activity. This withdrawal can partly be explained by the EU’s concern about its relatively poor performance in preventing and then ending the Balkan Wars, in part through the perceived need for consolidation and the further institutionalisation of the CFSP. The EU’s unsuccessful role in peacemaking efforts during the Yugoslav Wars clearly pointed to the lack of necessary instruments and the need for a consolidated institutional framework, which was finally established through the Amsterdam Treaty (Keukeleire and Delreux 2014, p. 47). The second phase of EU mediation thus began with the ratification of the Treaty of Amsterdam, through which the EU created the post of the Secretary-General/High Representative of the Common Foreign and Security Policy. The latter was taken up in June 1999 by Javier Solana, the former Secretary-General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. During Solana’s two terms in office between 1999 and 2009, the EU mediated several conflicts within and outside of Europe. In August 2001, High Representative Solana—together with the EU Special Representative for the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Francois Léotard, and in cooperation with US Special Envoy James Pardew— managed to broker the Ohrid Framework Agreement, which settled the

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conflict between the Macedonian government and the Albanian minority in Macedonia (Ilievski and Taleski 2010; Schneckener 2002). In November 2001, Solana initiated a mediation process between Serbia and Montenegro on the formation of a state union, which resulted in the Belgrade Agreement on Principles of Relations between Serbia and Montenegro within the State Union of March 2002 (see Chapter 3). Other cases of EU mediation activities within this period include the initiative to broker an agreement between the Israeli government and the Palestinian authorities to end the Israeli siege of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem in 2003 (Bretherton and Vogler 2006, pp. 184– 185; Tocci 2013, pp. 32–37) as well as the EU’s involvement in mediation between the Ukrainian government and the opposition movement that resulted in an agreement to repeat the run-off elections between Viktor Yushchenko and Viktor Yanukovych in the same year (Pifer 2007, pp. 31–37; Youngs 2009, pp. 361–364). In this phase, the EU also provided mediation support to other third parties (see Gündüz and Herbolzheimer 2010, pp. 25–26), the most prominent example being the assistance given to the Finnish non-governmental organization (NGO) Crisis Management Initiative in order to mediate the peace process in Aceh, Indonesia, between 2004 and 2008 (Higgins 2012, pp. 48–52). The EU sustained its involvement in mediation processes during High Representative Catherine Ashton’s term of office between 2009 and 2014, which is considered the third phase of EU mediation. In this period, the EU stepped up its mediation profile in the conflicts in the Balkans in particular. In 2009, Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt—acting on behalf of the Presidency of the Council of the EU (which Sweden held in the second half of 2009) together with US Deputy Secretary of State Jim Steinberg—led a joint EU–US mediation effort, the so-called Butmir Process, to broker an agreement on Bosnia Herzegovina’s political transition (Richter 2018). Since March 2011, the EU has been mediating between Kosovo and Serbia in the framework of the Belgrade– Pristina dialogue, which has led to several agreements between the conflict parties (see Chapter 4). EU mediation activities in this period also included EU co-mediation of the Geneva Talks on South Ossetia and Abkhazia (see Chapter 5); mediation during the ‘Euromaidan’ crisis in Ukraine (2013–2014); as well as several mediation missions in the context of Egypt’s political crisis between 2012 and 2014, and in Yemen between 2011 and 2014 (Girke 2015, pp. 514–520; Natorski 2018; Pinfari 2018).

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In the fourth and current phase of EU mediation starting with High Representative/Vice-President Federica Mogherini taking office in November 2014, the EU has continued critical mediation ­engagements such as the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue and the GID on Georgia’s secessionist conflicts (see Chapters 4 and 5). Mogherini also played a ­ prominent role in representing the EU in the negotiations with Iran over its nuclear programme, although the emerging literature on this case tends to perceive the EU’s role as that of a collective negotiator and party to the dispute rather than as a mediator (Adebahr 2017). In Macedonia’s political crisis between 2015 and 2017, Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), in concert with the European Commission, mediated an agreement between the four main political parties (Fonck 2018). Building Institutional Capacities for EU Mediation The EU’s emergence as an international mediator has been ­accompanied by the evolution of a systematic EU approach to mediation in terms of policy development and capacity-building. Although the entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam in 1999 consolidated the EU’s CFSP structures and instruments, it took almost another 10 years before mediation entered the centre-stage of EU foreign and security policy with the adoption of the 2009 Concept on Strengthening EU Mediation and Dialogue Capacities. Although the Commission’s Communication on Conflict Prevention in 2001 was the first EU document that mentioned mediation as a distinct EU foreign policy tool and emphasised its importance for the prevention and the management of violent conflicts, the 2003 European Security Strategy (ESS) fell short of further defining the role of mediation in EU external action.2 It was only in the context of the implementation of the ESS that mediation (re-)gained increased attention by EU policy-makers. Following the call in the ‘Report on the Implementation of the European Security Strategy’ for an expansion of EU mediation and dialogue capacities in 2008 (Council of the European Union 2008, p. 9), the Council of the EU adopted the above mentioned Concept. It represents the main conceptual and policy reference point of EU mediation. Instead of placing mediation within one specific field of EU external policy, it states that mediation is a cross-policy tool that involves both “CFSP/ESDP and Community instruments” (Council of the European Union 2009, p. 4). As regards conducting EU mediation efforts, the Concept spells out five guiding principles: (a) policy coherence

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(mediation efforts shall be conducted in line with the broader context of EU foreign policy objectives), (b) comprehensiveness (referring to consistent coordination between mediation efforts and other EU foreign policy activities such as CSDP missions in the same kind of conflict), (c) c­ areful assessment of risks before becoming involved in a mediation process, (d) complementarity with basic principles of transitional justice and human rights, and (e) promotion of women’s equal and full ­participation in the prevention and resolution of conflicts, including mediation processes (Council of the European Union 2009, pp. 6–9). Apart from defining the procedures for direct engagement as a mediator or co-mediator, the Concept specifies the following additional types of EU mediation involvement: 1. ‘Promoting mediation’: The EU promotes the use of mediation as a non-coercive instrument to deal with political conflict; 2. ‘Leveraging mediation’: The EU provides diplomatic leverage or economic resources to mediation processes being led by other third parties and supports the implementation of agreements; 3.  ‘Supporting mediation’: The EU supports mediation processes being led by other third parties through capacity-building, provision of expertise or logistical support; 4.  ‘Funding mediation’: The EU provides financial support to ­mediation efforts being led by other third parties (Council of the European Union 2009, p. 6; see Sherriff et al. 2013, p. 2). Given that these different EU mediation roles also build on the cooperation and coordination with other international actors, the Concept identifies the UN and regional organisations such as the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and the African Union as fundamental cooperation partners in the field of mediation (Council of the European Union 2009, p. 9). To implement the ambitious 2009 Concept, the EU established a Mediation Support Team within the European External Action Service (EEAS) that became operational in late 2011 (European External Action Service 2013). The Mediation Support Team itself is not engaged as a third-party mediator in violent conflicts, but it has offered a series of coaching and training activities for the EEAS (including EU Special Representatives) and EU delegations, and thus serves as an important ‘in-house’ provider of mediation expertise and knowledge. In addition,

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it has delivered operational support to EU actors engaged in mediation efforts and has developed a cooperation network with other international public and private actors, in particular with the United Nations Mediation Support Unit (see Sherriff and Hauck 2012, pp. 16–29). When it comes to conducting and managing of EU mediation efforts, the Mediation Support Team is only one component of a bigger institutional structure that builds on CFSP/CSDP actors, the European Commission, and the European Parliament. As mentioned, the High Representatives, EU Special Representatives, and, to a lesser extent, EEAS officials and EU delegations often ‘spearhead’ EU mediation activities. In particular, EU Special Representatives have been the leading EU figures involved in mediation, as their mandates typically include conflict resolution tasks such as participation in peace negotiations, mediation roles, and the supervision of the implementation of concluded peace agreements (Adebahr 2012, p. 165). Their significant role in EU mediation is also acknowledged by the 2009 Concept, which emphasises that “EUSR [EU Special Representative] teams need to be given appropriate training opportunities in the area of mediation and should, where relevant, include individuals who have experience and expertise in mediation” (Council of the European Union 2009, p. 5). Within the CFSP decision-making structures, the Political and Security Committee (PSC) plays a central role in mandating and steering EU mediation activities. “It is in the PSC where member states are regularly updated about EU mediation efforts carried out by the High Representatives, EU Special Representatives or other EU actors and discuss and decide on the mandates of EU mediators” (Bergmann et al. 2018, p. 163). On an ad hoc basis, the European Commission has also been involved in conducting mediation efforts through the participation of Commission officials in EU mediation teams. Examples include mediation efforts in the Western Balkans (Kosovo and Serbia, Macedonia) where mediation activities are closely interlinked with other EU external policy areas such as development and enlargement policy (Fonck 2018; Cooper 2015). Moreover, the Commission is the main funder of mediation efforts by other third parties, including international/regional organisations and specialised NGOs. In particular, through the Instrument contributing to Stability and Peace—the Community instrument managed by the Commission’s Service for Foreign Policy Instruments—the EU has funded a wide variety of mediation and confidence-building measures across the globe (Bergmann 2018a, pp. 13–16).

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Finally, the European Parliament has also conducted mediation activities in terms of its own parliamentary diplomacy efforts. One ­example is the so-called Cox-Kwasniewski mission to negotiate the release of Ukrainian politician Yulia Timoshenko from prison (2012–2013); another is the aforementioned involvement in EU-mediated talks between political groups in Macedonia (2015–2017) (Nitoiu and Sus 2016; Fonck 2018). To support these types of initiatives, the European Parliament set up its own European Parliamentary Mediation Service within its bureaucratic structure in 2014. The service provides support and advice for the European Parliament’s efforts in the field of ­mediation and conflict prevention “through ad hoc initiatives such as (silent or ­visible) diplomacy by parliamentary envoys, or by setting up […] training programmes towards foreign parliaments in a post-conflict or transition situation” (Fonck 2018, p. 4). In sum, these policy-related and institutional developments in the field of EU mediation demonstrate that mediation has evolved into an important instrument of EU foreign and security policy. The relevance of mediation within the EU’s external action toolbox is also recognised by the Global Strategy for the European Union’s Foreign and Security Policy, which highlights the important role of mediation, both in EU conflict prevention and conflict settlement approaches (European Union 2016, pp. 30f., 40).

1.2  Delimiting EU Mediation in Theory and Practice Mediation is an instrument of conflict management that can be applied to every type and in every phase of conflict (Greig and Diehl 2012, pp. 2, 15–17). While there is no consensus definition in the mediation literature, the conceptualisation by Bercovitch et al. (1991) is widely used by mediation scholars and describes characteristics of mediation shared by most researchers. The authors define mediation as a process of conflict management, related to but distinct from the parties’ own efforts, whereby the disputing parties […] seek the assistance, or accept an offer of help from an individual, group, state or organization to change, affect or influence their perceptions or behavior, without resorting to physical force, or invoking the authority of the law. (Bercovitch et al. 1991, p. 8)

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Essentially, this definition emphasises four main characteristics of mediation: 1. Mediation refers to the involvement of a third party (an international organisation, state, civil society actor, or private individual) in direct negotiations between the conflict parties, which is mutually permitted by the latter. 2. It is a voluntary process in which the conflict parties participate by their own choice and maintain full control over its outcome. 3. It is non-violent in the way that the mediator applies non-violent tactics to spur compromise agreements.3 4.  The outcome of the mediation process is non-binding (see Beardsley 2011, pp. 18–19; Greig and Diehl 2012, pp. 5–6). Based on the definition of international mediation by Bercovitch et al. (1991, p. 8), this book defines ‘EU mediation’ as any efforts by single or collective actors representing the European Union to assist negotiations between conflict parties and to help them bringing about a settlement to their conflict without resorting to physical force, or invoking the authority of the law. (Bergmann and Niemann 2015, p. 959)

This definition implies that the term ‘EU mediation’ includes ­ ediation efforts that are carried out by one or more of the following m actors within the EU’s foreign policy system (Davis 2014, p. 97): • the High Representative/Vice-President of the Commission • the Presidency of the Council of the EU • EU Special Representative(s) for a world region or policy field • Heads of EU delegations or CSDP missions in third countries • senior EEAS officials • MEPs. Mediation efforts carried out by individual EU member states only qualify as EU mediation if the member state is acting on an EU mandate or represents an EU institution.4 It is important to note that the definition of EU mediation adopted in this book is narrow, as it only refers to EU interventions into actual negotiations between conflict parties. In other words, diplomatic efforts

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undertaken by the EU to broker agreements between conflict parties that do not result from tripartite negotiations are not considered to be EU mediation incidents. Only if the conflict parties and the mediator meet at the negotiation table is an initiative considered to be EU mediation corresponding to the definition outlined above. This clarification serves to delineate EU mediation from other EU conflict management activities such as shuttle diplomacy and good offices along the lines of the definition of international mediation presented above. This is an important delimitation because the EU’s own definition of mediation, as formulated in the 2009 Concept on Strengthening EU Mediation and Dialogue Capacities differs from the definition adopted in this book in two regards. First, the EU’s definition emphasises that mediation is an instrument of conflict transformation that should be applied—if possible—to address the root causes of conflict. Although conflict transformation may be the ultimate aim of mediation in the long run, this book focusses on conflict settlement as the short- to medium-term objective of mediation. Second, according to the EU’s definition mediation implies the active involvement of the intervening third party by making substantial proposals and suggestions on how to solve the conflict. Although such a interventionist strategy is one possible form of mediation behaviour, less interventionist strategies such as facilitation and formulation also represent typical mediation approaches and are thus not excluded from the definition of EU mediation applied in this book (see Touval and Zartman 1985, pp. 10–14).

1.3  Research on EU Mediation and the Main Contribution of the Book Despite the EU’s history of mediation engagement and recent developments in terms of policy concepts and institutional capacity-building, research on the EU as a international mediator is nascent (Bergmann et al. 2018). Both in the literature on international mediation and EU foreign policy studies, there are few theory-guided empirical a­ ssessments of mediation efforts undertaken by the EU. The existing literature on EU mediation activities can be divided into four strands. First, there are studies that investigate the principles, concepts, and policies that guide and underlie the EU’s involvement as a mediator in conflicts. One example is the study by Laura Davis (2014), who investigates how the EU translates principles of peace and justice into policies and practices,

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focussing particularly on EU mediation and peace process support in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Another example is the article by Natalie Girke (2015), who examines the EU’s understanding of mediation and how it is reflected in its engagement as a co-mediator in Yemen’s National Dialogue Conference. Moreover, Karsten Friis’ (2007) article on EU mediation in the negotiations between the Montenegrin government and the opposition on the procedures for a referendum of independence in 2006 investigates to what extent the EU’s mediation behaviour reflected patterns of what he conceptualises as ‘post-modern diplomacy’ (Friis 2007, p. 87). Second, several single-case studies focus more explicitly on the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator in peace negotiations. The study by Magdalena Frichova Grono (2010) explains the EU’s limited success as a mediator in Georgia’s territorial conflicts, assessing internal and external EU factors that have influenced the GID on the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia in the period between 2008 and 2010. Referring to the same conflict context, the book chapter by Tuomas Forsberg and Antti Seppo (2010) analyses the EU’s role in brokering a c­ easefire between Georgia and Russia in August 2008 upon the initiative of French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Moreover, the study by Florian Bieber (2015) on the EU-facilitated dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina assesses to what extent the agreements reached between 2011 and 2015 represent an “EU success story” (Bieber 2015, p. 285), focussing on the EU’s contribution to conflict settlement. Most recently, the special issue of International Negotiation by Niemann et al. (2018b) includes a number of single-case studies of EU mediation incidents in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, the Israel–Palestine conflict, Ukraine and the Western Balkans (Bergmann 2018b; Davis 2018; Elgström et al. 2018; Richter 2018; Pinfari 2018). Although the findings on the effectiveness of EU mediation vary considerably across individual contributions, the editors conclude that “further analysis and reflection would be useful to understanding what the broader scope conditions are for successful EU mediation” (Niemann et al. 2018a, p. 329). Third, there is a considerable body of literature analysing the EU’s role and effectiveness in international conflict management and resolution that also touches upon EU mediation activities in individual cases (Coppieters et al. 2004; Gross and Juncos 2011; Tocci 2007; Whitman and Wolff 2012a). Although these studies do not systematically focus on EU mediation efforts, they add up to give us an understanding of

1 INTRODUCTION 

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the interaction between mediation and other EU conflict management instruments. Fourth, several policy-orientated studies provide valuable information on the different facets of the EU’s involvement as a mediator and identify several lessons learnt and a scope for the further development of the EU’s mediation capacities (Gündüz and Herbolzheimer 2010; Herrberg et al. 2009; Herrberg 2018; Sheriff et al. 2013). The majority of these studies are highly informative and provide useful recommendations for policy change, but they do not add up systematically to theorising about the EU’s effectiveness as an international mediator. Taken together, scholarly works either focus on conceptualising the EU’s approach to mediation or limiting their analysis to specific empirical aspects of EU mediation engagement in individual cases. Policyorientated studies provide highly relevant case-specific insights but only have a limited potential for generalisation. In sum, I argue that there are three distinct research gaps concerning the study of EU mediation: 1.  a lack of conceptualisations and theoretical frameworks to analyse EU effectiveness in mediation, hypothesising potential causal effects and mechanisms at play, and providing precise operationalisations of key concepts and variables; 2. a lack of theory-driven, in-depth assessments that generate generalisable, empirical knowledge about the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator and its conditions; and 3. a lack of comparative work that analyses and explains EU mediation effectiveness across cases.5 The book addresses these research gaps and advances our theoretical and empirical understanding of EU mediation in three ways. First, it develops and probes a theoretical framework for analysing the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator in peace negotiations. Second, it provides an in-depth investigation of three cases of EU mediation and compares the main findings across cases, thus contributing to a better understanding of EU mediation that goes beyond single-case analysis. Third, it provides an explanation of different degrees of mediation effectiveness across the three cases. While the first research objective serves the purpose of theorising, the second and third objectives constitute the main empirical focus of this book.

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1.4   A Comparative Case Study Approach A research design is a roadmap for carrying out a research project and for how to use evidence to answer the project’s main research questions (Gschwend and Schimmelfennig 2007, p. 1). This study is designed as a comparative case study (George and Bennett 2005, pp. 67–72) (see Table 1.1). The design is implemented in two steps. First, I conduct three single-case studies on EU mediation efforts in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the Kosovo-Serbia conflict, and the conflicts over Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Chapters 3–5). Second, I compare the within-case evidence generated through the case studies across cases to establish generalisable patterns that confirm or disconfirm the conclusions drawn from the individual case studies (Chapter 6). To implement the comparative case study design, I combine two methods of analysis: the congruence method and process tracing. The congruence method rests upon the core assumption that a causal relationship between two variables can be established based on the consistency between a theory’s prediction about the values of the independent and dependent variables and the outcome of a case. Hence, the task for the researcher is to assess whether the values of the variables in each case are congruent with the theoretical expectations about the strengths of the hypothesised causes and effects (George and Bennett 2005, pp. 181–204). A process tracing approach complements the congruence method, as consistency alone is not sufficient to make causal inferences. Process tracing is here defined as “the analysis of evidence on processes, sequences, and conjunctures of events within a case for the purposes of either developing or testing hypotheses about causal mechanisms that might causally explain the case” (Bennett and Checkel 2015b, p. 7). The objective is to Table 1.1  Key research design decisions Research design issue/task

Approach of this study

Research goal Strategy of inquiry Methods to implement research design Data sources

Explanation Comparative case study approach Congruence method and process tracing Official documents, semi-structured interviews, media sources, secondary literature (scholarly works and policy-orientated studies)

Source Own compilation

1 INTRODUCTION 

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document if the sequence of events or processes within an analysed case fits those predicted/anticipated by certain hypotheses (Bennett 2008, p. 705). Recent advances in the literature on qualitative methods have led to a differentiation of different types of process tracing (Beach and Pedersen 2013; Bennett and Checkel 2015a; Rohlfing 2012). The analysis in this book follows what Beach and Pedersen (2013, pp. 18–21) have termed ‘theory-testing process tracing’, that is to assess whether the hypothesised mechanisms can account for the outcome—the degree of EU mediation effectiveness in the respective cases. Due to its ­explorative nature, however, the explanatory ambition of this book is not to ­rigorously test deductively derived theories, but rather to systematically probe the plausibility of hypotheses that could be further tested by taking into account additional cases of EU mediation in future research (see Eckstein 1975, p. 109). Although the ambition of the case studies in this book is to provide the most fine-grained evidence as possible, there are also “pragmatic ­limits on how much detail a researcher will go into and how continuous an explanation they will seek” (Bennett 2008, p. 705). To mitigate these limitations of causal inference in process tracing, the empirical analysis rests upon the triangulation across multiple data sources (Rohlfing 2012, pp. 170–171). As Yin (2009, pp. 114–115) notes, triangulation “reduces reliance on any particular type of data, serves to verify the accounts ­mentioned in one particular source and enhances the confidence in the overall validity of our inferences”. The data used in this book includes both pre-existing material and original material in the form of interview data (Kapiszewski et al. 2015). Pre-existing material refers to official documents, including EU ­documents issued and adopted by any EU institution (such as European Council conclusions, Communications of the European Commission, statements, factsheets, press releases, etc.), documents issued by any of the conflict parties (such as legal documents, national security strategies, white papers, statements, press releases), as well as documents produced in the course of the mediation process such as position papers, draft agreements, and final agreements. Moreover, I rely on major press and secondary literature, the latter including both policy-orientated s­tudies and reports as well as more academic-orientated and theory-driven analyses of the three mediation incidents under scrutiny. In terms of original material, I conducted 79 semi-structured ­interviews on the condition of anonymity (see Annex A). The interview

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partners included (1) officials representing EU institutions and organs (EEAS, European Commission, EU delegations, EU Crisis Management Operations and Missions, European Parliament), (2) EU member state officials representing their countries in Brussels or in the respective conflict countries, (3) officials representing the conflict parties and working in foreign ministries, ministries of European Integration, offices of key state organs such as the prime minister, president, etc., (4) officials representing other parties involved in the management of the conflict, including representatives of the United States and international organisations (OSCE, UN), and (5) civil society representatives in the respective conflict regions and key mediation experts working in think tanks and NGOs at the national or European level. The semi-structured interviews were conducted using a pre-defined questionnaire, with sufficient flexibility to alter the order of the questions or raise additional issues (see Annex B).

1.5  Introducing the Cases of EU Mediation The literature on EU external policy suggests that the EU’s effectiveness as an international negotiator in domains such as climate or trade policy has varied considerably (Niemann and Bretherton 2013; da ConceicaoHeldt and Meunier 2014). We can expect similar findings on the EU’s effectiveness as an international mediator, which may be influenced by a variety of conditioning factors. The three cases in this book are similar with regard to three main characteristics. First, all cases refer to conflicts in the EU’s eastern neighbourhood, with two case studies focusing on conflicts in the Western Balkans and another one dealing with a conflict in the South Caucasus. In this geographical areas where the EU is an important partner and reference point for all of the countries concerned, we would expect favourable conditions for the EU being an effective mediator. Second, all cases selected are incidents of mediation conducted by EU institutions—in contrast to potential cases in which EU member states mediate on behalf of the EU. While an EU Special Representative has been mediating on behalf of the EU in the GID, both the Montenegro and the Kosovo-Serbia case have seen the High Representative of the Union in Foreign and Security Policy, in cooperation with the European Commission, leading the mediation efforts. Third, the three mediation efforts have been ongoing for a minimum of five years, which increases their likelihood to show within-case variation of conflict settlement

1 INTRODUCTION 

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over different mediation phases and thus allows the researcher to draw important within-case comparisons of EU mediation effectiveness and its conditions over a longer period of time. Apart from these similarities, however, the three cases vary with regard to their expected diversity regarding the dependent variable dimension of conflict settlement, which captures the degree to which EU mediation has led to concluded agreements on conflict issues (see Chapter 2). This expectation builds on an initial assessment of ­concluded agreements within eight cases of EU mediation in the EU’s eastern neighbourhood (see Bergmann and Niemann 2015, pp. 971–972). Selecting cases that were expected to differ in that regard was necessary to alleviate concerns that only ‘success cases’ of EU mediation were to be studied or that the focus would only be on EU efforts that did not bring about any traceable degree of conflict settlement. Moreover, selecting diverse cases with regard to the expected value of conflict settlement corresponds with the book’s focus on explaining EU mediation effectiveness, as studying diverse cases allows the researcher to investigate whether hypothesised relationships and mechanisms play out under different conditions (Gerring 2007, pp. 97–99; Schimmelfennig 2015, p. 105; Seawright and Gerring 2008, pp. 300–301). In sum, three cases were selected that have similar context characteristics, but are expected to differ with the degree of EU mediation effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement. The individual cases are further presented below. EU Mediation in the Conflict over Montenegro’s Independence (2001–2006) The first case study analyses the EU’s mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence from December 2001 to May 2006. In the first mediation phase from December 2001 to March 2002, the EU negotiators, led by High Representative Solana mediated the talks between the governments of Montenegro, Serbia, and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on the formation of a common state. The talks resulted in the Belgrade Agreement of March 2002, which established the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro and provided for the possibility of a referendum on independence to be conducted after a threeyear waiting period (Tocci 2007, pp. 84–85). In a second phase between April 2002 and May 2006, Solana and his team remained actively

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involved and brokered agreements during the negotiations on the Constitutional Charter of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro as well as in the negotiations over the rules of the Montenegrin referendum on independence in 2006 (Friis 2007, pp. 70–72, 78–86). EU Mediation Between Kosovo and Serbia (Since 2011) The second case study investigates the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator in the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue since March 2011. The EU initiated the mediation process after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) had concluded that Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence in 2008 did not violate international law (Economides and Ker-Lindsay 2015, p. 1033). In the first mediation phase from March 2011 to February 2012, the EEAS senior official, Robert Cooper, and his mediation team brokered nine agreements between the conflict parties. From October 2012 onwards, the mediation efforts have been continued at the highest political level under the auspices of the EU’s High Representatives Ashton (2012–2014) and Mogherini (since 2014). The EU’s mediation efforts have resulted in a series of agreements between the two sides—the First Agreement of Principles Governing the Normalization of Relations (2013) being the most prominent one. Despite these achievements, there remain several unresolved issues related to the north of Kosovo, while other agreements have also not been (fully) implemented yet. EU Co-mediation in the Geneva International Discussions (GID) (Since 2008) The third case study analyses the EU’s effectiveness as a co-mediator in the GID on the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia from October 2008 to December 2018. In this period, the EU—represented by the EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus and the Crisis in Georgia—together with the UN and OSCE co-chaired more than 40 rounds of negotiations between Georgia, Russia, United States and representatives of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The two main agenda items of the GID are (a) security arrangements and negotiations on the non-use of force, and (b) humanitarian issues, including the return of refugees/internally displaced persons (IDPs). Although the mediation process is ongoing, the GID have not led to any substantial agreements between the parties.

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1.6  Organisation of the Book To answer the research questions developed above, the book is structured as follows. Chapter 2 sets out an analytical framework that comprises two building blocks. First, it develops a two-dimensional conceptualisation of EU mediation effectiveness that differentiates between effectiveness as conflict settlement and effectiveness as goal-attainment. Second, it theorises six conditions of EU mediation effectiveness—mediator leverage, mediation strategy, EU policy coherence, mediator coordination, the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise, and the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness. The framework outlined in Chapter 2 is then used to structure the following three case studies in Chapters 3–5. First, each case study assesses the degree of EU mediation effectiveness, and, second, engages in explaining the degree of effectiveness by analysing the influence of the individual conditioning factors. Chapter 6 concludes by undertaking a comparative analysis of EU mediation effectiveness and its conditions across the three cases. By comparing the empirical results of the within-case analyses, it draws causal inferences on the explanatory power of the individual conditioning factors. Based on the comparative assessment, the chapter sets the findings in a broader context and discusses their theoretical, ­methodological, and policy implications.

Notes 1. See, for example, Jørgensen et al. (2011, p. 614) and Whitman and Wolff (2012b, pp. 212–213). 2. Instead of using the term ‘mediation’, the ESS refers to ‘political dialogue’ as a long-term preventive instrument, without defining it (European Council 2001, p. 3). 3. Participating in a mediation process may not preclude the conflict parties from engaging in violence while negotiating with each other. However, the use of violence parallel to peace negotiations may have a severe negative effect on the likelihood of mediation success. On this issue, see Regan and Stam (2000) and Greig (2001). 4. The Swedish co-mediation in the Butmir Process in 2009 in Bosnia and Herzegovina led by Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt is a case in point because Bildt was acting on behalf of the Presidency of the Council of the EU which Sweden held in the second half of 2009. 5. See also Bergmann et al. (2018) for further discussion of the state of the art of research on EU mediation.

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Jørgensen, K. E., Oberthür, S., & Shahin, J. (2011). Introduction: Assessing the EU’s performance in international institutions—Conceptual framework and core findings. Journal of European Integration, 33(6), 599–620. Kapiszewski, D., MacLean, L. M., & Read, B. L. (2015). Field research in political science: Practices and principles. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Keukeleire, S., & Delreux, T. (2014). The foreign policy of the European Union. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Lucarelli, S. (2000). Europe and the breakup of Yugoslavia: A political failure in search of a scholarly explanation. The Hague: Kluwer Law International. Natorski, M. (2018). EU mediation practices in Ukraine during revolutions: What authority as a peacemaker? International Negotiation, 23(2), 278–298. Niemann, A., & Bretherton, C. (2013). EU external policy at the crossroads: The challenge of actorness and effectiveness. Special Issue of International Relations, 27(3), 261–275. Niemann, A., Haastrup, T., & Bergmann, J. (2018a). Motives, roles, effectiveness and the future of the EU as an international mediator. International Negotiation, 23(2), 319–330. Niemann, A., Bergmann, J., Haastrup, T., & Whitman, R. G. (2018b). The European Union as international mediator: Theoretical and empirical perspectives. Special Issue of International Negotiation, 23(2), 157–176. Nitoiu, C., & Sus, M. (2016). The European Parliament’s diplomacy—A tool for projecting EU power in times of crisis? The case of the Cox-Kwasniewski Mission. Journal of Common Market Studies, 55(1), 71–86. Norwegian Nobel Committee. (2012, October 12). Announcement speech of the Chairman of Norwegian Nobel Committee on the Award of the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize to the European Union. Oslo. https://www.nobelprize.org/ prizes/peace/2012/prize-announcement/. Accessed 9 January 2019. Pifer, S. (2007). European mediators and Ukraine’s orange revolution. Problems of Post-communism, 54(6), 28–42. Pinfari, M. (2018). EU mediation in Egypt: The limits of reactive conflict management. International Negotiation, 23(2), 199–217. Regan, P. M., & Stam, A. C. (2000). In the nick of time: Conflict management, mediation timing, and the duration of interstate disputes. International Studies Quarterly, 44(2), 239–260. Richter, S. (2018). Missing the muscles? Mediation by conditionality in Bosnia and Herzegovina. International Negotiation, 23(2), 258–277. Rohlfing, I. (2012). Case studies and causal inference: An integrative framework. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Schimmelfennig, F. (2015). Efficient process tracing: Analyzing the causal mechanisms of European integration. In A. Bennett & J. T. Checkel (Eds.), Process tracing: From metaphor to analytic tool (pp. 98–125). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

24  J. BERGMANN Schneckener, U. (2002). Developing and applying EU crisis management: Test case Macedonia (ECMI Working Paper 14). Flensburg: European Centre for Minority Issues. Seawright, J., & Gerring, J. (2008). Case selection techniques in case study research: A menu of qualitative and quantitative options. Political Research Quarterly, 61(2), 294–308. Sherriff, A., & Hauck, V. (2012, December 31). EEAS mediation support pilot project: Evaluatory review. Brussels: European External Action Service. http:// ecdpm.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/EEAS-Mediation-Support-PilotProject-Evaluatory-Review-2012.pdf. Accessed 19 February 2015. Sherriff, A., Hauck V., & Rocca, C. (2013). Glass half full: Study on EU lessons learnt in mediation and dialogue (Study submitted to the European External action service by ECDPM through the AETS Consortium—Cardno). Maastricht: European Centre for Development Policy Management. Tocci, N. (2007). The EU and conflict resolution: Promoting peace in the backyard. London: Routledge. Tocci, N. (2013). The Middle East quartet and (in)effective multilateralism. The Middle East Journal, 67(1), 29–44. Touval, S., & Zartman, I. W. (1985). Introduction: Mediation in theory. In S. Touval & I. W. Zartman (Eds.), International mediation in theory and practice (pp. 7–17). Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Whitman, R. G., & Wolff, S. (Eds.). (2012a). The European Union as a global conflict manager. London: Routledge. Whitman, R. G., & Wolff, S. (2012b). The EU as a global conflict manager: Reflections on the past, perspectives for the future. In R. G. Whitman & S. Wolff (Eds.), The European Union as a global conflict manager (pp. 211–220). London: Routledge. Yin, R. K. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods. Los Angeles, CA: Sage. Youngs, R. (2009). ‘A door neither closed nor open’: EU policy towards Ukraine during and since the Orange Revolution. International Politics, 46(4), 358–375.

CHAPTER 2

EU Mediation Effectiveness: An Analytical Framework

When third parties enter a conflict constellation to mediate between two opposing sides, the negotiation structure turns into a trilateral one, which makes mediation a highly complex phenomenon. As mediation research is characterised by a dominance of rationalist models of explanation (Hellman 2012, p. 597), mediation is predominantly understood as a triadic bargaining process, in which the conflict parties pursue their own strategic preferences and try to maximise their own benefits compared to the costs of participating in the mediation process (Beardsley 2011, pp. 19–43). In other words, conflict parties only show cooperative behaviour when they expect an agreement that brings them positive payoffs (see Hopmann 1996, p. 450). Rationalist explanations of mediation focus on how mediators can help the parties to overcome barriers to bargaining success and overcome commitment problems, for example, through the provision of incentives to compromise as well as crucial information that alters conflict parties’ cost-benefit calculations (Gilady and Russett 2002, pp. 397–401). The analytical framework of this book rests upon a soft rational choice approach that builds on the core logic of rationalism but relaxes some ‘hardcore’ rationalist assumptions (see Haas 2001; Niemann 2006, pp. 24–27). In line with standard rational choice approaches, it is recognised that actors are rational utility-maximisers who seek to realise their interests. However, interests are not conceptualised as reflecting pure material needs. Instead, the ontology is non-materialistic, in the sense © The Author(s) 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0_2

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that it recognises that interests are value-driven, and these values may also include non-material elements (Haas 2001, p. 23). In addition, it implies that actors’ preferences are not taken as fixed and exogenously given. In contrast, actors have the ability to redefine their values, and thus to re-consider their preferences (Niemann 2006, p. 26). A soft rational choice approach for studying EU mediation effectiveness implies that we assume that all parties involved in a mediation process—including the mediator—do not have fixed and exogenously given preferences. Rather, their preferences may be subject to change due to social interactions between them, their perceptions of the mediation process, and the behaviour of the other parties involved. Perceptions feed into actors’ needs-based cost-benefit calculations, and a change in perceptions may lead to revised calculations. Consequently, a soft rational choice approach allows for a dynamic explanation of EU mediation effectiveness that is not bound to static and inflexible judgements with regard to the participating parties and their mediation behaviour.

2.1  Conceptualisation of EU Mediation Effectiveness Effectiveness is certainly one of the most frequently debated issues in International Relations theory in general (see e.g. Hegemann et al. 2013; Miles et al. 2002). In the field of EU foreign policy studies, the question of the EU’s effectiveness in international politics constitutes one of the key themes on scholars’ research agenda (Niemann and Bretherton 2013, p. 267). Although the literature offers a wide variety of conceptualisations of EU external effectiveness, effectiveness as goal-attainment has become a standard reference point for assessing EU effectiveness in multilateral negotiations and international institutions (Niemann and Bretherton 2013, p. 267; Oberthür and Groen 2015, p. 1319).1 In international mediation research, the main reference point is mediation success. Although there are different conceptualisations of mediation success, most frequently it is measured in terms of the concrete results achieved by mediation, such as a ceasefire agreement or a partial or full settlement of the conflict issues (Wallensteen and Svensson 2014, p. 322).2 This outcome-orientated definition of mediation success is also referred to as mediation effectiveness (Bercovitch 2005, pp. 293–294). Hence, ‘effectiveness’ is a concept widely used in both strands of research. Both research fields draw a line between problem-centred and

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actor-centred perspectives on effectiveness.3 Problem-centred perspectives on effectiveness focus on whether the problem targeted by a s­ pecific measure has been adequately addressed, and possibly solved. In contrast, actor-centred perspectives reflect on the interests and intentions of the actor under scrutiny (such as goal-attainment) (Peen Rodt 2014, pp. 19–22). This book adopts a two-dimensional conceptualisation of EU mediation effectiveness (interchangeably: EU effectiveness as a ­mediator) that includes both a problem-centred perspective and an actor-­centred perspective, or, more precisely, a conflict-specific perspective and an EU-specific perspective on effectiveness. The criteria for evaluating these two dimensions are (1) conflict settlement and (2) goal-attainment. Mediation Effectiveness as Conflict Settlement A conflict-specific perspective on effectiveness asks of the purpose of a certain action and analyses if it has been fulfilled. The purpose of conflict management efforts can be twofold: to contain the use of violence by conflict parties, and/or to settle the conflict in terms of reaching agreements between the conflict parties. Whereas conflict management efforts such as peacekeeping operations and sanctions primarily aim for conflict containment, the scope of mediation is broader as it aims to promote a political settlement of a conflict (Mitchell 1981, p. 287). Thus, a conflict-specific perspective on EU mediation effectiveness focusses on the concrete results achieved and assesses whether EU mediation leads to the settlement of the conflict. In most studies on international mediation research, the degree of conflict settlement is evaluated once the mediation has ended—either when it has broken down or has led to an agreement between the conflict parties (Wallensteen and Svensson 2014, p. 323). However, a qualitative assessment of mediation incidents should go beyond this static conceptualisation of conflict settlement (Sisk 2009, p. 44). Analysing two ongoing cases of international mediation makes the argument for a dynamic conceptualisation of conflict settlement even more compelling. Consequently, I propose adopting an issue-based approach to evaluate conflict settlement. In other words, I assess the degree of settlement of each individual issue separately in a first step before comparing the results on the individual issues and evaluating the overall degree of conflict settlement in the respective case.

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Adopting the issue-by-issue approach and dividing the mediation process into a series of negotiation phases, I propose to differentiate between the following possible results of the issue-specific evaluation: a. Full settlement of conflict issue: Agreement reached that fully solves all aspects of incompatibility between the conflict parties about the specific conflict issue, and the agreement has been fully implemented; b. Partial settlement of conflict issue: Agreement reached that solves some aspects of incompatibility between the conflict p ­ arties about the specific conflict issue, and the implementation of the agreement is ongoing; c. No settlement of conflict issue: Mediation has not led to any agreement on the conflict issue. It is important to note that I consider a conflict issue to be fully settled when there is an agreement on its solution and this agreement has been fully implemented. Given that agreements mediated by regional organisations such as the EU are more likely to fail within a few weeks (Gartner 2011), I argue for focussing not only on the agreements per se, but also on their sustainability in terms of implementation. Sustainability thus means that we have to scrutinise whether concluded agreements have been taken up and moved to the implementation stage.4 Having analysed the settlement of conflict issues in each ­mediation phase, in a second step the overall degree of conflict settlement is assessed. For this evaluation, I propose to distinguish the following five values that the dependent variable dimension conflict settlement can take on: 1. Full settlement of conflict: All conflict issues have been fully settled through negotiated agreements; 2. Major settlement of conflict: The majority of conflict issues have been fully or partially settled through negotiated agreements; 3. Minor settlement of conflict: A small number of conflict issues have been fully or partially settled through negotiated agreements; 4. Process agreement: No agreement has been made on the settlement of conflict issues, but there is agreement on holding further rounds of negotiations, establishing procedural aspects for talks, or on strategies for the implementation of concessions;

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5. No settlement: The mediation efforts have neither led to the full or partial settlement of any conflict issue through negotiated agreements nor to any process agreement to continue the mediation process.5 Translating the values of conflict settlement into measures of mediation effectiveness results in five different degrees of EU mediation effectiveness on the conflict settlement dimension: (1) EU effectiveness is very high if there is a full settlement of the conflict; (2) EU effectiveness is high if there is a major settlement of the conflict; (3) EU ­effectiveness is medium if there is a minor settlement of the conflict; (4) EU ­effectiveness is low if there is only a process agreement; and (5) EU effectiveness is very low if there is no agreement at all. Mediation Effectiveness as Goal-Attainment The EU-specific perspective on mediation effectiveness captures the degree to which the EU has achieved its objectives as a mediator in a certain mediation effort. A sound conceptualisation of goal-attainment as a criterion to evaluate effectiveness requires answers to two questions: First, what research strategy is applied to determine the goals that have been sought? Second, how to define and operationalise ‘achievement’? Beginning with the former, there are various research strategies to identify the EU’s goals in multilateral negotiations. Elsig (2013, p. 328), for example, defines the EU’s main objective in trade policy ex ante, “as the pursuit of European societal interests at large (as opposed to short-term gains one-sidedly pushed by special interest groups or veto players among the Member States)”. Far more common, however, is an inductive approach, leaving it to the empirical work to clarify the EU’s goals in particular policy areas or multilateral negotiation settings (see Brattberg and Rhinard 2013; da Conceição-Heldt and Meunier 2014b; Groen and Niemann 2013). To structure the empirical analysis, I propose making an analytical distinction between two different categories of goals that a mediator may seek to achieve: process goals and outcome goals. First, process goals refer to mediator goals concerning aspects of the negotiation and could relate, for example to the negotiation agenda, the desired duration of the mediation efforts, and the costs that will be incurred for taking over the mediator role. In addition, process goals may also include normative objectives,

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such as the goal to give a certain conflict party a say in the negotiations and provide them with the opportunity to articulate its needs and interests. Second, outcome goals include all mediator goals that concern the ‘end-product’ of a mediation process, that is, the specific contents of a potential settlement of the conflict. The mediator may have concrete preferences regarding the substance of an agreement or have at least some priorities concerning the question of what kind of conflict issues should be addressed in a potential agreement between the disputants. Goal-attainment is here understood in terms of a continuum of degrees that ranges from low to medium to high (see da ConceiçãoHeldt and Meunier 2014a, pp. 968–969). Assuming that the EU usually pursues more than one goal simultaneously, I propose to evaluate goal-attainment in two steps. First, I assess the degree of goal-attainment for each individual mediator goal identified, differentiating between three values of goal-attainment: a. High degree of goal-attainment: The EU has fully achieved the goal; b. Medium degree of goal-attainment: The EU has only partly achieved the goal, attaining some, but not all aspects/benchmarks related to the goal; c. Low degree of goal-attainment: The EU has not achieved the goal. Second, to assess the overall degree of EU effectiveness in terms of goal-attainment, the findings on the individual mediator goals are taken together, differentiating between five degrees of effectiveness: 1. Effectiveness is very high: The EU has been able to achieve all its mediator goals to a high degree; 2. Effectiveness is high: The EU has achieved most of its mediator goals to a high degree; 3. Effectiveness is medium: The EU has attained most of its goals only to a medium degree; 4. Effectiveness is low: The EU has not attained most of its goals; 5. Effectiveness is very low: The EU has not achieved any of its mediator goals. Taking goal-attainment as a measure to evaluate EU mediation effectiveness raises some challenges. First, actors can state their goals in such a broad way that an empirical assessment of their achievement is hardly

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possible and sometimes meaningless. Second, goals can change over time which necessitates a dynamic assessment of goals and their a­ chievement. Third, in the case of multiple goals, objectives could be perceived as being of varying importance to the actor pursuing them. Given that actors may invest unequal amounts of resources to realise different goals, it would be misleading not to take their relative importance into account in the empirical assessment. Fourth, it should be accounted for how ­difficult or easy it is to achieve certain goals (Oberthür and Groen 2015, pp. 1321–24). Fifth, when the mediating actor is of composite ­character and involves several sub-actors, the latter could pursue varying—and even diverging—goals, which renders the analysis even more difficult (Jørgensen et al. 2011, p. 604; Peen Rodt 2014, p. 23). However, there are also ways to deal with these challenges. Classifying goals into the proposed categories (process and outcome goals) serves as a first step towards a systematic assessment of the EU’s mediation goals. Moreover, the triangulation of qualitative research methods sheds further light on the specific objectives beyond very broad and general goals articulated publicly. Concerning the relative importance of goals to the actors pursuing them, acknowledging this fact itself should prevent the researcher from drawing too superficial—and thus misleading— conclusions. In addition, asking interview partners to make judgements about the relative importance of EU goals and rank the different objectives according to the importance attributed to them contributes to more accurate empirical evaluations (Peen Rodt 2014, p. 23). Most importantly, researchers should be as transparent as possible concerning their evaluations of goal-attainment. Only by systematically presenting all pieces of empirical evidence and discussing in detail how they can be plausibly related to different degrees of goal-attainment can a sufficient level of intersubjective reliability be reached. The two dimensions of EU mediation effectiveness—that is, conflict settlement and goal-attainment—are not mutually exclusive in the sense that the EU can either be effective in terms of goal attainment or in terms of conflict settlement. For example, certain mediator goals could be attained through the achievement of progress in terms of conflict settlement. In addition, it is also possible to imagine a situation in which the outcome of a mediation effort, for example a major settlement of the conflict, means the full attainment of the mediator goals. However, it could also be that the EU’s goals have been more ambitious than achieving just conflict settlement by itself, which underlines the importance of considering both dimensions.

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2.2  Theorising the Conditions of EU Mediation Effectiveness Researchers agree that mediation is a highly complex phenomenon that does not lend itself to one single, linear explanation of its success or failure (Beardsley 2011: 114–125; Bercovitch and Houston 2000: 171; Greig and Diehl 2012: 117). Acknowledging this understanding of mediation, the analytical framework builds as a basic premise on the assumption that there is no single, causal explanation of EU mediation effectiveness. Rather, several conditions come into play and possibly interact with each other. It is the task of the researcher to identify those that, together, provide the most plausible explanation of EU mediation effectiveness in a given case. Combining insights and propositions of both mediation research and EU foreign policy studies, I identify six conditioning factors of EU mediation effectiveness that either relate to the mediator or the conflict parties: leverage, mediation strategy, coherence, mediator coordination, the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise, and the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness. Before I discuss these variables in detail, it is important to note that the term ‘conflict party’ is here broadly understood as the ­ political institutions/entities that the individual negotiators represent in the mediation process. In the case of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue (see Chapter 4) between representatives of the Republic of Serbia and the Republic of Kosovo,6 for example, the designation ‘conflict parties’ refers to the governments of both sides. However, given that national governments in democratic systems are elected to represent the political will of their populations, other domestic actors, such as opposition parties, civil society, and media, are also relevant actors for the mediation process, which is accounted for by inquiring into the internal cohesiveness of the conflict parties. Leverage The identity of a mediator determines the power she or he has vis-à-vis the conflict parties. In the mediation literature, this factor is referred to as mediator leverage. Although there seems to be consensus among mediation researchers that leverage plays an important role in understanding the success or failure of mediation, it is one of the most

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under-specified concepts in the mediation literature (Kleiboer 1996, p. 371). Building on Touval and Zartman (1985, p. 12), leverage is defined in this context as any kind of resources and capabilities the EU brings to the negotiation table to alter the dynamics between the conflicting parties and potentially spur an agreement between them. We can distinguish two types of mediator resources. First, the mediator may possess resources that are made conditional on the parties’ willingness to reach compromise agreements. These resources may either be used as coercive measures or positive incentives. Coercive measures may involve diplomatic pressure, the imposition of political and economic sanctions, and/or the threat or active use of military force (Sisk 2009, pp. 55–56). Coercive measures aim to make the status quo of unsettled conflict more uncomfortable and costly to the conflict parties. In contrast, positive incentives change the conflict parties’ calculations in terms of increasing the potential benefits of agreement, thus making it more attractive (Touval and Zartman 1985, p. 13). Positive incentives include rewards such as technology transfer (including arms exports), development aid, free trade and/or association agreements, the lifting of visa regulations, or the promise of future direct investments (see Bergmann and Niemann 2015, p. 962). Moreover, mediators can provide insurances to the conflict parties, such as the promise of the deployment of peacekeeping forces or conferring legitimacy to a group’s cause, for example by recognising it as a legitimate international actor (Sisk 2009, pp. 54–55). Second, leverage can also refer to mediators’ institutional ­capacities and their cognitive resources in terms of expertise and experience in mediation. These include a well-functioning and effective diplomatic apparatus as well as established diplomatic contacts and networks with the opposing sides as key mediator resources. Previous experience in mediating conflicts, institutionalised pools of mediation experts, and sufficient financial resources and staff to initiate and conduct mediation activities over a longer period of time are also important mediator assets (Greig and Diehl 2012, p. 118). Leverage is understood as a necessary precondition of mediation effectiveness because, without the possession of any resources, mediators may find it very difficult to exert any kind of influence on the ­conflicting parties in their attempt to move them towards a compromise agreement (Touval and Zartman 1985, pp. 12–13). The literature assumes that leverage is positively linked to mediation effectiveness.7 The greater the extent of the leverage at the EU’s disposal, the more

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flexible it is concerning the use of different mediation strategies and tactics; and the greater the readiness for making the investments in terms of the diplomatic efforts, funds, and personnel that are necessary to lead the mediation efforts over a longer period. Taken together, I hypothesise that mediator leverage positively influences EU mediation effectiveness, both in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment. To operationalise EU mediator leverage, I distinguish between three different degrees of leverage: high, medium, and low, capturing the ­ extent to which the EU possesses relevant resources. Accordingly, the following questions guide the analysis of mediator leverage: • To what extent does the EU possess resources that are attractive to the parties and could be used to incentivise the parties to move towards agreement? • To what extent did the EU provide resources to the parties in the past, the withdrawal of which could be used as a threat to coerce the parties to move towards agreement? • To what extent does the EU possess institutional resources and capacities to organise, conduct and fund the mediation efforts? Mediation Strategy Mediation scholars understand mediation strategy primarily in terms of the mediator’s overall approach to manage and resolve a conflict. Mediation strategy here is not only understood as the ex ante defined plan of mediators to handle the mediation process, but also refers to the mediator’s actual behaviour in the negotiations and the tactics she or he uses to help parties to find an agreement (Beardsley et al. 2006). Hence, I assume it is the degree of control the mediator de facto exerts on the negotiation process that influences negotiation outcomes. The understanding of mediation strategy employed in this book builds on the central assumption that, in any bargaining situation, the actors’ preference orderings overlap in such a way that alternatives to the continuation of conflict exist which all parties could potentially agree on. This bargaining space, or zone of agreement (ZOA), consists of all possible outcomes that would allow each side to achieve their minimum threshold for acceptable goals or even more (Beardsley et al. 2006, pp. 62–66). Mediators can employ numerous tactics to help the parties identify the ZOA and to reach a compromise solution within this area of preference

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overlap.8 To systematise these different tactics, mediation scholars have developed various classifications of mediation strategy, which, in essence, differ with regard to the degree of control the mediator exerts on the negotiation process (Bercovitch and Houston 2000; Curran et al. 2004; Beardsley et al. 2006). The analytical framework of this book adopts the classification developed by Touval and Zartman (1985, pp. 12–13), who distinguish between the ideal types of facilitation-communication, formulation, and manipulation. Facilitation-communication (hereafter: facilitation) is the least-interventionist type of mediation strategy. The mediator primarily serves as an information provider and communicator between the parties, focussing on the establishment of a permanent dialogue between the disputants and helping them to identify potential compromise solutions within the ZOA. Possible tactics of a facilitator may include the identification and clarification of the issues underlying the conflict as well as the needs, views and interests of the parties; highlighting common interests and characteristics to create trust between the parties; and ensuring that all parties have the same level of information, which may also involve the provision of additional, hitherto missing information by the mediator (Beardsley et al. 2006, pp. 62–63; Bercovitch and Lee 2003, pp. 3–4; Capelos and Smilovitz 2008, p. 75). Thus, the primary mechanism through which the mediator seeks to help the parties to reach an agreement within the ZOA is information revelation (Beardsley et al. 2006, pp. 65–66). Formulation is a more interventionist mediation strategy. The mediator makes substantial suggestions for concessions, formulates alternatives to settle the conflict, and offers to help the parties handle problems with their constituencies or superiors (Capelos and Smilovitz 2008, p. 76). In addition, formulation may also include what Bercovitch and Houston (2000, p. 175) have termed ‘procedural strategies’, that is, exerting control on the structural environment of the negotiations. Mediators may choose the site of the meetings and control the pace of negotiations, suggest procedures for the negotiations, and structure and simplify the negotiation agenda by eliminating, limiting, or combining issues (see Bercovitch and Lee 2003, p. 4). Hence, the primary mechanism through which formulators seek to help parties to reach an agreement within the ZOA is coordination (Beardsley et al. 2006, pp. 63–64). Finally, manipulation is the most interventionist type of mediation strategy. Similar to formulation, a mediator as manipulator substantially contributes to peace negotiations by making suggestions (and

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even recommending certain solutions), and by structuring the negotiation process. However, manipulation goes beyond formulation as it may also involve the use of coercive measures or positive incentives, that is, leverage, to move the parties towards agreement. In the mediation literature, this strategy has often been referred to as ‘power mediation’ or ‘mediation with muscles’ (Svensson 2007b, pp. 229–30).9 Manipulative mediators may exert heavy diplomatic pressure as an additional tactic to move parties towards agreement. Pressure can be generated through the use of ultimatums and deadlines, mass media appeals and the threat of withdrawal as a mediator (Pinfari 2013, pp. 17–19; Sisk 2009, p. 55). Hence, the primary mechanism for a mediator as ‘manipulator’ is the expansion of the ZOA and pushing the parties to change their reservation points, thereby increasing the range of acceptable agreements to all sides (Beardsley et al. 2006, p. 64). In sum, facilitation, formulation, and manipulation represent three ideal types of mediation strategy. They are not mutually exclusive, as “mediators always use facilitation in some fashion and rarely use manipulation without also engaging with formulation” (Beardsley et al. 2006, p. 65). The relationship between mediation strategy and effectiveness has been the subject of considerable debate among mediation researchers (Wallensteen and Svensson 2014, pp. 319–320). Mediation scholars largely agree that manipulation is the most effective strategy to move parties towards a peace agreement.10 Recent studies provide further empirical support for this hypothesis, but they also argue that manipulation can have a negative effect on the long-term durability of agreements. This is because ‘manipulators’ risk brokering agreements that rest upon artificial incentives and break down as soon as the third party’s commitment to the implementation of the brokered deal ceases (Beardsley 2011, pp. 106–107). Accordingly, facilitative strategies seem to be more effective in promoting enduring peace between conflict ­parties, in particular in the case of power asymmetries between the disputants (Quinn et al. 2013, p. 209; Vukovic 2011, p. 115). Given the focus on conflict settlement as defined above, I hypothesise that the more control the EU exerts on the mediation process—that is, moving from facilitation towards manipulation, the more effective it is as a mediator. At the same time, I also expect that this kind of mediation behaviour may, in fact, lead to a lack of implementation of concluded agreements, and thus also create a higher demand for subsequent or continuing mediation. To assess the EU’s mediation strategy in a given case,

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I analyse the various tactics that EU mediators have employed, based on the classification mediation strategies and corresponding tactics developed above. A mediation strategy can be categorised as facilitation/ formulation/manipulation if we can observe a predominant share of ­tactics of one particular category being applied. The following questions guide the assessment of the EU’s mediation strategy: • How have EU mediators interacted with the conflict parties in the mediation process? • What tactics have EU mediators employed, and in what ways do they represent examples of facilitative, formulative or manipulative tactics? • What is the overall balance of the different mediation tactics applied, and what ideal type of mediation strategy does the EU’s mediation behaviour reflect? Coherence Policy coherence is certainly “one of the most fervently discussed” (Gebhard 2011, p. 101) issues in EU foreign policy and has been conceptualised in many different ways.11 Broadly stated, coherence refers to the degree of coordination between different actors and policies in a common policy-making environment. In the context of EU mediation, coherence is here understood as the degree of coordination of actors involved in conducting EU mediation, both within and across different fields of EU foreign policy. Thus, the conceptualisation of EU coherence in mediation encompasses two main dimensions: a.  The degree of coordination between individual member states’ policies towards a conflict and the EU mediation effort (vertical coherence); b. The degree of coordination between the different EU ­institutions involved in organising and conducting the EU mediation effort, both within the CFSP and across other EU external policies (e.g. development policy, European Neighbourhood Policy, etc.) (horizontal/institutional coherence). In fact, both dimensions reflect the main imperatives of EU e­ xternal action that have been formally codified in Art. 21(3) and (4) of the

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Treaty on European Union (Thomas 2012, p. 459). The provisions of the Treaty on European Union indicate what coherence in terms of coordination in the field of EU mediation means (Treaty on European Union 2012: Art. 21). First, it implies support for EU mediation efforts both by EU member states and EU institutions, in terms of rhetoric, positions, and actions; and, consequently, that there are no actions undertaken that undermine the EU’s effort to mediate between the ­disputants. It also implies that there is a collective EU stance towards the conflict and the disputing parties, and that actors share relevant information with each other and broadly agree on the EU’s approach and strategy as a mediator. A prominent assumption on the EU’s role as an international actor is that the EU has to ‘speak with a single voice’ in order to be effective in international politics (Niemann and Bretherton 2013, pp. 267–268; da Conceição-Heldt and Meunier 2014a, p. 961). Given the EU’s complex and multi-layered institutional structure, it is apparent that coherence constitutes one of the most frequently applied standards to evaluate EU foreign policy.12 How does coherence relate to EU mediation effectiveness? It is plausible to hypothesise a positive relationship between EU coherence and mediation effectiveness, that is, the more coherently the EU acts, the more effective it is as a mediator. The argument would be that a highly coherent EU approach leaves no room for interpretation and speculation concerning the EU’s preferences regarding the outcome of the mediation efforts, and that it sends a strong signal of the EU’s resolve to help the disputants to settle their conflict (Bergmann and Niemann 2015, p. 7). In turn, this signal of determination increases the EU’s credibility because the conflict parties’ concerns about the EU’s ability to deliver on promises are significantly reduced. In other words, if the EU demonstrates a high degree of coherence, the conflict parties are reassured that it is not bluffing concerning its intentions and preferences and is not being deceived by the opposing side (see Maoz and Terris 2009, p. 69). Vice versa, it is hypothesised that a low degree of coherence negatively affects EU mediation effectiveness because it undermines the EU’s credibility and increases the conflict parties’ doubts about its ability to deliver on promises made in the course of the mediation. EU policy coherence is best understood in terms of a continuum of degrees with high, medium, and low values as the main reference points. A high degree of coherence is when there is both a high degree

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of coordination between individual member states’ policies towards a conflict and the EU mediation efforts (vertical coherence), and among the EU institutions involved in organising and conducting the mediation and the respective policies (horizontal coherence). A medium degree of coherence means that coordination has been established to a certain extent, but that there are also aspects of the mediation efforts on which coordination is limited or situations where EU member states or institutions have taken actions that have undermined EU mediation. A low degree of coherence implies that there is very limited—or even no— coordination between individual member states’ policies towards a conflict and the EU mediation efforts as well as among the EU institutions involved in organising and conducting the mediation. To analyse the EU’s coherence as a mediator in the case studies, I address the following questions: • Has there been a collectively shared EU position towards the conflict and the disputing parties? • Have EU member states supported the EU mediator/mediation team during the negotiations? • Have EU member states taken any relevant actions outside the negotiation context that had a favourable or negative effect on negotiation dynamics and the conflict parties’ ability to find a settlement to their conflict? • Have the different EU institutions involved in the mediation efforts (EEAS, EUSRs, European Commission, etc.) adopted a collectively agreed approach towards the organisation of the mediation efforts and the EU’s mediation behaviour? • Have the different EU institutions involved in the mediation efforts shared relevant resources and information with each other? Mediator Coordination The conceptualisation of coherence above refers to the degree of ­coordination ‘within’ the EU when mediating peace negotiations. Given the multilateral nature of many EU mediation engagements, the degree of coordination between the EU and other mediating third parties constitutes another conditioning factor that should be accounted for in the empirical analysis. Mediator coordination not only approximates what EU foreign policy scholars have termed ‘external coherence’ (Gebhard 2011,

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p. 109), but it is also a variable that has been discussed by mediation researchers (Böhmelt 2012; Crocker et al. 1996, 1999, 2007). Crocker et al. (1999, p. 230) argue that the higher the number of mediators, the higher the coordination costs as well as the potential of diverging interests and agendas and resulting misunderstandings. Likewise, however, multi-party mediation may also increase mediator leverage through the pooling of resources and institutional capacities, which may have a positive effect on mediation effectiveness. Empirical studies on the impact of the number of mediators on mediation outcomes suggest that there is no linear relationship between the size of the mediation team and its effectiveness, “thereby rejecting the naïve claim that more mediators are always more effective” (Böhmelt 2011, p. 122). Assuming that the number of mediators does not automatically translate into a certain degree of mediation effectiveness, I argue here for analysing the quality of mediator coordination rather than the number of mediators. Consequently, it is hypothesised that the closer the coordination between the EU and other mediators within a multi-party mediation team, the more effective the EU is as a mediator in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment. Similar to EU policy coherence, mediator coordination is best understood as a continuum of degrees, with high, medium, and low values as the main reference points. A high degree of mediator coordination is when there is intensive communication between the mediators and a close interaction that involves the pooling and sharing of resources, knowledge, and expertise. A medium degree of mediator coordination means that communication and interaction between the mediators has been established to a certain extent, but it does not exclude the possibility of the mediators taking unilateral steps or withholding information and resources. A low degree of mediator coordination implies that there is a very limited and infrequent—or even no—communication and interaction between the mediators. To analyse mediator coordination in the case study on the GID, I address the following questions: • Has there been a common position of all mediators towards the conflict and its management? • Have individual mediators taken any relevant actions outside the mediation context that had a favourable or negative effect on the collective mediation efforts?

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• Has there existed an agreement among the mediators on the basic rules and procedures to organise and conduct the mediation? • Have the co-mediators shared relevant information with each other and pool their resources to increase their leverage vis-à-vis the ­conflict parties? The Conflict Parties’ Willingness to Compromise One key factor conditioning mediation effectiveness is the conflict parties’ motivation to settle their conflict (Bercovitch and Lee 2003, ­ p. 5). The assumption that disputants who have entered a mediation process wish to see it succeed is contested in the peace and conflict studies literature (Hellman 2012, p. 592). Conflict parties may have various motives for initiating and participating in mediation efforts in the first place, ranging from true interest in settling the conflict, to increasing the group’s international and national legitimacy, or even using a pause in the fighting to rebuild their own military strength (Richmond 1998, pp. 708–709; Svensson 2007a, p. 180). It is plausible to assume that any kind of peace agreement is only possible if conflict parties show a sincere interest in settling the conflict through negotiations. If mediation serves only as an instrument to buy time to ‘close ranks’ before an intended continuation of violence, then a negotiated agreement—not to speak of its implementation—will be rather unlikely. From a rationalist perspective, conflict parties will prioritise a ­negotiated settlement if the expected benefits of negotiation outweigh those they would achieve by other means, including the continuation of violence. In other words, the expected gains of mediation have to be greater than those of non-mediation and the preservation of the status quo (Sisk 2009, p. 74). In line with the soft rational choice approach of this book, however, it is argued that the expected gains of conflict ­parties are not only a result of their material cost-benefit calculations, but are also influenced by their perceptions of their counterparts, the mediator, and the whole process of mediation itself: “It is through the filter of those perceptions that the negotiators calculate what their objectives are, whether they want to cooperate during the process of mediation, hinder or reject it” (Richmond 1998, pp. 709–710). In other words, the conflict parties’ willingness to make ­concessions and their motivation to find a compromise solution depends on their expectation of the benefits they would gain through a negotiated

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settlement. The higher the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise based on their expected gains from a negotiated settlement, the more effective the EU is as a mediator. A conflict party’s willingness to compromise is certainly a matter of degree and may also vary on an issue-by-issue basis. To o ­ perationalise this complex variable, I differentiate between low, medium, and high degrees of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise. As a ­calculation of the potential benefits of a negotiated settlement varies for every conflict party, it is important to investigate parties’ motivations individually before inferring from these findings the overall degree of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise. To analyse empirically what gains each conflict party expects from a settlement achieved through mediation, the following questions serve as guidelines: • What political and economic benefits and costs of a negotiated ­settlement at the domestic and international level do conflict parties expect? • What are their perceptions of the mediation process and how do they influence their expectations about the potential benefits of a settlement? • On what issues and in what ways are conflict parties willing to make concessions? What are their ‘red lines’ concerning possible compromise solutions? The assessment of the motivations, preferences and red lines of each ­conflict party allows for assessing the potential zone of agreement between the parties (ZOA) and the degree of their willingness to compromise within this range. The empirical analysis inquires into the conflict parties’ cost-benefit calculations and perceptions and compares them ex post with the willingness to compromise that they have shown in the negotiations. This approach allows for making inferences about how this factor has influenced the EU’s mediation effectiveness in the respective cases. The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness Mediation scholars agree that the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness may significantly influence mediation outcomes (Kleiboer 1998, p. 21). Cohesiveness has been understood in two slightly different ways. First, it has been conceptualised as the stability of parties’ internal power

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structure, focussing on whether there are clearly identifiable leaders who have the authority to negotiate with the opposing side and are able to secure the implementation of agreements, if necessary, against internal resistance (see Assefa 1987, p. 13). Second, cohesiveness has also been understood as the nature and number of the conflict parties’ domestic constituencies, assuming that the more constituencies, the less cohesive a conflict party, and therefore the more difficult the interaction between disputants (see Kleiboer 1996, p. 365). In both understandings of cohesiveness, however, the main argument is the same: The more internally united a conflict party is and the stronger the support for the leadership by its constituents, the stronger the negotiators’ mandate and the lower the chances that factions within this party will act as spoilers seeking to derail the peace process. According to Stedman (1997, p. 5), spoilers are “leaders and parties who believe that peace emerging from negotiations threatens their power, worldview, and interests, and use violence to undermine attempts to achieve it”. Apart from the use of violence, spoilers may also seek to manipulate public opinion in a way that spurs domestic opposition against the mediation process as such and/or the conflict party’s negotiation behaviour, which then may also result in the outbreak of violence. Spoilers thus put negotiators under considerable pressure and can jeopardise the mediation process, as their occurrence may also lead to the deterioration of the relationship between the different conflict parties and/or relation with the mediator (Greig and Diehl 2012, p. 134). The more imminent these spoiler problems, the more difficult the negotiation environment in which the parties seek to reach an agreement (Kydd and Walter 2002, pp. 264–65). In turn, the more internally united a conflict party is, the greater their room for manoeuvre—and thus the ZOA—and the lower the chances of spoilers, which increases the chances for a compromise solution. As Sisk (2009, p. 50) notes, “[W]ell-integrated parties with a clear line of decision-making responsibility and deference to a single leadership can ‘deliver’ at the table.” Summarising these arguments, I hypothesise that the more internally cohesive the conflict parties are, the more effective the EU is as a mediator. The conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness is understood as a continuum of degrees, ranging from low to medium to high degrees of cohesiveness. The degree of a conflict party’s internal cohesiveness is high if there is broad domestic support for its negotiation positions and

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behaviour, and no spoiler behaviour observable by factions within the government, the opposition, or the broader civil society. The degree of internal cohesiveness is medium if there is considerable domestic s­ upport for the government’s negotiation behaviour in the mediation ­process, but also some level of (regionally concentrated) resistance against the government’s participation in the process. The resistance may also be accompanied by attempts to undermine the government’s efforts to settle the conflict. The degree of internal cohesiveness is low if there is marginal support for the government’s approach to the mediation and a broad domestic coalition of opposition against its participation in the mediation process expressed through large-scale protests and violent clashes meant to undermine the efforts to settle the conflict. To assess the degree of the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness, the analysis is structured around the following questions: • Are there different factions within the conflict party that have diverging positions and preferences concerning the desired outcomes of the mediation process? • Are there factions within the conflict party that openly oppose their party’s involvement in the mediation process? • Has the mediation process been accompanied by outbreaks of violence and clashes that can be related to factions that oppose the mediation process? • To what extent have the conflict parties’ leaderships been able to accommodate potential spoilers and prevent attempts to derail the mediation process?

2.3  Delimiting the Boundaries of the Analytical Framework Mediation scholars have discussed a wide range of alternative factors that could potentially influence mediation outcomes. However, it would go beyond the scope of this book to investigate all factors potentially influencing EU mediation effectiveness in one way or the other. Rather, I delimit the analytical focus on those conditions presented above, which are the most relevant factors in light of the state of the art of mediation research and EU foreign policy studies. Apart from practical reasons, there are also substantive arguments for why certain conditioning

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factors, such as the timing of the intervention, conflict intensity, or the nature of the conflict issue, should not be included (Bercovitch 2009, pp. 348–350; Kleiboer 1998, pp. 18–23). In a nutshell, the six conditioning factors already capture key assumptions associated with these potential alternative factors, which reinforces the case for not including them as separate variables. Concerning the timing of mediation, academic debate has centred on the concept of ‘ripeness’, originally proposed by William Ira Zartman (1989, 2000, 2001). According to Zartman, the conflict parties’ willingness to resolve their conflict is contingent upon the existence of a mutually hurting stalemate, which describes a situation in which both sides perceive the costs of the continuation of fighting to be greater than the expected benefits of the further use of violence, while simultaneously concluding that a unilateral victory will be impossible to achieve (Hellman 2012, p. 593). In this situation, a conflict is ripe for resolution, and the timing for a mediation initiative is ideal. Mediation scholars have controversially debated the usefulness of the ripeness concept for explaining the occurrence of mediation and its effectiveness (Greig 2005, pp. 251–252; Hellman 2012, pp. 595–597). I argue here that the issue of timing, in essence, is a function of the conflict parties’ willingness to make concessions (Kleiboer 1994, pp. 115– 116). If there is a high level of willingness to compromise, the timing for EU mediation is right and the conditions for effective mediation are thus more favourable. However, as the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise is already accounted for, taking timing issues into consideration would actually not add to the framework’s explanatory power. The same goes for conflict intensity and the nature of the conflict issue, since both factors influence the conflict parties’ cost-benefit calculations. Moreover, the inconclusiveness of empirical findings on the direction of the causal relationship between these factors and mediation effectiveness provides an additional argument for not integrating them into the framework (Kleiboer 1998, p. 20; Greig and Diehl 2012, pp. 130–31). Finally, mediation scholars have controversially debated the role of mediator bias and impartiality in influencing mediation effectiveness. The empirical evidence on the importance of this factor is mixed, which is also a function of different conceptualisations of bias (Wallensteen and Svensson 2014, pp. 320–322; Maoz and Terris 2009; Siniver 2006). For this reason, mediator bias has not been included into the analytical

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framework as a separate factor, but the case study chapters examine the extent to which the EU may be biased vis-à-vis individual conflict parties when analysing its mediation goals and the degree of policy coherence within the EU. In sum, the choice for the six conditions presented above can be reasonably justified, although one can never fully diminish the risk of excluding potentially relevant conditioning factors of EU mediation effectiveness. The following case study chapters all proceed in a similar way. First, they provide a brief account of the conflict background in order to understand why EU mediation occurred in the first place. Second, they discuss the mediation format and setting during the different phases of the EU’s mediation involvement. Third, they present the results of the empirical analysis of the EU’s mediation effectiveness in the given case. Fourth, they discuss the findings on the conditions of EU mediation effectiveness and relate them to the hypotheses developed in this chapter. The main goal of the within-case analysis is to assess and explain the degree of EU mediation effectiveness in each case within a given time period. More specifically, the aim is to probe whether the pieces of evidence on EU mediation effectiveness and its conditions in each case are consistent with the hypotheses, or whether they cast doubt on alternative explanations that do not fit the evidence, corresponding to the principles of ‘affirmative explanation’ and ‘eliminative induction’ (Bennett 2008, p. 705). The case studies also pave the way for the cross-case comparison in the concluding chapter, which serves to establish generalisable patterns beyond the individual cases. In sum, the analytical framework of this book adopts a two-dimensional conceptualisation of mediation effectiveness, differentiating between effectiveness as goal-attainment and effectiveness as conflict settlement. The framework includes six conditions of EU mediation effectiveness. Concerning the characteristics and behaviour of the mediator, it identifies mediator leverage, mediation strategy, policy coherence, and mediator coordination (in case of multi-party mediation) as main factors influencing EU mediation effectiveness. Regarding the conflict parties, their willingness to compromise and their internal cohesiveness have been identified as key conditioning factors. The subsequent three case study chapters rigorously apply the analytical framework, before the concluding chapter provides a cross-case comparison and reflects on the utility of the analytical framework.

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Notes



1.  For different conceptualisations of EU external effectiveness, see for example, da Conceição-Heldt and Meunier (2014b), Ginsberg (2001), Laatikainen and Smith (2006), Thomas (2012), and Van Schaik (2013). 2. For different conceptualisations of mediation success, see for example, Beardsley et al. (2006), Frei (1976), Regan and Stam (2000), and Regan and Aydin (2006). 3. In a similar vein, Peen Rodt (2014, pp. 19–22) distinguishes between actor-centred and target-centred perspectives. 4. In contrast, I do not account for the durability of implemented agreements, i.e. whether conflict parties adhere to concluded agreements over a longer period of time, as this would go beyond the scope of this book. 5. It is important to note that “negotiated agreement” refers to any written document that is endorsed by all conflict parties participating in the mediation process. 6. The Serbian government does not recognise The Republic of Kosovo and rather speaks of the representatives of temporary self-government in Pristina when referring to their counterparts. 7.  Some scholars equate leverage with mediation strategy, assuming that the possession of material leverage such as economic resources or military power automatically induces the mediator to use them and apply an interventionist mediation strategy (Beardsley 2011, p. 115; Siniver 2006, p. 811). However, this logic is somewhat flawed because it implies that mediators who possess great degree of leverage vis-à-vis the conflict parties have no other possibility than to draw on and use it. As Bercovitch and Houston (2000, p. 197) demonstrate, however, it is not mediator leverage but rather the characteristics of conflict parties and the mediation environment that are the most important determinants of mediation strategy. 8.  Capelos and Smilovitz (2008, pp. 74–75), for example, based on an extensive survey of secondary literature on mediation from a range of different disciplines, have compiled a list of 66 possible mediator tactics. 9. A prominent example regarding coercive measures is US mediation at the Dayton Conference which led to the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In this case, the United States drew on vast economic and military resources “to coerce the disputants, to entice them, to bargain with them, and ultimately to persuade them to sign the documents” (Touval 1996, p. 567). An example of the use of resources as additional incentives are the payments by Italy to the Mozambique resistance organisation RENAMO to persuade them to agree to a

48  J. BERGMANN ceasefire arrangement mediated by Italy and the Catholic lay organisation Sant’ Egidio (Sisk 2009, p. 54; see also Rothchild 1997, pp. 251–253). 10.  For studies providing empirical evidence for this relationship, see for example, Gartner and Bercovitch (2006, pp. 833–834), Siniver (2006, pp. 821–823), Sisk (2009, pp. 53–56), and Wilkenfeld et al. (2003, pp. 292–293). 11. For different conceptualisations of policy coherence, see for example, da Conceição-Heldt and Meunier (2014a), Jupille and Caporaso (1998), Van Schaik (2013), and Thomas (2012). 12. For an overview of this literature, see for example, Bretherton and Vogler (2006), Gauttier (2004), Gebhard (2011), and Nuttall (2000, 2005).

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Maoz, Z., & Terris, L. G. (2009). Credibility and strategy in international mediation. In J. Bercovitch & S. S. Gartner (Eds.), International conflict mediation: New approaches and findings (pp. 69–95). London, New York, NY: Routledge. Miles, E. L., Andresen, S., Carlin, E. M., Skjærseth, J. B., Underdal, A., & Wettestad, J. (Eds.). (2002). Environmental regime effectiveness: Confronting theory with evidence. Cambridge: MIT Press. Mitchell, C. R. (1981). The structure of international conflict. Basingstoke: Macmillan. Niemann, A. (2006). Explaining decisions in the European Union. Cambridge, New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Niemann, A., & Bretherton, C. (2013). Introduction: EU external policy at the crossroads. International Relations, 27(3), 261–275. Nuttall, S. J. (2000). European foreign policy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nuttall, S. J. (2005). Coherence and consistency. In C. Hill & M. E. Smith (Eds.), International relations and the European Union (pp. 91–112). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Oberthür, S., & Groen, L. (2015). The effectiveness dimension of the EU’s performance in international institutions: Toward a more comprehensive assessment framework. JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, 53(6), 1319–1335. Peen Rodt, A. (2014). The European Union and military conflict management: Defining, evaluating and achieving success. London: Routledge. Pinfari, M. (2013). Peace negotiations and time: Deadline diplomacy in territorial disputes. London: Routledge. Quinn, D., Wilkenfeld, J., Eralp, P., Asal, V., & Mclauchlin, T. (2013). Crisis managers but not conflict resolvers: Mediating ethnic intrastate conflict in Africa. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 30(4), 387–406. Regan, P. M., & Aydin, A. (2006). Diplomacy and other forms of intervention in civil wars. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 50(5), 736–756. Regan, P. M., & Stam, A. C. (2000). In the nick of time: Conflict management, mediation timing, and the duration of interstate disputes. International Studies Quarterly, 44(2), 239–260. Richmond, O. (1998). Devious objectives and the disputants’ view of international mediation: A theoretical framework. Journal of Peace Research, 35(6), 707–722. Rothchild, D. S. (1997). Managing ethnic conflict in Africa: Pressures and incentives for cooperation. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press. Siniver, A. (2006). Power, impartiality and timing: Three hypotheses on third party mediation in the Middle East. Political Studies, 54(4), 806–826. Sisk, T. D. (2009). International mediation in civil wars: Bargaining with bullets. London: Routledge.

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CHAPTER 3

The EU as a Mediator in the Conflict over Montenegro’s Independence

In the view of many analysts of the EU’s foreign policy endeavors in the 2000s, the Union’s involvement in the resolution of the conflict over Montenegro’s independence between 2001 and 2006 represents a success story (Noutcheva 2012; Stahl 2011). Given its peaceful resolution through a referendum on Montenegrin independence in 2006, the conflict had taken a very different path compared to other regional trouble spots such as Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina. However, although the conflict in Montenegro had not been driven by allegiances to certain ethnic identities, its gradual escalation since 1997 seriously threatened the stability in the Balkans, which was already endangered by the conflicts in Kosovo and Macedonia and the volatile post-war situation in Bosnia (Huszka 2003, p. 43). When the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) fell apart in the early 1990s, its six republics—Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia—took diverging paths. While there were violent clashes in Slovenia, Croatia engaged in a war with Serbia between 1991 and 1995, and Bosnia-Herzegovina witnessed one of the cruelest civil wars in Europe until 1995. In these times of political turmoil, Montenegro remained a stable and loyal partner of Serbia (Stahl 2011, pp. 155–156). In an independence referendum on 1 March 1992, more than 95% of Montenegrin voters opted to stay in a joint state with Serbia (Bieber 2003, p. 21). Following the result of the referendum, the governments of Serbia and Montenegro © The Author(s) 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0_3

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agreed to create a new state—the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia—with a constitution adopted in April 1992 that reinforced both the sovereignty of the two republics and the unity of the federal state. In the period between 1992 and 1997, the Montenegrin government, led by the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS), remained a loyal partner to Serbia and “posed no significant problems for Milosevic’s power ambitions” (Caspersen 2003, p. 106). Driven by severe dysfunctionalities of the newly created FRY, however, the partnership crumbled gradually and an alienation between the Serbian and Montenegrin government developed, eventually leading to a split within the Montenegrin government and the ruling DPS. This split became apparent at the start of 1997 when the Montenegrin prime minister, Milo Djukanovic, openly criticised Milosevic in a newspaper interview, calling him “a man of obsolete political ideas, lacking the ability to form a strategic vision of the problems this country is facing” (Vreme, 22 February 1997; cited by Cerovic 2001, p. 3). Djukanovic’s disagreement with Milosevic was primarily due to diverging views on economic policies and Montenegro’s international orientation. Economic measures taken by the Montenegrin government in 1998 and 1999 included the gradual cessation of payment transactions to the federal budget, the introduction of customs duties at the Montenegrin borders, the lifting of visa requirements for foreigners, and the introduction of the Deutsche Mark as a parallel official currency next to the Yugoslav dinar (Huszka 2003, p. 54). Unsurprisingly, these measures were not applauded by officials in Belgrade. However, one of the most decisive breaks with Milosevic’s Serbia was of a political rather than an economic nature. During the Kosovo War and the bombing campaign of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) against Serbia in 1998 and 1999, the Montenegrin government declared its neutrality and refused to participate in military actions undertaken in Kosovo by the Federal Yugoslav Army (Cerovic 2001, p. 4). Although Montenegro was still affected by the conflict through the influx of 80,000 Albanian refugees, turning away from Milosevic’s policy of repression against Kosovo Albanians also led to a huge extension of financial aid from the United States and the EU, which sought to actively support Montenegro as a ‘beacon of hope’ and resistance against Milosevic’s Serbia within the FRY (Bieber 2003, pp. 33–34). Meanwhile, the political situation in Serbia changed dramatically in October 2000 when Milosevic was finally removed from power.

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Following his defeat in the September 2000 federal presidential elections by the main opposition candidate, Vojislav Kostunica, Milosevic was forced to resign in response to massive protests throughout the country (Baker 2015, p. 83). Although the fall of Milosevic had removed the primary reason for Montenegro’s policy of disassociation with the FRY, the conflict between the Montenegrin government and the federal authorities persisted. The Montenegrin government refused to recognise Kostunica as federal president because it no longer regarded the federal arrangement as legitimate. Moreover, Kostunica’s move to form an alliance with the Serbian People’s Party (SNP) at the federal level to secure a majority in the parliament spurred increasing anger in Podgorica (Noutcheva and Huysseune 2004, p. 120). In the Montenegrin parliamentary elections of April 2001, Djukanovic’s DPS failed to secure a majority of seats in the parliament and was forced to form a minority government with the Social Democratic Party (SDP), supported by the Liberal Alliance of Montenegro (LSCG). At the same time, some moderate rapprochement between the newly elected Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic and Djukanovic occurred, resulting in trilateral talks behind the scenes with federal government representatives about the future of the federation in summer 2001 (Crisis Group 2002, p. 5). In October 2001, Serbian Prime Minister Djindjic, Federal President Kostunica, and Montenegrin Prime Minister Djukanovic met in Belgrade and came to the conclusion that their positions on the future of the federal state were irreconcilable (European Stability Initiative 2001, p. 1). As Federal President Kostunica said in a public statement after the meeting on 26 October, “We were unable to bring our stances closer, which means only one possible route remains – and that is for the public of Montenegro to voice its view” (Montenegro Set for Independence Vote 2001, p. 1). Even the nationalist Serbian SNP appeared to have given up its firm objection against a referendum and signalled its willingness to discuss what quorum would be necessary for a change in Montenegro’s status (Crisis Group 2002, p. 5). Taken together, the political developments in late autumn 2001 were moving in the direction of an independence referendum to be held in 2002. It was in this moment during an emerging consensus between the different parties in Montenegro and Serbia that the European Union decided to step in and intervene as a mediator. After its meeting on 19–20 November 2001, the EU’s General Affairs Council, in its conclusions,

56  J. BERGMANN urged the Belgrade and Podgorica authorities to hold a democratic and constructive dialogue in order to reach agreement rapidly on constitutional arrangements that are acceptable to all parties […] [and] reiterated its attachment to a democratic Montenegro in a democratic Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) and once again stressed the importance of avoiding any unilateral action which might threaten the internal stability of the FRY and stability in South Eastern Europe. (Council of the European Union 2001b, p. 17)

In addition, the Council asked Secretary-General/High Representative Javier Solana to travel to Belgrade and Podgorica “to promote further dialogue” (Council of the European Union 2001b, p. 17). Based on this mandate, Solana initiated a mediation process between the governments of the two republics and the federal government. This chapter analyses the EU’s mediation efforts in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence between November 2001 and May 2006. It argues that the EU was a highly effective mediator because it brokered a major settlement to the conflict and achieved its ultimate objective of leading the mediation to an outcome that would not endanger regional stability. The EU’s mediation strategy—based on a mix of manipulation and formulation—was crucial to exploit the zone of potential agreement between the parties that emerged due to their expectations of gaining from a compromise agreement.

3.1  Mediation Format and Setting Two phases of EU mediation engagement in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence can be distinguished: a first phase (November 2001 until March 2002), which was concluded with the signing of the so-called Belgrade Agreement; and a second phase (April 2002 until May 2006), when the EU was involved in brokering agreements on the implementation of the Belgrade Agreement. Whereas the first phase was marked by a continuous mediation process, the second phase was characterised by EU mediation involvement at specific critical junctures of the implementation of the Belgrade Agreement, most notably during the drafting process of the Constitutional Charter between 2002 and 2003, and the negotiations on rules for Montenegro’s independence referendum in 2006 (Dzankic 2015, pp. 87–89; Tocci 2007, pp. 85–88).

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A few days after the General Affairs Council had provided Solana with the mandate to promote a dialogue between Belgrade and Podgorica on 19 November 2001, the High Representative travelled to the two capitals for his opening visits, seeking consensus on the format of a mediation process between the two sides. Solana proposed to hold the talks in three different working groups where the parties were present, together with EU experts. The latter were mandated to provide their input and technical expertise on the different issues under discussion (Interviews Serbia 3, 5). The three working groups focussed on the key themes that had to be discussed in order to clarify the future of relations between Serbia and Montenegro: (1) constitutional and legal issues, (2) economic and social issues, and (3) foreign policy and security (Crisis Group 2002, pp. 6–7). On the EU side, the delegation of experts consisted of European Commission staff and members of the Policy Unit within the EU Council Secretariat. Besides High Representative Solana, a key figure on the EU side was Stefan Lehne, who served as Head of the Task Force for Western Balkans and Central Europe within the Council Secretariat and played an important role in organising and coordinating the initiative (Interviews Serbia 3, 5; EU 13). On the side of the conflict parties, there were two delegations: a Montenegrin government delegation, and a joint Serbian and federal government delegation. As a former senior federal-level official noted, having only two delegations instead of a separate federal-level delegation was a political decision taken by Federal President Kostunica and Serbian Prime Minister Djindjic that was intended to signal there was a joint pro-federal and pro-integrationist coalition (Interview Serbia 5). Indeed, the joint Serbian/federal delegation also included Montenegrin officials delegated to the federal level who were SNP party members and close to Kostunica’s position of being in favour of a joint federal state. The Serbian/federal delegation was led by Slobodan Samardzic, advisor for political issues to Federal President Kostunica, while the Montenegrin delegation was headed by Mijat Sukovic, professor and member of the Montenegrin Academy of Sciences and Arts. Each delegation sent two to three experts to each working group.1 The first working group meeting was held in Belgrade on 23 December, the second on 27 December in Podgorica, and the third a few days later in Belgrade again (Koprivica 2001; Sukovic 2001, 2002). Accompanying the working group meetings were a number of

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high-level meetings between Solana and government representatives from Montenegro and Serbia and the FRY, held in Belgrade, Podgorica, and Brussels in January and February 2002 (Crisis Group 2002, pp. 7–8). In addition, Solana and his team were engaged in active shuttle diplomacy between Brussels and the two capitals in between the mediation rounds (Interview EU 13; Crisis Group 2002, p. 8). On 4 February 2002, another working group meeting was held in Brussels. In the working groups on economic and social issues, and on foreign policy and security, the conflict parties issued joint reports. The working group on political and constitutional matters saw two separate reports produced by each delegation. However, even in the joint reports, the overall conclusion was that there was total disagreement. As one participant in the mediation process noted, “We agreed that we disagreed on everything” (Interview Serbia 5). After a few more high-level meetings in Belgrade and Podgorica—and to the surprise of many observers and the public in both Montenegro and Serbia—the parties managed to achieve the Agreement on Principles of Relations Between Serbia and Montenegro within the State Union on 14 March 2002, which came to be known as the Belgrade Agreement. The Belgrade Agreement was signed by the highest representatives of the FRY, the Republic of Serbia, and the Republic of Montenegro and was formally witnessed by High Representative Solana (Belgrade Agreement 2002).2 According to the Belgrade Agreement, a state union between Serbia and Montenegro was to be established based on a Constitutional Charter, the latter to be drafted and submitted to the republican and federal parliaments by the end of June 2002 at the latest (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 4). The Belgrade Agreement did not bring an end to EU intervention in the negotiations between Montenegro and Serbia. Solana and his team remained actively involved in the negotiations on the Constitutional Charter of the newly created state union in 2002 as well as in the negotiations over the rules for an independence referendum in Montenegro in 2006. These episodes of EU engagement in the period between 2002 and 2006 are here referred to as the second phase of EU mediation in the conflict. Similar to the final negotiation rounds in the first phase of EU mediation, the EU’s mediation engagement on the Constitutional Charter primarily occurred at the highest political level, resulting in trilateral meetings between the representatives of the FRY/state union, Serbia,

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and Montenegro, but the EU was less visible publicly than it had been during its mediation involvement between 2001 and 2002 (Crisis Group 2003b, pp. 3, 11; Interviews EU 11, Montenegro 2). An important difference between EU mediation efforts in the two phases is that the first initiative was an intervention into talks between FRY representatives and the two republics, whereas the latter was an attempt to mediate in the intra-Montenegrin dispute over the referendum rules between the Montenegrin government and the pro-unionist opposition (Dzankic 2015, pp. 90–92). In addition, it was not High Representative Solana who mediated on behalf of the EU in the referendum negotiations, but Special Envoy Ambassador Miroslav Lajcak, who represented the EU in these talks in January and February 2006 (OSCE [Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe] 2006, p. 3). Notwithstanding the different constellations of conflict parties in the 2006 effort, the negotiations on the referendum rules are considered here to be an extension of the EU’s mediation initiative that had begun in late 2001. Given that the conflict between the Montenegrin government and the opposition represented the same cleavage as the one between Montenegro and Serbia/FRY, it seems justified to regard it as a sub-phase of the EU’s overall mediation efforts.

3.2  The EU’s Effectiveness as a Mediator Conflict Settlement in the First Mediation Phase 2001–2002 The first phase of EU mediation on Montenegro’s independence saw the achievement of one major agreement between the conflict parties: The Agreement on Principles of Relations between Serbia and Montenegro within the State Union (Belgrade Agreement), signed on 14 March 2002 in Belgrade. Before this day, the mediation efforts had not led to any tangible results. Even the joint reports of the two working groups mentioned above were only another manifestation of the disagreement between the two parties. With the Belgrade Agreement, however, the parties managed to achieve consensus on major proceeding points for restructuring the relations between Serbia and Montenegro within the framework of a state union. There was a consensus among all parties involved that a process of restructuring the relations between Serbia and Montenegro would have to consider all aspects of the relationship between the two republics: the nature of the future political and legal

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framework for relations between them; international representation and foreign policy; security and defence; and economic and financial policy (Van Meurs 2003, pp. 68–72). Concerning the question of the nature of the relations between Serbia and Montenegro, the Belgrade Agreement foresaw the creation of a state union. The official name was State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. The construction of the state union somehow represented a middle ground between a federal state with two federal units and the creation of two equal, independent states. According to the Belgrade Agreement, the state union was to be created through the adoption of a Constitutional Charter by the two republican parliaments and, subsequently, by the federal parliament (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 2). A Constitutional Commission was tasked with elaborating on a draft of the Constitutional Charter by June 2002 (Crisis Group 2002, p. 11). Importantly, the agreement opened the possibility for each member state to reconsider its membership of the union after three years, granting Montenegro the right to leave the state union through a referendum process.3 Regarding the state union’s institutions and common policy fields, the agreement foresaw the creation of a unicameral parliament, a president elected by the parliament, a Council of Ministers nominated by the president, a Constitutional Court and a Supreme Defence Council. The establishment of a Council of Ministers indicated the compromise the parties made concerning the delineation of common-state and individual-level competencies. It was to be compromised of five departments: foreign affairs, defence, international economic relations, economic relations, and protection of human and minority rights (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 3). However, the specific competencies of the departments and their relationship to institutions in the member states were not further defined. In turn, other competences remained in the responsibility of the two republics, including contested policy areas such as economic and monetary policy, trade and customs, border management, policing, and visa, migration and asylum policy (Tocci 2007, p. 84). In addition, the agreement was silent on concrete d ­ ecision-making procedures within the federal institutions, except from the Supreme Defence Council, where decisions were to be taken unanimously (Van Meurs 2003, p. 69). Similarly, the agreement did not specify how the Constitutional Commission was to be composed and how it would function. The agreement’s vagueness in this regard is astonishing, given that the Constitutional Commission was tasked to craft the political

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and legal framework of the new state union. The same applies for the rules for electing representatives to the unicameral parliament. Here, the agreement refers to the member states of the state union to adopt respective laws that have to comply with principles to be defined by the Constitutional Charter (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 3). Due to the agreement’s “extreme brevity and vagueness” (Tocci 2007, p. 85) on these essential provisions for creating the union, it represents only a partial settlement of the issue of conflict over the constitutional framework of the relations between Serbia and Montenegro. Although the basic building blocks of the new union were defined in the document, many points of contention—specifically concerning the procedures for elections and appointments—were not settled through the Belgrade Agreement. On the issue of international representation and foreign policy, parties reached agreement on joint proportional representation in international organisations. The representation in relations with the UN, the OSCE, the EU and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development was to be based on parity, established through a system of rotation, whereas “special models for representation” had to be found for international financial organisations (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 4). In addition, proportionate representation was applied concerning the staffing of the diplomatic and consular representative offices of the state union. However, the rotation rules as well as the procedures for presentation in international financial organisations were not further defined. In addition, the agreement text was silent about how to deal with Montenegro’s separate ‘trade missions’ that had been established as de facto Montenegrin embassies in a number of Western capitals following the split between Djukanovic and Milosevic in 1997 (Huszka 2003, p. 54; Lyon 2004, p. 60). Given these unresolved aspects of international representation, the agreement provided only a partial settlement of this conflict issue. Concerning the issue of security and defence, the Belgrade Agreement referred to a joint Army of Serbia and Montenegro to be commanded by the Supreme Defence Council, composed of the presidents of the state union and the two member states. Decisions by the Supreme Defence Council were to be taken unanimously, which meant that the Montenegrin government was granted a right of veto over the use of the federal army. The latter had been perceived as a permanent threat by the Montenegrin government for a long time. In turn, the Montenegrin

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government had built up a special police force to counter that potential threat (Lyon 2004, p. 66). In addition, the agreement granted conscripts the right to serve on the territory of their respective member states. Through these provisions, which are formulated in a precise and unambiguous way, the agreement represented a full settlement of the conflict issue of security and defence. Finally, the provisions on economic policy comprise one of the sketchiest parts of the Belgrade Agreement. The agreement commits the parties to seek the establishment of a common market and to harmonise their respective economic systems with the EU’s system in order to “overcome the existing differences, primarily in the spheres of trade and customs policies” (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 4). However, the agreement does not go beyond this general commitment and does not specify how exactly this harmonisation shall be undertaken, for example, with regard to the issues of different currencies and diverging customs levels (Noutcheva 2012, p. 132). Instead of providing a substantial solution to the conflict over economic policy, the agreement text seems to suggest that a quasi-automatic harmonisation of the two systems will occur through the process of adaptation and harmonisation with the EU’s economic policies in the framework of the Stabilisation and Association Process (SAP) (Crisis Group 2003b, p. 6; Djuric 2004, p. 83). Given the agreement’s vagueness on these important points of contention, it can only be evaluated as a partial settlement of the conflict issue of economic policy. In sum, the Belgrade Agreement established a very loose federal level of governance. Its specific functions and working procedures were spelt out very vaguely in the agreement (Tocci 2007, p. 84). Only on one of the four main issues in dispute—security and defence—did the agreement provide a full settlement. Particularly with regard to economic policy, the agreement is first and foremost a declaration of intent and does not propose a comprehensive solution to this conflict issue (Van Meurs 2003, pp. 73–74). Nevertheless, the agreement covered all the relevant conflict issues and provided, at minimum, a partial settlement to each conflict issue. Conflict Settlement in the Second Mediation Phase 2002–2006 In the second phase of the mediation process (March 2002–May 2006), the parties reached two agreements: the Constitutional Charter of February 2003, and the agreement on a formula for Montenegro’s

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independence referendum in February 2006. Although the Belgrade Agreement had set out June 2002 as the final date for adopting the Constitutional Charter, it took the parties more than half a year to achieve a compromise and draft the text. Among the three issue areas that were only partly settled through the Belgrade Agreement, the Constitutional Charter provided further substance on the political and legal framework while reiterating the vague provisions of the 2002 agreement on international representation and economic policy. The Constitutional Charter established a state union between two republics that enjoyed equal policy-making power at the state level, while simultaneously keeping the state union competencies to a minimum (Tocci 2007, pp. 84–85). Although the document specifies some working procedures and inter-institutional relationships, it did not eradicate the tensions between the state union level and the two republics that were built into the construction of the state union by the Belgrade Agreement (Noutcheva and Huysseune 2004, p. 126). Moreover, the Constitutional Charter did not resolve the disagreement on competence allocation in the fields of intellectual property rights, visa, asylum and migration, border management, and the rights of minorities (Tocci 2007, p. 85). In sum, it provided for a specification of a number of provisions initially formulated in the Belgrade Agreement, but it did not fully settle the conflict between the Montenegrin and the Serbian/FRY governments on the political and legal construction of a common state. As mentioned above, the final episode of the EU’s mediation efforts occurred in 2006 during the intra-Montenegrin dispute over the referendum rules. According to the 2003 Constitutional Charter, the law on referendum was to be passed by the respective member state that envisaged breaking away from the state union, “bearing in mind the internationally recognized democratic standards” (Constitutional Charter of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro 2003, p. 10). Whereas securing a victory in the referendum was of utmost importance to the Montenegrin government, vast parts of the pro-union opposition refused to participate in a dialogue with the government over the referendum rules. Those factions within the opposition that were willing to talk about possible referendum procedures argued that a change of status of the state should be decided by a minimum of 50% of the total electorate. The government, however, argued in favour of a majority of ‘50 per cent plus one’ of the votes (OSCE 2006, p. 3).

64  J. BERGMANN Table 3.1 Overview of conflict settlement in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence Mediation phase

Full settlement

Partial settlement

EU mediation resulting in the Belgrade Agreement, 2001–2002

Security and defence (federal army)

Political and legal framework for Serbia– Montenegro relations (Belgrade Agreement) International representation Economic policy

EU mediation resulting in the adoption of the Constitutional Charter and Referendum Law, 2002–2006

Referendum criteria

Political and legal framework for Serbia– Montenegro relations (Constitutional Charter)

No settlement

Source Own compilation

Given these divergent positions, the fact that both parties achieved a consensus on the procedures for the referendum based on EU mediation was remarkable. The compromise agreement stated that the threshold for gaining independence was to be a minimum of 55% of the votes being in favour of independence, with a turnout of at least 50% of the electorate (Dzankic 2015, p. 91). Through this formula, a compromise was achieved that had the consent of both the government and the opposition. This agreement thus represented a full settlement of the conflict over the referendum rules and was a major success of the EU’s mediation efforts in this conflict.4 Taken together, all agreements achieved in the mediation process represented either a full or partial settlement of the individual issues (see Table 3.1).5 Consequently, the overall degree of conflict settlement between 2001 and 2006 in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence corresponds to a major settlement of the conflict. Translating this into an evaluation of the degree of effectiveness, the EU’s mediation effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement in this case is judged as high. Assessing the EU’s Mediation Goals At the time when the EU had stepped in as a mediator, the previously held bilateral negotiations between the Serbian/FRY and Montenegrin governments had ended in the joint conclusion that a referendum in 2002 on

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Montenegro’s independence was the only viable solution (Crisis Group 2002, p. 3). The empirical findings indicate that an important process goal of the EU was to prevent an early referendum on independence in Montenegro by engaging the parties, again, in a dialogue on the future relationship between Serbia and Montenegro, this time mediated by EU officials (Interviews EU 13, Serbia 5, Montenegro 2). From the perspective of EU policy-makers, holding a referendum in 2002 resulting from failed bilateral negotiations between the parties would have borne a high risk of polarising the Montenegrin population and a subsequent escalation of violence. According to a former EU senior official who participated in the mediation process, There was the perception on our side that it would be rather risky to witness a polarisation between the conflict parties because it could lead to great instability. At that time, there was a possibility that stability in Montenegro would be at risk and that there would be an open escalation of violence between the independence movement and the pro-Yugoslav forces. (Interview EU 13)

Not only within the EU, but also in the wider international community, the dominant perception in autumn 2001 was that a Montenegrin referendum would be premature, as Montenegro’s secession could lead to a radicalisation of Serb nationalists, risking also the stability within Serbia (Tocci 2007, p. 80; Interview Serbia 3). Montenegrin and Serbian officials who had participated in the mediation process also shared the perception that the main goal of the EU was “to prevent clashes and a violent conflict” within Montenegro, but also between Podgorica and Belgrade (Interviews Montenegro 2; Serbia 3, 5). This concern on the side of the EU was also reflected by the General Affairs Council in its 19 November Conclusions, which warned against “any unilateral action which might threaten the internal stability of the FRY and stability in South Eastern Europe” (Council of the European Union 2001b, p. 17). In other words, the EU’s main process goal in the mediation was to buy time and prevent a decision that was perceived as being made hastily (Crisis Group 2002, pp. 2, 18; Interviews Serbia 5, Montenegro 2). Concerning the outcome of the mediation efforts, the EU pursued the goal of maintaining a common constitutional framework between Serbia and Montenegro, and thus a functioning common state. In public statements made in April 2001 after Montenegrin parliamentary elections—and several months before the beginning of the mediation process—this preference became visible when both High Representative

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Solana and German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer called on Belgrade and Podgorica to initiate a dialogue about their common future (Niksic 2001). The foreign ministers of the 15 EU member states, meeting for the General Affairs Council on 11–12 June 2001, underscored this stance by concluding that “a further priority is resolving the future constitutional relations between Serbia and Montenegro, through an open dialogue and a spirit of compromise, aiming at an agreed redefinition of their relations in a renewed federal framework according to democratic principles” (Council of the European Union 2001a, p. 22; emphasis added). Consequently, the Council’s mandate to High Representative Solana to mediate between the parties reiterated the EU’s goal to keep “a democratic Montenegro in a democratic Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY)” (Council of the European Union 2001b, p. 17). In an article published with the Montenegrin daily newspaper Vijesti, Solana made it clear that maintaining a constitutional link and creating a common State Union of Serbia and Montenegro was the EU’s top priority. Solana pointed to examples of groups that enjoyed a great degree of autonomy within an overarching federal state, such as the people of Scotland or Bavaria, thereby providing an argument for why a federal state could be in the political and economic interest of Montenegrins (Solana 2002, p. 1). Why was the EU prioritising a common state? From the perspective of EU decision-makers at that time, maintaining a constitutional link between Serbia and Montenegro served another EU goal: leading the mediation efforts to an outcome that would not jeopardise regional stability. As a former senior EU official explained, The most serious concern on part of the EU was that regional stability as such could be jeopardised by the break-up of the FRY. And this has also to be seen in the context of the Kosovo conflict, where the international community pursued a ‘standards before status’ policy. If Montenegro left the state union, the concern was that this would have put the EU under immense pressure to lead Kosovo towards independence as well and to give up on the ‘standards before status’ policy. And another concern was related to Bosnia, as there was a fear that Montenegro’s independence could further destabilise the situation there. (Interview EU 13)6

In a similar way, interview partners from the Montenegrin and Serbian side shared the assessment of the EU having pursued the goal of stabilising the region and preventing the ‘chaotic disintegration’ of Serbia

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and Montenegro (Interview Serbia 5; similarly, Montenegro 1, 2; CS 10). Consequently, the goal of finding a solution that would not endanger regional stability is identified as the second outcome goal that the EU was pursuing as a mediator in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence. In the first mediation phase, the two outcome goals were perceived as being fully congruent with each other. During the second phase of the mediation process, however, they became gradually disentangled after the adoption of the Constitutional Charter when it turned out that the constitutional arrangements were dysfunctional and would not lead to a gradual rapprochement and integration of the two republics (Interviews Serbia 3; Montenegro 1, 3). In particular with regard to economic and trade policy, the European Commission had to realise in 2005 that “the attempts to achieve a minimum level of common trade policy and internal market integration did not achieve the desired results” (European Commission 2005, p. 2). A few months after the Montenegrin vote for independence, EU Special Envoy Lajcak stated that the main purpose of the EU’s presence in the conflict between Montenegro and Serbia was not to help separate Montenegro from Serbia. It was engagement that respected the reality on the ground and wished to set the referendum parameters so that this process raises no questions or disputes – now or in the future. The main objective – to maintain an open-ended result until the last day – had been achieved. (Lajcak 2006, p. 7)

Lajcak’s statement underlines the realisation within the EU that leading the process to a stable outcome was even more important than keeping the two republics together in a common state union. In turn, the goal of keeping a constitutional link between Serbia and Montenegro became less important to the EU and was accepted to be overridden by the overall concern for stability in the run-up to the referendum in 2006. Evaluating EU Goal-Attainment Did the EU achieve its goals as a mediator in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence? The evidence suggests that the EU has been highly effective in terms of goal-attainment (Table 3.2).

68  J. BERGMANN Table 3.2  EU mediation goals and degrees of goal-attainment in the ­conflict over Montenegro’s independence Degree of goalattainment/type of goal

High

Medium

Low

Process goals

Preventing an early referendum on Montenegrin independence Leading mediation effort to an outcome that would not endanger regional stability

–

–

Maintaining a common constitutional framework for Serbia and Montenegro

–

Outcome goals

Source Own compilation

First, the EU fully attained its goal of preventing an early referendum in Montenegro in 2002, thereby buying time for finding a settlement to the conflict (Crisis Group 2002; Interview Serbia 5). By engaging the parties in a mediation process—and thus reviving the talks between the Montenegrin, Serbian and federal government, which had not led to any results in 2001—the EU prevented a unilateral decision by the Montenegrin government to hold a referendum as early as possible. In addition, by signing the Belgrade Agreement, the EU mediators managed to commit all parties to wait for a minimum period of three years before holding a referendum on dissolving the state union. Second, the EU managed to maintain a constitutional link between Serbia and Montenegro and convinced the governments of both republics to form a state union. Although the Belgrade Agreement and the subsequently adopted Constitutional Charter resulted in a very loose union between the two republics, on paper, these documents nevertheless provided for a renewed federal framework. Although EU actors, and particularly the European Commission, had initially hoped that this construction would lead to a gradual integration of the different economic systems over time, they had to realise that this was an unrealistic assumption (Djuric 2004, pp. 94–95). At the same time, the goal of keeping Montenegro and Serbia within a joint state became less important to the EU. In turn, the EU’s second outcome goal—leading the mediation efforts to an outcome that would not jeopardise regional stability—became the top EU objective in the run-up to the 2006 referendum (Noutcheva 2012, pp. 135–136;

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Interview EU 13). Winning the parties consent for the referendum formula proposed by EU Special Envoy Lajcak was a key prerequisite for all sides to accept the referendum outcome. When a 55.5% majority of Montenegrin voters voted in favour of independence on 21 May 2006, it was far from certain that political stability in Montenegro and the whole region would be maintained. However, as it turned out, all parties—including the Serbian government as well as the Montenegrin opposition—publicly accepted the referendum result, which assured continuing stability in the smallest Balkan state (Morrison 2011, pp. 6–7). In other words, this outcome meant that the EU also achieved its goal of leading the mediation efforts to a final outcome that would not endanger stability in Montenegro and the whole region. As a former Serbian official acknowledged when asked about the EU’s contribution to the referendum process, The EU contained the process very well, there was absolutely no violence, there was absolutely no instability, political or any other kind. In that sense, it was done perfectly well and I can only congratulate the individuals who organised this process. (Interview Serbia 5)

The praise for the EU’s contribution to stability notwithstanding, former EU officials today also acknowledge that the situation after the referendum was on a knife edge: Let me be very honest with you: We were incredibly lucky. After the threeyear period was over, the trick was to find a possibility, to craft out a referendum formula that would allow the opposition to participate in the referendum. That was a delicate matter. The result was very close, and we also had a good dose of luck in this whole effort. The opposition did not question the legitimacy of the results, and that’s how everything turned out in the end. (Interview EU 13)

In sum, the empirical results indicate that the EU achieved a high degree of effectiveness in terms of goal attainment (Table 3.2). Although it was not successful in attaining the goal of maintaining a functioning state union, it traded this goal for the sake of preserving stability in Montenegro and Serbia. Thus, the results also stand in contrast to the often-heard accusations in Montenegro that the EU’s main goal was to prevent Montenegro’s independence (Interview CS 10). Rather, the

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analysis suggests that the EU’s goal was to prevent an early referendum in 2002 out of its primary concern for regional stability. At the time when the risk of instability was perceived as being somehow manageable, the EU accepted that independence was a realistic scenario (Interview EU 13). Out of this realisation, the EU engaged in brokering a referendum formula to ensure a stable and sustainable outcome that would be respected by all sides.

3.3  Conditions of EU Mediation Effectiveness To explain these findings, I investigate the influence of five conditions on EU mediation effectiveness: (1) mediator leverage, (2) mediation strategy, (3) EU policy coherence, (4) the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise, and (5) their internal cohesiveness. The EU’s Leverage vis-à-vis the Conflict Parties To assess the degree of the EU’s leverage vis-à-vis Serbia and Montenegro, it is important to recapitulate the situation before the initiation of the mediation process in December 2001. Long before its mediation initiative, the EU had established itself as an important provider of financial assistance to the governments of the FRY, Serbia, and Montenegro. After its creation in 1992, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was placed under international isolation and targeted by international sanctions, ending a period of rather well-established trade relations between Europe and its predecessor state, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Djuric 2004, p. 81). Due to the EU’s preoccupation to end the violent conflicts in the Western Balkans, there was no comprehensive policy towards the region in the period between 1991 and 1995 (Pippan 2004, p. 221). Following the Dayton Agreement, the EU decided to develop a Regional Approach to foster the cooperation between the countries of the former Yugoslavia and the EU. Under this new framework, the EU began to offer “financial assistance, unilateral trade preferences and contractual relations in the form of bilateral cooperation agreements” (Pippan 2004, p. 222). The FRY and the two republics of Serbia and Montenegro also considerably benefitted from EU assistance provided in this framework. As far as Serbia is concerned, €180 million in 2000 and €203 million in 2001 were provided under

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the EU’s Emergency Assistance Programme to support economic reconstruction and reform (European Commission 2002a, pp. 35–36). Substantial amounts of bilateral financial assistance to Montenegro started being handed out a few years earlier. When the split between Djukanovic and Milosevic occurred, relations between the EU and Montenegro increased considerably, paving the way for EU financial assistance to back the Montenegrin government’s efforts to strengthen what was perceived as a democratic beacon in the FRY (Bieber 2003, pp. 33–34). In April 1998, the Council decided to provide financial assistance amounting to €3 million to Montenegro “to send a clear and immediate signal of its support for the reform process” in the country (Council of the European Union 1998, p. 6). Another €5 million was made available by the European Commission in December 1998 to support the economic reform process in Montenegro. Under the framework of the OBNOVA programme, Montenegro’s national budget received assistance of €23.3 million in 1999 (see European Commission 2001, p. 2). In May 2000, the Council decided to allocate further assistance of up to €20 million to Montenegro (Council of the European Union 2000, p. 2), primarily on infrastructure work and repairs as well as on transport, agriculture, financial/fiscal reform, and education (Djuric 2004, p. 82; European Commission 2002a, p. 36). When the EU stepped in as a mediator between Serbia and Montenegro in December 2001, it had provided financial assistance amounting to approximately €330 million to them in the same year. Moreover, financial assistance in 2002 was planned to amount to another €205 million (European Commission 2002a, p. 35). Apart from the assistance for economic reconstruction and reform, the EU had launched the SAP in 1999 to create a specific instrument to strengthen ties with the Western Balkans countries and to assist them in meeting the relevant criteria for potential EU membership. By establishing the SAP, the EU also formally introduced the principle of political conditionality into its relations with the Western Balkan countries (Pippan 2004, pp. 229–230). On 20 June 2000, the European Council meeting in Santa Maria de Feira recognised the Western Balkans countries as ‘potential candidates for EU membership’ (European Council 2000, para 67). The Feira European Council conclusions offered all Western Balkan countries a membership prospect that became even more concrete when the Thessaloniki European Council in 2003 stated that

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“the future of the Western Balkans is within the EU” (European Council 2003, para 2). Consequently, at the time when the EU initiated the mediation between Montenegro and Serbia/FRY in December 2001, the prospect of EU membership was already on the table. Six months earlier, the inaugural meeting of the EU-FRY Consultative Task Force had been held, the establishment of which represented the first step of the SAP. However, in comparison to the other Western Balkan countries, the prospect of EU membership for Serbia and Montenegro was far less concrete, partly due to the historical burden of the Milosevic era and the fact that the FRY’s period of isolation had just ended one year earlier, and partly due to the uncertainty concerning the stability and functionality of the FRY (Interview EU 13; Djuric 2004, pp. 89–92). Taken together, the EU had considerable leverage at its disposal visà-vis the conflict parties when it entered the mediation process. It had established a track record of substantial financial assistance to the parties and provided them with a clear prospect of further association with the EU and continued financial assistance. By including the FRY into the SAP—an initiative that initially was aimed primarily at the stabilising of the region rather than setting in motion the process of EU accession (Tocci 2007, p. 90)—it opened the way for the use of political conditionality towards the two countries. However, at that time, the prospect of EU membership was more attractive to the Montenegrin than to the Serbian government. As Deputy Prime Minister Miroljub Labus stated concerning the prospect of EU membership of Serbia, We won’t be happy as the other nations of Eastern Europe. For them EU is the symbol of liberation from communism. For us this is not the case. This is not the question of political will. This is the question of the existing spirit. (Labus in the Serbian newspaper Politika; cited by Djuric 2004, p. 92)

Nevertheless, the incentive was potentially attractive to both sides, as a former senior Serbian/FRY official explained: “It was some kind of incentive, and many people within the Serbian government had trust in this […] it was some, let us say, prospective agenda which was convincing both for Djukanovic and Djindjic” (Interview Serbia 3). In addition, although the prospect of EU membership for Serbia was a long-term one, the Serbian government could expect to gain considerable financial

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assistance from the EU on the path towards EU membership in the short term. For these reasons, the EU’s leverage—both vis-à-vis Serbia and Montenegro—is assessed as high. EU Leverage and Mediation Effectiveness The empirical results suggest that the EU had considerable leverage at its disposal vis-à-vis the conflict parties. However, the extent to which the EU could use these resources in the context of the mediation process was limited. The EU’s track record of financial assistance to Serbia and Montenegro and the prospect of their future EU membership gave the EU the flexibility to adopt a manipulative strategy if needed to persuade the parties to make concessions to their counterparts. At the same time, the prospect of EU membership for Serbia and Montenegro was more a long-term incentive and less concrete than for other Balkan states. Thus, the enlargement incentive was concrete enough to be used by the EU as an incentive for cooperation, but the EU sold it as a much bigger ‘carrot’ than it actually was in terms of attraction, in particular in relation to Serbia (see Tocci 2007, pp. 90–96). The fact that the EU could draw on this incentive certainly contributed to its strength as a mediator in the negotiations, which is also demonstrated in the analysis of mediation strategy in the next section. In a similar vein, the EU’s capacity to organise and mediate negotiations between the parties over a period of five years and engage in active shuttle diplomacy underlines its institutional capacities for mediation. In sum, the findings support the hypothesised positive relationship between EU leverage and EU mediation effectiveness. At the same time, the evidence does not allow for tracing how leverage actually translated into effectiveness, indicating that leverage may instead be an initial precondition of effective EU mediation and influence effectiveness indirectly through its impact on mediation strategy. The relationship between leverage and mediation strategy is further explored in the next section. The EU’s Mediation Strategy—From Facilitation to Manipulation Concerning its mediation approach, the EU gradually moved from facilitation in the first few negotiation rounds in 2001 to a strategy of manipulation in the final negotiations before the signing of the Belgrade

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Agreement in 2002 and continued to apply this strategy until the referendum in May 2006. At the start of the mediation process, the main rationale behind the EU’s mediation approach was to address practical issues that had to be solved in order to define any future relationship between Serbia and Montenegro, focussing not only on the status/ sovereignty questions, but also on issues such as economic policy, healthcare, education, pensions, and citizenship, among others (Crisis Group 2002, p. 7). However, the EU did not set a specific agenda for the talks, which would have been an indication of a formulative approach (Interview Serbia 5; Montenegro 2).7 In the expert groups’ first meetings in Belgrade and Podgorica, EU officials remained in the background and let the parties exchange their opposing views on the different conflict issues (Interview Serbia 5). The EU’s involvement in the negotiations, however, did not remain at this low-profile level, but significantly increased with the negotiation round in Brussels on 4 February 2002. In this meeting, EU experts took up a more prominent role, holding presentations about possible ways to restructure the relationship between Serbia and Montenegro within a common framework. Regarding economic issues, EU experts suggested further harmonising the different economic approaches and argued for creating a single customs area and customs administration (Interviews Serbia 3, 5). The positioning of the EU mediators was even made public through a press release issued by the Council Secretariat and immediately published after the negotiation round: EU participants underlined that further fragmentation in the region would not only be contrary to the process of European integration, but would carry significant economic costs. The benefits of the bigger market will be lost, foreign investments will be discouraged and the lack of a common trade policy would be an obstacle to EU and WTO integration. Early adoption of the Euro might involve substantial economic risks and costs. (Council Secretariat, statement S0019/02; cited by Crisis Group 2002, p. 8)

Apparently, from the Brussels meeting onwards, the EU moved beyond a strategy of facilitation towards a more interventionist approach, including tactics of formulation and manipulation. Formulation was a key characteristic of the EU’s strategy throughout the two mediation phases. In high-level meetings with the leaders in Podgorica and Belgrade after the Brussels negotiation round, Solana

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presented some first sketches of a possible agreement to the respective sides (Serbians Reject EU Proposal on Preserving Yugoslavia 2002; Crisis Group 2002, p. 9). As a former member of the EU mediation team explained, “our role was to identify elements on which the parties could agree, to put them together and formulate it in a way that it had chances to be accepted by both sides” (Interview EU 13). In the aforementioned article authored by Solana published in the Montenegrin newspaper Vijesti on 22 February, the High Representative made public some of the details he had presented to President Djukanovic: This includes the notion of establishing a Union of Serbia and Montenegro. This Union would have few competencies, leaving sufficient room to the constituent republics to manage their own affairs. While the Union would have only one seat at the United Nations, it would allow for a considerable international role for Montenegro […] Finally, there should be a provision allowing each Republic - after a few years - to review the arrangement and to decide on its future. (Solana 2002, p. 2)

In addition, Solana assured Montenegrins that there was no obligation to take back any reforms that had been previously accomplished (Solana 2002, p. 1) Based on the high-level consultations in February 2002, High Representative Solana and his team prepared a non-paper that was sent to the Montenegrin, Serbian, and federal governments a few days before the signing of the Belgrade Agreement finally occurred. As an interviewee remembers, We got some kind of non-paper and had many communications with Brussels and Podgorica […] and we could ‘smell’ what would be the final paper. It was a non-paper which turned out to be the EU proposal for an agreement. We got it one day, it was 8 or 9 March 2002 […] and then had some kind of proximate talks between the two delegations in Belgrade, mediated by Solana’s advisors. (Interview Serbia 3; similarly, Montenegro 2)

Formulation was also a key characteristic of the EU’s mediation approach in the second phase. When the negotiations on the Constitutional Charter became stalled, the High Representative proposed to the Montenegrin government that they make an important concession. The most contested issue was the election procedures for the Parliament of

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Serbia and Montenegro, which had not been specified in the Belgrade Agreement.8 Whereas the Montenegrin government favoured the delegation of representatives to the state union’s parliament, the leaders in Belgrade advocated direct elections to grant the parliament with a higher level of legitimacy (Crisis Group 2003b, p. 3). In November 2002, Serbian Prime Minister Djindjic proposed a compromise solution that allowed for initial ‘indirect elections’ through delegation for two years, followed by direct elections in late 2004. In November 2002, after several visits by Solana and his advisor Lehne to the Constitutional Commission meetings, the parties agreed on this compromise. The compromise occurred because the EU mediators had convinced the Montenegrin government that it would be beneficial to them to agree to this compromise solution (Interview EU 13; Crisis Group 2003b, p. 3). When mediating between the Montenegrin government and the opposition on the referendum rules, EU Special Envoy Lajcak also adopted tactics of formulation. In January 2006, before the actual start of the mediation, Lajcak’s team drafted a document entitled ‘Key Principles of a Democratic Referendum Process in the Republic of Montenegro’. The document identified the main topics to be addressed in the negotiations and asked the parties to provide their positions on each theme. Based on this exchange of positions, the mediation team then compiled a new document, entitled ‘Possible Solutions Regarding the Legislative Framework for Democratic Referendum in Montenegro’, which became the main platform for the subsequent mediation process (Friis 2007, pp. 81–82). On the most contested issue—the majority requirement for the referendum—the EU’s formulative mediation style became clearly visible. The formula for the Montenegrin referendum on independence in May 2006—a minimum of 55% of the votes to be in favour of independence, with a turnout of at least 50% of the electorate—was an EU proposal (Interviews EU 13, Montenegro 2, Serbia 3). Interestingly, by convincing the parties to accept this criterion, Lajcak brokered a solution that went beyond the recommendations of the Venice Commission of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, which had concluded in December 2005 that “a minimum turnout of 50% of the registered voters seems appropriate for a referendum on the change of status” (Venice Commission 2005, p. 8).9 Going beyond formulation, the EU’s mediation approach throughout the period between 2002 and 2006 also reflected tactics of manipulation. In the first mediation phase, the EU’s mediation approach included two key elements of a manipulative strategy: recommending a particular

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settlement proposal and threatening the withdrawal of resources. Concerning the first tactic, the High Representative as well as the EU member states had made it clear very early in the process that they favoured a continuation of a joint federal state of Serbia and Montenegro and asked all sides to follow their recommendation. In a public statement Solana made on 27 November 2001, weeks before the initiation of the mediation process, he argued that “the best solution would be a continuation of the federation […] it is a mistake to think that separation would be a faster way to become part of the EU” (Solana 2001). EU mediators made it very clear to the parties that a common state was what they perceived as the best solution for all parties at that time (Interviews Montenegro 4; Serbia 3; Noutcheva 2012, p. 72). Moreover, EU negotiators went beyond articulating their preference for the state union and made the latter a requirement of the two countries’ EU accession prospect, thus purposefully linking the mediation efforts with the SAP. While public statements made by Solana indicated this kind of negative conditionality, it was also communicated informally to the conflict parties, in particular to the Montenegrin government (Tocci 2007, p. 94). As an EU official remembers, Of course, we made it clear to the two parties that a secession of Montenegro would have negative consequences, both with regard to the regional stability and as far as Montenegro’s prospect of EU membership was concerned. We made it clear to Djukanovic that it was in his interest to have a period of transition and to agree to this solution. (Interview EU 13)

After the signing of the Belgrade Agreement, the requirement of maintaining a common state was communicated more openly and publicly, and turned into the overarching condition for establishing contractual relations with the EU. In a speech delivered on 3 July 2002, Commissioner Chris Patten emphasised that the full implementation of the Belgrade agreement and the EU’s Stabilisation Process go hand in hand. The two are completely compatible, indeed they are mutually reinforcing […] If we are to do a Feasibility Study, we have to have something to study. So we need the Constitutional Charter to be adopted. And we need credible Actions Plans on the harmonisation of trade and customs, and on the establishment of an internal market. (Patten 2002, p. 2)

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In other words, the European Commission linked the gradual harmonisation of Serbia’s and Montenegro’s economic policy to the SAP, using financial assistance as a positive incentive to move parties towards the implementation of the Belgrade Agreement (Noutcheva 2012, p. 104).10 In particular in the field of economic policy, the European Commission specified clear and binding conditions for further advancement on the path towards European integration (Tocci 2007, p. 95). In the 2003 ‘Stabilisation and Association Report’, the Commission emphasised unambiguously that “a prerequisite for contractual relations with the EU […] remains the implementation of an internal market and a single trade policy” (European Commission 2003, p. 1). However, when the European Commission realised that Montenegro and Serbia were not willing to introduce a common customs tariff and to harmonise their trade policy regime, it had to back down from its harmonisation conditionality. Instead, it introduced a twin-track model in 2004 that marked the beginning of separate trade negotiations with Serbia and Montenegro (Djuric 2004, pp. 94–95). In the negotiations on the referendum formula, EU officials also adopted the tactic of recommending a solution to the conflict parties. In the document entitled ‘Possible Solutions Regarding the Legislative Framework for a Democratic Referendum in Montenegro’, Lajcak’s mediation team provided the parties with specific recommendations for solutions on each point of the referendum process (Friis 2007, p. 81). Moreover, High Representative Solana and EU Special Envoy Lajcak exerted a considerable degree of public pressure on the Montenegrin government to accept the referendum criteria proposed by the EU (Council of the European Union 2006). Interview partners also described the EU’s mediation approach in the final pre-referendum phase as an interventionist one. The majority requirement was termed as a formula “designed in Brussels” (Interview Montenegro 2) and a “creation of the EU to be implemented by Lajcak” (Interview EU 13). In sum, the evidence suggests that the EU’s mediation approach in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence primarily reflected a strategy of manipulation that also included strong elements of formulation. Although the EU initially played the role of a facilitator in the first two negotiation rounds, it soon moved towards a more active mediation engagement.

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Mediation Strategy and EU Mediation Effectiveness The EU’s mediation approach influenced strongly its mediation effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment. Concerning the first mediation phase, the evidence suggests that the Belgrade Agreement, signed on 14 March 2002, was based on an EU proposal, although the parties were able to adapt certain provisions of it before it was turned into the final agreement (Interviews Montenegro 2, EU 13). However, a comparison between the “basic ideas” (Solana 2002, p. 2), presented by Solana in the Vijesti article, and the provisions of the Belgrade Agreement leaves little reason to doubt that the main building blocks of the final agreement were based on the EU proposal. Moreover, the strong pressure exerted by the EU on the Montenegrin government was one major reason why the latter decided to agree to the EU proposal and to postpone the referendum planned for 2002, which meant that the EU attained one of its key goals (Interviews Montenegro 2, 3; Crisis Group 2002, p. 17).11 In a similar vein, the EU’s success in attaining the goal of leading the mediation efforts to an outcome that would not endanger regional stability can also be explained by the EU’s mediation strategy. As Friis (2007) in his analysis of the referendum negotiations notes, The EU was capable of promoting the 55 per cent threshold in the referendum since it had the ‘stick and carrot’ power of future membership. It was in reality a ‘take it or leave it offer’, where neither side could afford politically to reject it. (Friis 2007, p. 84)

In addition, the EU preference for a 55% threshold coincided with both parties’ belief that the threshold would be within their reach (Friis 2007, p. 84). The medium degree of goal-attainment concerning the objective of maintaining a functioning common constitutional framework can be explained by the waning conditionality the EU applied to both parties after the adoption of the Constitutional Charter. Although the European Commission initially sought to uphold the conditionality link between the implementation of the Belgrade Agreement and the SAP, it had to realise that the harmonisation conditionality had failed and the introduction of the twin-track model was inevitable. From this moment onwards,

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the EU had given up on its strongest instrument to incentivise the parties to implement the terms of agreement. What is difficult to explain by focussing solely on mediation strategy is the partial settlement of core conflict issues in the Belgrade Agreement. One could plausibly argue that the strong use of pressure and conditionality should have led to a higher degree of conflict settlement. Hence, we need to consider other conditions of mediation effectiveness to explain this outcome. The EU as a Coherent Mediator in the Conflict over Montenegro’s Independence? Assessing the degree of vertical coherence first, I find a high degree of coordination between the member states’ policies towards Serbia and Montenegro and the EU’s mediation efforts. The foundation of this high degree of coherence was a widespread agreement among EU member states that a split between Montenegro and Serbia in the early 2000s could have detrimental effects on the stability of the Western Balkans and thus run against the EU member states’ security interests (Interview EU 13). Based on this consensus, “common security interests of EU member states overwhelmingly dominated the political thinking of EU policy-makers when the decision to push for a common state between Serbia and Montenegro was made” (Noutcheva 2012, p. 102). In particular, Germany and France pushed for a solution that maintained the constitutional relationship between Montenegro and Serbia and publicly reiterated the call for a democratic Montenegro in a democratic Yugoslavia (International Pressure on Montenegro to Remain within Yugoslavia 2001). This preference for maintaining the state union became the EU’s common position shared by all member states (Council of the European Union 2001b, p. 17). In the sessions of the Political and Security Committee and the Working Party on the Western Balkans Region (COWEB), EU member state officials were regularly briefed about the EU-mediated talks between Belgrade and Podgorica (Interview EU 13). Certainly, not all member states were equally enthusiastic about the two-sided policy to pressure Montenegro to stay in a joint state with Serbia and granting them, at the same time, the right to leave the state union after a period of three years (Crisis Group 2003b, p. 11). A former EU official

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describes the discussions within the PSC and COWEB on Serbia and Montenegro in the following way: I cannot remember that the case of Montenegro has been discussed very controversially in the PSC and COWEB. Sure, for some Member States such as Spain, this topic was an uncomfortable one, particularly due to their own conflicts revolving around possible secessions. But all Member States understood that the package deal we had proposed constituted the best way for the EU to deal with Montenegro. (Interview EU 13)

In line with this perception, there is no evidence for any major conflict between the 15 EU member states on the EU’s approach towards Serbia and Montenegro that could be interpreted as a departure from the EU’s common position (see Noutcheva 2012, p. 103; Interviews Serbia 3, Montenegro 1). In sum, the analysis suggests a high degree of vertical EU coherence concerning the EU’s mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence. A different picture emerges with regard to horizontal coherence. The degree of coordination between the different EU actors involved in the mediation efforts was limited and gradually decreased throughout the two phases of the mediation effort. At the start of the EU mediation efforts, there was close coordination between the European Commission’s Directorate-General for External Relations (DG RELEX) and the Council Secretariat, carried primarily through the individual engagement of the two responsible individuals: High Representative Solana and Commissioner Patten. Particularly in the first four rounds of the mediation, in late 2001 and early 2002, Solana and his team relied on the expertise of Commission officials in presenting their views on potential options for a future constitutional relationship between the two entities (Interviews EU 13; Serbia 5). Officially, the European Commission was supporting the assessment shared by EU member states and the High Representative that a common state of Serbia and Montenegro was the desired outcome of the mediation efforts. The Belgrade Agreement, however, triggered a controversy between the Commission and the High Representative that gradually increased the tensions between the two EU institutions (Van Meurs 2003, p. 103). The main interest of Solana and his team lay in maintaining the state union for the sake of regional stability. In contrast, the European

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Commission was primarily driven by the interest to have a capable negotiation partner that would be able to fulfil its obligations in the framework of the SAP (Noutcheva 2012, p. 103). For this reason, the European Commission strongly pushed for the fast implementation of the Belgrade Agreement and the prompt establishment of institutions at the state union level to ensure the functionality of the newly created entity (European Commission 2003, p. 37; Patten 2002, p. 2). The divergence of interests between the High Representative and the Commission became most visible in the area of economic harmonisation. Inside the Commission, the major impression was that Solana and his mediation team did not care too much about the implementation of the provisions on economic harmonisation as long as the objective of maintaining the constitutional relationship was achieved (Noutcheva 2012, p. 103; Interview EU 13). Publicly, Solana defended the Belgrade Agreement “against unsubstantiated criticism” and declared his belief in the “viability of the Union” (Bukalo 2003, p. 1). At the same time, the High Representative did not put a lot of public pressure on the Montenegrin government to comply with the agreement. Rather, Solana left the thorny economic dimension of the agreement to be dealt with by the European Commission (Keane 2004, p. 502; Stahl 2011, p. 157). Contrary to Solana, Patten repeatedly expressed his frustration with the lack of economic harmonization (Patten 2002, 2004). Against the backdrop of the failed implementation of the law on the Action Plan for internal harmonisation between Serbia and Montenegro, the European Commission realised that a different approach to the negotiations on a Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) with the two entities was inevitable (Djuric 2004, p. 95; Tocci 2007, p. 86). Based on the proposal by the European Commission of July 2004, the Council endorsed a twin-track approach, implying negotiations on a single SAA “with distinct negotiations with the Republics on trade, economic and possibly on other relevant sectoral policies” (Council of the European Union 2004, p. 16). This turn in the EU’s approach towards SAA negotiations with Serbia and Montenegro was, in fact, another step towards the independence of Montenegro, making it less likely to achieve the goal of maintaining a constitutional link between the two republics (Interview EU 13). In sum, the findings suggest that there was a moderate degree of coordination between the High Representative and the European

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Commission—or put differently, between EU mediation and the EU’s efforts in the context of the SAP.12 To be clear, I did not find evidence for an open confrontation between the different EU institutions and policies—which would have led to an assessment of a low degree of horizontal coherence. Nevertheless, there were important differences between the High Representative and the European Commission concerning their interests and approaches towards the conflict, in particular in the field of economic policy (Noutcheva 2012, pp. 103–105; Stahl 2011, p. 157). These differences became gradually more visible over the course of the EU’s mediation engagement. Policy Coherence and EU Mediation Effectiveness The empirical findings point to a high degree of vertical EU coherence and a medium degree of horizontal coherence in the case of EU mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence. In what ways have these different degrees of coherence affected the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator? Concerning vertical coherence, the EU member states’ support for the formula of “a democratic Montenegro in a democratic Federal Republic of Yugoslavia” (Council of the European Union 2001b, p. 17) clearly signalled the EU’s preference for maintaining a federal arrangement between Serbia and Montenegro and for not preventing a premature decision on Montenegro’s independence. This signal was well understood in Podgorica and Belgrade (Interview Serbia 3; Montenegro 2). The member states’ consensus on the common state formula provided Solana with a strong mandate and the authority to use the EU’s leverage to compel the two parties to agree to a common constitutional framework (Crisis Group 2002, pp. 7–8; Noutcheva 2012, pp. 102– 103). According to an interview partner participating in the mediation, the clear-cut mandate of the EU—which stood in stark contrast to the EU’s difficulties in finding a consensus position on the conflicts over Bosnia and Kosovo some years earlier—meant that “Solana was really a representative of the EU. We did have the impression that it was really a single voice we heard from Brussels” (Interview Serbia 3). In a similar vein, Montenegrin interview partners emphasized that the EU member states’ support for Solana’s mediation efforts and

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those undertaken by Special Envoy Lajcak sent a clear signal of the EU’s interests and its commitment to help the parties find a compromise solution (Interview Montenegro 2, 3; CS 10). The findings concerning vertical coherence thus correspond with the hypothesised positive relationship between policy coherence and mediation effectiveness. Concerning horizontal coherence, the evidence is less clear-cut. Interview partners on the side of the conflict parties, surprisingly, reported that they had perceived the approaches taken by the High Representative and the European Commission as being ­well-coordinated and consistent (Interview Serbia 3; Montenegro 1). Other studies focusing on EU coherence in this case, however, conclude that the EU’s limited horizontal coherence had been perceived by the political elites in both countries as Brussels speaking with two distinct voices, thereby having an important effect on whether domestic actors perceived the EU’s conditionality as credible (Djuric 2004, p. 91; Noutcheva 2012, p. 105; Tocci 2007, pp. 94–96). One key argument made by these studies is that the different degrees of conditionality applied by the European Commission and the High Representative concerning economic policies created incentives to obstruct the functioning of the state union in this policy field (Tocci 2007, p. 96). In particular, the Montenegrin government justified its resistance to implement the Action Plan on economic harmonisation by arguing that the Belgrade Agreement negotiated with Solana asked the parties to harmonise their economic policies with the EU rather than with the other member state of the state union (Noutcheva 2012, p. 170).13 Consequently, it is difficult to establish a direct negative effect of EU horizontal coherence on mediation effectiveness. Nevertheless, it seems that the Montenegrin government—at least rhetorically— exploited the differences between the European Commission and the High Representative to justify their reluctance to make the state union work. In other words, a conclusion that can be drawn from the findings on horizontal coherence is that the differences between the European Commission and the EU mediation team provided the Montenegrin government with another opportunity to criticise the European Commission’s push for further economic harmonisation, which, in the end, led to the adoption of the twin-track approach, preparing the ground for Montenegro’s independence.

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Montenegro’s Willingness to Compromise: Between Red Lines and Domestic Uncertainty Almost a year before the start of the EU-mediated talks between Belgrade and Podgorica, the Government of Montenegro issued a ‘Platform for Talks with the Government of Serbia on New Relations between the Two States’ to prepare for the talks with Serbia about the future relationship between the two republics (Government of Montenegro 2000). In the platform presented by Djukanovic on 28 December 2000, the Montenegrin government explained its negotiation position on the different conflict issues. The core element of the document is the proposal of a union of fully independent and internationally recognised states. The independence of Montenegro (and Serbia), according to the platform, was to be decided through a referendum of their citizens. In principle, the document called for the creation of a state union with minimal competencies that was not intended to interfere in the national sovereignty of its two member states: “Montenegro and Serbia, independent from each other regarding questions of national and state sovereignty, in fulfilling the common interest should function without centralization” (Government of Montenegro 2000; cited by Van Meurs 2002, p. 21). In addition, the platform proposed to narrow down the competencies of the state union considerably compared to the FRY, limiting its responsibilities for defence and external security, foreign policy, and securing a common market and a convertible currency. Concerning the latter, it is important to note that the Montenegrin government pursued the goal of establishing a common market and common customs area with Serbia that would allow the free flow of goods, capital, and people as well as trade without internal tariffs in conformity with World Trade Organization regulations (Government of Montenegro 2000; cited by Van Meurs 2002, p. 23). Thus, the Montenegrin government clearly sought to gain independence through a referendum vote while maintaining a relationship with Serbia in the form of a very loose state union that would guarantee that both countries could benefit economically from such an arrangement. Despite the Montenegrin government’s strong preference for independence, the April 2001 parliamentary elections in Montenegro casted some doubts on the government’s determination to hold a referendum as early as possible. The elections saw only a slight advantage of

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the pro-independence bloc over the pro-Yugoslav coalition and forced the DPS to form a minority coalition with the SDP, depending on the support of the LSCG. In light of these developments, the Montenegrin government became increasingly reluctant to implement the promise of an independence referendum in 2001 or 2002 (Bieber 2003, p. 36; Van Meurs 2003, p. 64). There was considerable uncertainty within the government on two questions: Would a referendum in 2002 really result in a majority voting in favour of independence? And would it be a wise decision to hold a referendum given the EU’s strong pressure to maintain a constitutional relationship with Serbia? (Interviews Montenegro 1, 2). Another consideration was that without international recognition of an independent Montenegro, self-proclaimed independence could de-legitimise the Montenegrin government and make it more difficult to participate in international organisations and other multilateral cooperation fora, particularly in case the EU disapproved of a unilateral declaration of independence. This strive for international recognition thus considerably limited the government’s bargaining options, as it had to lead Montenegro to independence in a way that would be accepted— and even supported—by the international community (Noutcheva 2012, p. 171). Hence, from the Montenegrin government’s point of view, the expected benefit from agreeing to the compromise solution proposed by Solana was a legal recognition of Montenegro’s right to hold a referendum. In addition, it was expected that the three-year waiting period would allow the government to prepare properly for its implementation, while seeking to increase the share of independence supporters in the meantime (Interview Montenegro 2). Apart from the main goal of achieving independence, the Montenegrin government was also interested in maintaining Montenegro’s prospects for future EU membership. Although becoming an EU member state was subordinate to the goal of full independence at that time, integration into the Euro-Atlantic structures has been a long-term strategic objective of the Montenegrin government (Djukanovic 2001, p. 4; Mulkins 2001, p. 102). Nevertheless, Montenegrin officials also made it clear to EU officials that remaining outside the EU and developing an independent state was a viable alternative for Montenegro, signalling to the EU that it would not trade its goal of independence for future EU membership (Noutcheva 2012, p. 171).

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After the signing of the Belgrade Agreement, the Montenegrin government’s willingness to compromise drastically decreased in the subsequent negotiations—both on the Constitutional Charter and the implementation of the agreement. Given that the decision on holding a referendum was only postponed for another three years, there was little interest on the Montenegrin side to invest a lot of resources to make the state union work. Except from the Foreign Ministry and Supreme Defence Council, where Montenegro cooperated relatively closely with Serbia, the Montenegrin government was very reluctant to give any support to the newly created state union institutions. In particular, the Montenegrin government refused to call for elections in 2005 for the State Union Parliament (Crisis Group 2005, pp. 5–8). Instead, the Montenegrin government sent a proposal to the Serbian government on the dissolution of the state union and the creation of a union of independent states to overcome the dysfunctionalities of the common state created two years earlier. The proposal was immediately rejected by Belgrade (Crisis Group 2005, p. 8; SDA 2005). In the final phase of the EU’s mediation efforts, when EU Special Envoy Lajcak led negotiations between the Montenegrin government and the opposition, the Montenegrin government, again, was only reluctantly willing to seek compromise agreements. On Lajcak’s request, the Montenegrin government issued a platform for the negotiations on the referendum formula, stating that the Referendum Law of 2001 provided a sufficient legal basis for the referendum. This meant that the Montenegrin government refused to agree to a majority threshold higher than the one specified in the Referendum Law, namely, a majority of the votes (Friis 2007, p. 81). Thus, the government’s willingness to make concessions in this final mediation phase was rather low, but the overriding goal of conducting a referendum—the result of which would be recognised by the international community—constrained the government’s ability to insist on its maximalist position and thus provided some bargaining space to be utilised by the EU (see below). In sum, the Montenegrin government’s willingness to compromise was due to their expectation of being granted the right to hold a referendum within a few years’ time as well as assurances that the referendum results would enjoy full recognition by the international community. In addition, given the Montenegrin population’s division on the independence question and the resulting uncertainty about the likelihood of

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a majority turnout for independence, the government expected to gain additional time to mobilise support for independence if it agreed to a waiting period. Serbia’s Willingness to Compromise: Between Federalist Preferences and Pragmatism After the fall of Milosevic in 2000, Serbian political actors—both at the federal and the republican level—were united in their preference for maintaining a common state between Montenegro and Serbia, arguing that this would be for the better of both republics (Interviews Serbia 3, 5, EU 13; Noutcheva 2012, p. 173). Beyond this consensus, however, there were also diverging positions concerning the nature of the constitutional arrangement. Most prominently, Federal President Kostunica and his conservative Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS) clearly favoured the model of a federal republic with a strong institutional structure (Interview Serbia 3). Responding to the ‘Platform for Talks with the Government of Serbia on New Relations Between the Two States’ issued by the Montenegrin government, Kostunica drafted a counter-proposal that was later also endorsed by the other parties organised in the Democratic Opposition of Serbia coalition, including Prime Minister Djindjic’s Democratic Party (DS) (DeVrieze 2001, p. 7). The proposal built on the notion of what Kostunica had termed ‘functional federation’, implying a highly decentralised state with federal competencies in the protection of basic rights and freedoms (including social rights), foreign policy, national defence, ‘basics of the economic system’, and transport and communications (President Kostunica’s Proposal for the Reconstruction of Yugoslavia; cited by Van Meurs 2002, p. 23). In other words, the proposal envisioned the exclusive competency of the federal state over foreign and security policy and defence matters, the monetary system, the customs systems, transport, and securities. Moreover, the federal parliament would be granted the right to adopt so-called framework laws in areas of mixed competence between the federal and state level, such as basic rights and freedoms, property relations, taxation, banking, trade, and pensions (Kostunica Proposal for the Reconstruction of Yugoslavia; cited by Van Meurs 2002, pp. 24–25). Despite their consent for Kostunica’s proposal, Serbian Prime Minister Djindjic and the leadership of the Democratic Party DS took

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a more pragmatic stance concerning the nature of a future common state between Montenegro and Serbia (Noutcheva 2012, p. 174). On the one hand, Djindjic believed that a dissolution of the federation between Montenegro and Serbia could have dangerous implications and he therefore argued for the preservation of a constitutional relationship (Interview Serbia 3, EU 13). On the other hand, he held the view that a common state should not be preserved at all costs. According to an interview partner, “Djindjic, as a pragmatist, from day one [of the mediation] had realised that there was no chance for Serbia and Montenegro to survive as one integrated state. I don’t think that Djindjic had any illusion that such a thing could survive” (Interview Serbia 5). The more pragmatist stance taken by Djindjic and the DS leadership was rooted in their strong European orientation and being more willing than other Serbian parties “to cast off territorial claims – and to confront other national taboos – in return for international legitimacy, foreign aid, and the credible promise of European integration” (Fraser 2013, p. 236). For this reason, Prime Minister Djindjic was more reluctant than Federal President Kostunica to take any risks that could have jeopardised Serbia’s EU membership prospects. Consequently, the Serbian government was more willing to make compromises concerning the nature of the constitutional arrangements. Due to the DS’s strong European orientation, the goal of increasing Serbia’s chances for a future EU membership was deemed more important than the issue of restructuring the FRY into a strong federal state. This order of preferences thus opened some room for the EU to manoeuvre Prime Minister Djindjic towards accepting a looser federal arrangement than the one envisaged by Kostunica (see below). After the assassination of Djindjic in March 2003, the newly elected prime minister, Boris Tadic (DS), continued the policy of moderate support for the state union. However, investing resources into the state union with a Montenegrin leadership that was set to hold an independence referendum as early as possible became less a priority for the Serbian government. This more pragmatic stance towards the maintenance of the state union was also a result of the increasing frustration on the Serbian side about Montenegro’s non-compliance with the Belgrade Agreement and the Constitutional Charter. The increasing frustration with the state union notwithstanding, the Serbian government fiercely rejected Montenegro’s proposal for a dissolution of the state union in 2005 (SDA 2005). The reaction to the Montenegrin proposal demonstrated the

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Serbian government’s insistence on the implementation of the Belgrade Agreement and its unwillingness to let Montenegro go, unless an independence referendum that was in line with the Belgrade Agreement showed that this was the will of a large majority of the Montenegrin population. In sum, the common objective of the Serbian political elite—both in the federal government and the republican government—was to maintain a constitutional, federal relationship with Montenegro. Simultaneously, the federal government and the Serbian government held diverging views concerning the degree of centralization and the competencies of the federal level within a common state. Having signed the Belgrade Agreement and entering the second mediation phase, the Serbian government, led by Kostunica from 2004 onwards, established the preservation of the state union as a firm red line of Serbian policy, despite an increasing realisation that a Montenegrin referendum on independence in 2006 was inevitable. The Conflict Parties’ Willingness to Compromise and EU Mediation Effectiveness The discussion of the conflict parties’ preferences and red lines concerning the substance of the negotiations illustrates that there was a zone within the bargaining space where agreement was possible. The EU successfully exploited this zone of agreement in the first mediation phase. Although Montenegro’s strive for independence seemed irreconcilable with the preference of the federal and Serbian government for maintaining a common state, a zone of potential agreement between the parties emerged due to two key factors. First, Montenegrin President Djukanovic was aware that compromising on the referendum issue could backfire domestically (Interview Montenegro 2). As Tocci (2007, p. 89) succinctly puts it, Djukanovic was “stuck between the Scylla of his government’s independence drive and the Charybdis of the pro-Yugoslav opposition’s blunt refusal”. These concerns notwithstanding, the Montenegrin government was finally willing—reluctantly though—to postpone the planned referendum on independence in order to gain additional time to increase the share of independence supporters among the Montenegrin population. In addition, the confirmation of Montenegro’s right to hold a referendum through an agreement

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mediated by the EU provided the prospect of international recognition for the results of the referendum. Second, despite the consensus among Serbian policy-makers that a common state between Serbia and Montenegro had to be preserved, Serbian Prime Minister Djindjic took a more pragmatic stance compared to Federal President Kostunica and was willing to allow for the possibility of a referendum on Montenegro’s independence after some time, in turn for the common state to be preliminarily maintained. According to a former EU official, “Djindjic held the opinion that a withdrawal of Montenegro from the joint federation, at that particular moment in time, was very risky, but he was willing to make concessions to Djukanovic concerning the nature of the common state” (Interview EU 13). The strong pro-European orientation of Djindjic and the DS, coupled with a good dose of pragmatism, was a favourable circumstance that clearly played into the EU’s hands. Additionally, the EU managed to sideline Kostunica in the negotiations, leaving him as well as other Serbian conservative political figures with little influence on the negotiation outcome (Noutcheva 2012, p. 184; Van Meurs 2002, pp. 9–10). Instead, Djindjic and Djukanovic emerged as the two key figures that shaped the negotiation process on the side of the conflict parties, and took the final decision of consent for the Belgrade Agreement: “The real deal was made between Djindjic and Djukanovic because both had understood that it was a reasonable decision to both to give their consent to the Belgrade Agreement” (Interview EU 13). The parties’ willingness to compromise was a key condition for the achievement of the Belgrade Agreement and constitutes a main explanatory factor of EU effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement in the first mediation phase. The comparison of both parties’ positions on the conflict issues clearly demonstrates that the Belgrade Agreement addressed interests of both sides and represented the lowest common denominator (Van Meurs 2003, pp. 67–72). At the same time, it also included the possibility of a referendum after three years, which successfully accommodated Montenegro’s maximalist position of gaining independence, and thus enabled the Montenegrin government’s consent for the preservation of a common state. Turning to EU goal-attainment in the first mediation phase, Montenegro’s willingness to postpone the referendum—in return for

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being granted the legal right to hold it a few years later—explains why the EU attained its process goal of preventing an early referendum. If Montenegro had insisted on holding the referendum in 2002, it is hard to imagine that the EU could have prevented its realisation. In the second mediation phase between April 2002 and May 2006, the conflict parties’ decreasing willingness to compromise and their strong reluctance to move beyond the minimum compromise of the Belgrade Agreement became clearly visible. The Montenegrin leadership showed no ambition to go beyond the partial settlement achieved by the Belgrade Agreement. Rather, it obstructed attempts to further integrate the two political systems, be it in the economic sphere or concerning institutional issues such as the election procedures for the State Union Parliament (Crisis Group 2005, pp. 5–8). On the Serbian side, the firm stance on the preservation of the state union led to a decrease in cooperative behavior, which made the functioning of the state union even more difficult. The conflict parties’ adherence to their positions in this period is thus key to understanding the medium degree of EU goal-attainment in terms of maintaining a functional common state. Nevertheless, the conflict parties’ consent for the referendum clause in the Belgrade Agreement laid the foundation for the EU to be able to attain its goal of leading the mediation efforts towards an outcome that would not endanger regional stability. Moreover, the willingness of the Montenegrin government and the pro-Yugoslav opposition to compromise on the referendum formula—primarily motivated by a belief on each side that the proposed majority criterion was within their reach— finally assured that the risk of post-election violence was dramatically reduced (Friis 2007, pp. 83–86). In sum, the evidence supports the hypothesis about a positive relationship between the conflict parties’ expected gains, their willingness to compromise, and the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator. The analysis demonstrated the importance of the conflict parties’ expectations of gaining from a compromise agreement in order to understand the EU’s ability to achieve a major settlement of the conflict and attain most of its goals to a high degree. The parties’ unwillingness to reach additional compromises in the second mediation phase led to stagnation in EU effectiveness, both in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment. In the period between 2002 and 2004, when EU conditionality continued to be equally strong, the parties’ decreasing willingness to compromise explains why neither a full settlement of the conflict issues through

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the Constitutional Charter nor a full attainment of the EU’s goal to maintain a functioning state union could be realised. The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness: Deep Divisions Among Montenegrin Political Parties The analysis suggests that the level of internal cohesiveness of the Montenegrin political parties was moderate. Since the 1997 split with the Milosevic regime, the Montenegrin political landscape and public opinion14 had been divided between supporters of independence and a pro-Yugoslav camp advocating for the preservation of a common state with Serbia (Huszka 2003, pp. 44–53). The Montenegrin government’s policy of disassociation from the FRY had led to a polarisation of Montenegrin political parties that turned national elections into a competition between supporters and opponents of independence (Bieber 2003, pp. 33–34). Due to these polarisation dynamics, three main groupings within Montenegro’s political scene emerged: first, the coalition of Djukanovic’s DPS with the SDP, both supporting independence; second, the alliance of pro-Yugoslav opposition parties—composed of the SNP, People’s Concord of Montenegro (NS CG) and Serb People’s Party (SNS)—favouring a common state with Serbia; third, the LSCG as a party that supported the pro-independence policy of the government but was very critical of the DPS and regularly offered scathing criticism about the slow pace of steps towards independence (Bieber 2003, p. 36). Due to the results of the 2001 parliamentary elections, which forced the DPS to form a minority coalition with the SDP, the government depended on the support of the Liberal Alliance. When the Montenegrin government entered the EU mediation process, it could build on a domestic majority coalition for independence—although a fragile one, given the tensions between the DPS and the LSCG. Due to this domestic constellation, the Montenegrin government felt strong pressure to deliver on the promise of independence when negotiating with Serbia/FRY under the mediation of the EU. This pressure considerably reduced the room for manoeuvre to commit to anything less than a credible prospect of independence. This pressure was particularly felt by President Djukanovic who had tied his political career to the project of leading Montenegro towards independence (Interviews Montenegro 1, 2). The Belgrade Agreement and the envisaged creation of a state union was perceived as a strong setback to Montenegro’s independence

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aspirations by the political parties in the pro-independence camp. While Djukanovic persuaded the SDP leadership to back his position and remain in the government, the LSCG presented the Belgrade Agreement as a betrayal of Montenegro’s national interests and announced its withdrawal of support for the DPS/SDP minority government (Caspersen 2003, p. 114). These developments forced the government to hold early parliamentary elections in October 2002, which “brought a degree of clarification and certainty into the Montenegrin political scene subsequent to the signing of the Belgrade Agreement” (Bieber 2003, p. 37). Indeed, the DPS/SDP coalition managed to secure a majority of seats (39 out of 75 seats) in the Montenegrin parliament, while the LSCG lost much of its support after having coalesced with the pro-Yugoslav parties in an attempt to defeat Djukanovic. Hence, the outcome of the elections provided the DPS/SDP government with a solid basis of support for continuing on its political course of domestic economic and political reforms, making progress on the path towards EU membership, simultaneously resisting attempts to form a functioning state union government, and preparing for a referendum on independence after passing the three-year waiting period (Crisis Group 2005, p. 5; Darmanovic 2003, pp. 145–146). The pro-Yugoslav opposition parties played some role as spoiler, but only with limited effect. In the bilateral negotiations about the possibility of holding a referendum between the FRY/Serbia and Montenegrin political parties in 2001, the pro-Yugoslav forces in Montenegro had signalled their willingness to join a grand coalition government that would oversee a referendum in 2002. When the EU stepped into this process and articulated its clear preference for “a democratic Montenegro in a democratic Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY)” (Council of the European Union 2001b, p. 17), the dialogue was immediately cut short. In fact, the EU’s calls for preserving a common state strongly discouraged the pro-Yugoslav parties from seeking any compromise agreement on the referendum issue (Crisis Group 2002, pp. 6–7; Tocci 2007, p. 94). The Belgrade Agreement largely reflected the interests of the proYugoslav bloc. Hence, the pro-Yugoslav parties supported the efforts to implement the Belgrade Agreement and favoured further economic integration, whereas their government sought to “quietly sabotage the common state institutions” (Noutcheva 2012, p. 172). When the Montenegrin government reignited the debate on holding a referendum in 2005, the pro-Union parties (SNP, NS CG and SNS) refused to engage in any dialogue with the government on referendum procedures and threatened to boycott a referendum (Friis 2007, p. 79). Again, the

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pro-Union camp felt assured in their position by what they perceived as clear signals from the EU being opposed to a referendum. In the end, however, the pro-Union bloc did not play a major spoiler role because the EU’s Special Envoy managed to include them in a negotiation process with the Montenegrin government. Finally, the opposition parties also accepted the referendum formula of a 55% threshold for independence (Friis 2007, pp. 83–84). In sum, the split between pro-independence parties and the supporters of a union with Serbia endured over the course of the mediation process and was not overcome until the referendum in 2006 brought about a final decision on this issue. However, despite this divide, the Montenegrin government managed to secure a relatively stable domestic coalition that supported its policy course. The Montenegrin leadership entered the mediation process with the support of a coalition of parties that favoured independence and held a majority of seats in the parliament. When the LSCG withdrew its support for the government, Djukanovic managed to re-establish a domestic coalition that supported his decision to wait another three years to hold a referendum, despite the initial huge disappointment about the Belgrade Agreement in the camp of the pro-independence parties (Interviews Montenegro 1, 2; CS 10). Although the opposition parties strongly advocated for the preservation of the state union and outwardly objected to a referendum on Montenegro’s independence in the first place, their spoiler potential was considerably contained through their inclusion in the mediation over the referendum procedures. The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness: Broad Unity Among Serbian Political Parties There was a relatively high degree of internal cohesiveness among Serbian political parties concerning the question of the future relationship between Serbia and Montenegro. The Serbian political elites, both at the federal and domestic levels, were united in their stance to maintain a common state with Montenegro (Interviews Serbia 3, 5, EU 11; Noutcheva 2012, p. 173). Both the DSS and the DS as well as their highest representatives in government—Federal President Kostunica and Serbian Prime Minister Djindjic—favoured an agreement that would establish a union between Serbia and Montenegro. Apparently, there were differences among the Serbian political parties about the preferred strength of the federative elements within the joint state. The diverging preferences concerning the institutional set-up of the state union

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notwithstanding, these differences were subordinated to the common objective of maintaining a constitutional relationship with Montenegro. The reactions to the signing of the Belgrade Agreement reflected this consensus among Serbian political parties. Although Kostunica was not very pleased by the substance of the Belgrade Agreement, he publicly expressed his satisfaction with it, preferring it over a split-up of the two republics. In a similar vein, the criticism that was raised by Serbian politicians against the Belgrade Agreement focussed less on the creation of the state union as such, but rather on the question of the viability and practicality of the provisions of the agreement. While liberal Serbian politicians such as Miroljub Labus and Mladen Dinkic were very dissatisfied with the agreement, they also realised that it represented the maximum of what could be achieved (Crisis Group 2002, p. 12). However, the increasing frustration over the lagging implementation of the Belgrade Agreement and the dysfunctional arrangements with Montenegro led to a growing resentment against the state union among Serbian politicians over time and was voiced publicly more often after the adoption of the Constitutional Charter (Crisis Group 2003a, pp. 9–10). The rise of the anti-unionist G17 Plus movement and their participation in the minority government with DSS mirrored the resonance of the critique of the state union, which was increasingly perceived as a hindrance to the necessary economic reforms and too big a financial burden for Serbia (Noutcheva 2012, pp. 93, 178). The Serbian government’s strong rejection of the Montenegrin proposal to dissolve the state union in 2005, however, demonstrated that the critical view of the state union was still a minority position among Serbia’s political elites. As one interview partner explained, Prime Minister Kostunica was still hoping for a majority of the Montenegrin population to vote against independence in a likely referendum (Interview Serbia 5). Through the inclusion of the G17 Plus platform into the government, Kostunica accommodated the critics of the state union for the time being. The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness and EU Mediation Effectiveness The findings suggest that the hypothesised positive relationship between internal cohesiveness and EU mediation effectiveness is only partly reflected by empirical reality. Regarding Montenegro, the findings even tentatively point to a reverse direction in relationship between internal cohesiveness and EU effectiveness.

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In the negotiations leading to the Belgrade Agreement, the deep divide within Montenegro’s political scene between parties supporting independence and those favouring a joint state with Serbia meant that the government did not have a strong political mandate to achieve independence at all costs. Instead of negotiating from a position of strength, the Montenegrin leadership was under strong pressure from two sides: the pro-Yugoslav bloc, which had abandoned any dialogue on a possible referendum in 2001, and the LSCG, which had signalled that it would not accept anything less than independence. Thus, this divide among political parties in Montenegro prevented the government from defending its maximalist position in the negotiations—the dissolution of the FRY and the immediate independence of Montenegro. The lack of a high degree of cohesiveness actually enabled the Montenegrin government to consider other policy options and opened up the possibility for the EU to exploit this uncertainty in order to convince the Montenegrin leadership that a three-year waiting period was in their interest (Interview Montenegro 2; EU 13). In other words, the empirical analysis suggests that the limited degree of internal cohesiveness had a positive effect on conflict settlement and EU goal-attainment. Although there is no sufficient evidence to support this counter-intuitive claim, the finding nevertheless brings into question the hypothesis about a linear, positive relationship between the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness and EU effectiveness. At the same time, the continuing stand-off between the pro-independence government and the pro-union camp in Montenegro between 2002 and 2006 blocked any efforts to establish functioning institutions at the state union level. The enduring support of the independence movement provided the Montenegrin government with sufficient political backing to pursue its policy course of sabotaging the state union and preparing for the 2006 referendum (Noutcheva 2012, p. 172). In other words, the limited degree of internal cohesiveness within Montenegro’s political scene reinforced the Montenegrin government’s unwillingness to implement the Belgrade Agreement, and thus hampered the full settlement of conflict issues. This finding, in turn, tentatively speaks in favour of a positive relationship between internal cohesiveness and EU mediation effectiveness. Concerning Serbia, the findings are more clear-cut. The broad domestic support for preserving a constitutional relationship with Montenegro clearly signalled to Podgorica and the EU that the Serbian/federal side was not willing to compromise on anything less than the construction of

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a joint state. However, the common denominator of establishing a constitutional relationship also enabled the Serbian negotiators to explore different viable alternatives concerning the specifics of the construction of the state union. To Prime Minister Djindjic, a key figure in the mediation leading to the Belgrade Agreement, granting Montenegro full independence was not a realistic option, but he realised that he could make concessions to Podgorica as long as a there was a (loose) federal structure binding the two republics together (Interviews Serbia 5; EU 13). In other words, the broad domestic support for finding a formula that would preserve a common state between Serbia and Montenegro actually increased the ZOA between the parties as the Serbian side was willing to make concessions on the institutional design of the state union. In the second mediation phase, the consensus on maintaining the state union was sustained, despite the increasing amount of criticism voiced by G17 Plus politicians. The Montenegrin government was primarily responsible for the stagnation in the implementation of the Belgrade Agreement and the Constitutional Charter between 2002 and 2006. However, because the Serbian government held on to the state union, it prevented an early collapse of the joint state and the related unpredictable consequences for regional stability. The EU’s ability to lead the mediation efforts to an outcome that would not endanger regional stability was thus only possible because the individual Serbian governments throughout this period were able to form a domestic coalition in support of the preservation of the state union.

3.4  Explaining EU Mediation Effectiveness in the Conflict over Montenegro’s Independence The EU’s mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence was highly effective. The continuous efforts of EU diplomats to broker a compromise agreement between supporters and opponents of Montenegrin independence resulted in a major settlement. The Belgrade Agreement (2002) and the Constitutional Charter (2003) fully or partially settled various conflict issues. In terms of goal-attainment, the EU was equally effective. It fully achieved its goals of preventing an early referendum in 2002 and led the mediation to an outcome that did not (further) endanger regional stability. The EU’s goal of pushing the parties towards maintaining a functional state union was traded for the sake of securing stability when the EU realised that it could not move the parties

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towards full implementation of the Belgrade Agreement. On balance, the EU was a highly effective mediator in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence. To explain this finding, I investigated five conditions of EU mediation effectiveness. Relating the values of the conditioning factors to EU mediation effectiveness shows that the empirical findings are largely consistent with the original hypotheses (see Table 3.3). Mediation strategy and the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise stand out as the main explanatory factors. The EU’s manipulative strategy based on conditionality, coupled with a strong formulative role, was a key condition of the EU’s ability to broker the Belgrade Agreement, thus achieving a major settlement of the conflict and attaining the goal of preventing an early referendum in Montenegro in 2002. The decrease in manipulative elements of the EU’s mediation approach since the adoption of the Constitutional Charter in 2003 also demonstrates the significance of mediation strategy as an explanatory factor. When the EU decided to implement the twin-track approach, its strongest instrument of manipulation was out of its hands. This decision drastically reduced the conflict parties’ incentives to work together towards forming a state union. What mediation strategy alone cannot sufficiently explain is the partial settlement of core conflict issues in the Belgrade Agreement because one would expect that a strong use of pressure and conditionality could/should have led to a higher degree of conflict settlement. This finding points to the centrality of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise. The analysis demonstrated the importance of parties’ expectations to gain from a compromise agreement in explaining the EU’s mediation effectiveness. The Belgrade Agreement represented

Table 3.3  Conditions of EU mediation effectiveness in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence Conditions of EU mediation effectiveness

Degrees/values of conditions

Mediator leverage Mediation strategy EU coherence Conflict parties’ willingness to compromise Conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness

Medium to high Manipulation Medium to high High Medium to high

Source Own compilation

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the lowest common denominator of the conflict parties’ preferences and accommodated Montenegro’s maximalist position of achieving independence by granting the right to hold a referendum after a three-year waiting period. In addition, the parties’ unwillingness to make further compromises in the second mediation phase is the main factor that explains why neither a full settlement of the conflict issues through the Constitutional Charter nor a full attainment of the EU’s goal to maintain a functioning state union could be realised. The other factors—mediator leverage, EU policy coherence, the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness—were conducive to EU mediation effectiveness, but their influence was less direct. The EU’s leverage in terms of financial resources and the prospect of EU membership enabled the EU to draw on a full range of mediation tactics, including the provision or withdrawal of resources. EU member states’ unambiguous support signalled to the conflict parties that High Representative Solana was speaking and acting on behalf of the 15 states. However, there were also tensions between the Solana’s mediation team and the European Commission on the necessity to apply conditionality to foster economic harmonisation that were exploited by domestic actors on the side of the conflict parties, fuelling the resistance against the full implementation of the Belgrade Agreement. In terms of internal cohesiveness, the broad consensus among Serbian political parties on preserving a common state strengthened the Serbian government’s negotiating position and allowed it to make concessions on the institutional design of the state union as long as the constitutional relationship with Montenegro would be maintained. In contrast, the strong divide between supporters and opponents of independence enabled the Montenegrin government to consider different policy alternatives and opened up the possibility for the EU to exploit the uncertainty about the likely outcome of a referendum on independence in order to convince the Montenegrin leadership that a three-year waiting period was in their interest. Overall, the mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence is certainly an EU success story. Despite the fact that the development of the EU’s foreign policy framework was in its early stages, the EU demonstrated its ability to make a significant contribution to the management of the conflict between Montenegro and Serbia. At the same time, the case study also demonstrated that the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator has its limits. Despite a high degree of leverage, an active mediation approach, and a high degree of vertical coherence, the EU

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was not able to incentivise the parties to fully implement the Belgrade Agreement and prevent the Montenegrin government from defecting from the implementation of the agreement. Moreover, the Montenegro case also provides an example of the double-edged effects of an interventionist mediation strategy. Manipulation as a strategy was key to brokering the Belgrade Agreement, but it did not significantly contribute to socialisation and trust-building between the parties, which could have built the basis for a full implementation of the agreements.

Notes







1.  For further information on the composition of the delegations, see Sukovic (2001, p. 1). 2. More specifically, the agreement was signed by the president of the FRY, Vojislav Kostunica; the deputy federal prime minister Miroljub Labus; the president of the Republic of Montenegro, Milo Djukanovic; the prime minister of the Republic of Serbia Zoran Djindjic; and the prime minister of the Republic of Montenegro, Filip Vujanovic (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 1). 3.  While the agreement does not prescribe a referendum as being the only way of taking the decision to leave the union, the referendum option is clearly built into the agreement, as it stipulates that the “laws on Referendum shall be adopted by the member states, taking full account of internationally recognized democratic standards” (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 2). Interestingly, the agreement also emphasises that if Montenegro leaves the union, Serbia becomes the successor state of the FRY and all international documents related to the FRY shall fully apply to Serbia. The specific mention of UN Security Council Resolution 1244 on Kosovo indicates that this clause was primarily built into the agreement to reiterate Serbia’s claim on territorial integrity and authority over Kosovo. 4. However, doubts about the stability of this consensus remained until the final referendum day, as it was unclear how the government would proceed in the case of achieving more than 50% of support for independence but less than 55%; see, e.g., OSCE (2006, p. 4). 5. Only in the case of economic policy could it be debated as to whether the provisions of the Belgrade Agreement constitute a settlement at all. However, I would argue here that the agreement to establish a common market and to protect the freedom of goods is itself a substantial agreement and justifies the evaluation as a partial settlement.

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6. These concerns on part of the EU have also been documented by Tocci (2007, p. 80). 7. See also Sukovic (2001). 8. According to an interview partner present in the final negotiation rounds leading to the Belgrade Agreement, Djukanovic had convinced Kostunica that there should be no explicit provision on this issue in the agreement and that it could be resolved at a later stage (Interview Montenegro 2). 9. In retrospect, the EU has been criticised for introducing “a new threshold for democracy” (Stahl 2011, p. 158) that went beyond the usually applied criterion of an absolute majority of votes. 10. See also the report on the fifth meeting of EU-FRY Consultative Task Force on 9–10 July 2002 that documents the European Commission’s approach to make the fullimplementation of the Belgrade Agreement a prerequisite for further steps towards the SAA; see European Commission (2002b). 11.  This assessment is also shared by Noutcheva and Huysseune (2004, p. 122), Stahl (2011, p. 157), Van Meurs (2003, p. 65), and Tocci (2007, pp. 94–95). 12. This assessment is also shared by Noutcheva (2012, p. 105), concluding that “the EU did not co-ordinate its actions in the Serbia–Montenegro political context well”. 13. In fact, the European Commission in various documents asked the parties to harmonise their economic policies in relationship with each other (European Commission 2002b, p. 2; Patten 2002, p. 2). In contrast, the Belgrade Agreement demands the “harmonisation of economic policies with the EU” (Belgrade Agreement 2002, p. 4). 14. According to public opinion polls in 2000 conducted by the Centre for Democracy and Human Rights (CEDEM), 48.1% of the respondents would have voted in favour of independence, while 39.9% would have voted against it; see Caspersen (2003, p. 112).

References Baker, C. (2015). The Yugoslav wars of the 1990s. London: Palgrave. Belgrade Agreement. (2002, March 14). Agreement on principles of relations between Serbia and Montenegro within the State Union: Proceeding points for the restructuring of relations between Serbia and Montenegro. Belgrade. http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/ declarations/73447.pdf. Accessed 24 November 2016. Bieber, F. (2003). Montenegrin politics since the disintegration of Yugoslavia. In F. Bieber (Ed.), Montenegro in transition: Problems of identity and statehood (pp. 11–42). Baden-Baden: Nomos.

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Bukalo, E. (2003, November 20). Interview of Javier Solana, EU High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy. Montenegro News Agency, Podgorica. Caspersen, N. (2003). Elite interests and the Serbian-Montenegrin conflict. Southeast European Politics, 4(2–3), 104–121. Cerovic, S. (2001, April 2). Serbia and Montenegro: Reintegration, divorce, or something else? (Special Report). Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace. http://www.usip.org/sites/default/files/sr68.pdf. Accessed 2 August 2016. Constitutional Charter of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. (2003). Constitutional Charter of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. Südosteuropa Mitteilungen, 43(3), 77–87. Council of the European Union. (1998, April 27). 2085th Council meeting—General affairs (Press Release C/98/109 [Presse 109]). Luxembourg. http://europa. eu/rapid/press-release_PRES-98-109_en.htm. Accessed 16 August 2016. Council of the European Union. (2000, May 22). Council decision of 22 May 2000 providing exceptional financial assistance for Montenegro (Press Release 2000/355/EC). Brussels. http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/ PDF/?uri=CELEX:32000D0355&from=SL. Accessed 16 August 2016. Council of the European Union. (2001a, June 11). 2356th Council meeting— General affairs (Press Release 9398/01 [Presse 226]). Luxembourg. http:// europa.eu/rapid/press-release_PRES-01-226_en.htm. Accessed 11 August 2016. Council of the European Union. (2001b, November 19). 2386th Council Meeting—General affairs (Press Release 13802/01 [Presse 414]). Brussels. http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_PRES-01-414_en.htm. Accessed 4 August 2016. Council of the European Union. (2004, October 11). 2609th Council Meeting of the General Affairs and External Relations Council (Press Release C/04/276). Luxembourg. http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_PRES-04276_en.htm. Accessed 9 January 2019. Council of the European Union. (2006, February 25). Javier Solana, EU High Representative for the CFSP, calls for an internal agreement in Montenegro on the modalities for the referendum (Press Release S056/06). Brussels. http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/declarations/88516.pdf. Accessed 19 August 2016. Crisis Group. (2002). Still buying time: Montenegro, Serbia and the European Union (Balkans Report 129). Podgorica, Belgrade, Brussels: International Crisis Group. http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/europe/Montenegro%209.pdf. Accessed 28 July 2016. Crisis Group. (2003a). Serbia after Djindjic (Balkans Report 141). Belgrade, Brussels: International Crisis Group. https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/28068/ 141_serbia_after_djindjic.pdf. Accessed 16 February 2019.

104  J. BERGMANN Crisis Group. (2003b). A marriage of inconvenience: Montenegro 2003 (Balkans Report 142). Podgorica, Brussels: International Crisis Group. http://www. crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/europe/142%20-%20A%20Marriage%20 of%20Inconvenience%20-%20Montenegro%202003.pdf. Accessed 27 July 2016. Crisis Group. (2005). Montenegro’s independence drive (Europe Report 169). International Crisis Group. https://www.crisisgroup.org/europe-centralasia/balkans/montenegro/montenegros-independence-drive. Accessed 16 February 2019. Darmanovic, S. (2003). Stability and continuity in Montenegro: Montenegro after a rather uninteresting round of presidential elections. Südosteuropa Mitteilungen, 43(3), 22–32. DeVrieze, F. (2001, October). Federal Republic of Yugoslavia: The Montenegrin dilemma (WRITENET Paper 03/2001). UNHCR Centre for Documentation and Research. http://www.refworld.org/pdfid/3c4bf7274. pdf. Accessed 15 September 2016. Djukanovic, M. (2001). Keynote address by Milo Djukanovic, President of the Republic of Montenegro. In N. Whyte (Ed.), The future of Montenegro: Proceedings of an expert meeting, 26 February 2001 (pp. 1–7). Brussels: Centre for European Policy Studies. Djuric, D. (2004). Montenegro’s prospects for European integration: On a twin track. SEER—South East Europe Review for Labour and Social Affairs, 4, 79–105. Dzankic, J. (2015). The role of the EU in the statehood and democratization of Montenegro. In S. Keil & Z. Arkan (Eds.), The EU and member state building: European foreign policy in the Western Balkans (pp. 83–101). Abingdon: Routledge. European Commission. (2001). A support programme for Montenegro in 2001: Draft programme. http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/pdf/financial_assistance/cards/publications/montenegro_support_programme_en.pdf. Accessed 16 August 2016. European Commission. (2002a, April 4). Federal Republic of Yugoslavia: Stabilisation and association report (Staff Working Document SEC[2002] 343). Brussels. http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/archives/pdf/serbia_and_ montenegro/com02_343_en.pdf. Accessed 16 August 2016. European Commission. (2002b, July 10). Fifth meeting of the EU-FRY consultative task force—Belgrade, 9–10 July 2002 (Press Release IP/02/1030). Brussels. http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-02-1030_en.htm. Accessed 18 August 2016. European Commission. (2003, March 26). Commission staff working paper: Serbia and Montenegro: Stabilisation and association report 2003 (Press Release SEC [2003] 343). Brussels. http://www.becei.org/DOKUMENTI/ com03_343_en.pdf. Accessed 22 August 2016.

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European Commission. (2005, April 12). Communication from the Commission on the preparedness of Serbia and Montenegro to negotiate a Stabilisation and Association Agreement with the European Union (COM [2005] 476 final). Brussels.  http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri= CELEX:52005DC0476&from=en. Accessed 12 August 2016. European Council. (2000, June 20). Santa Maria de Feira European Council, 19 and 20 June 2000: Conclusions of the presidency. Santa Maria de Feira. http://aei.pitt.edu/43325/1/Feira_Council.pdf. Accessed 16 August 2016. European Council. (2003, June 21). EU-Western Balkans Summit, Thessaloniki 21 June 2003: Declaration (Press Release 10229/03 [Presse 163]). Thessaloniki. http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_PRES-03-163_en.htm. Accessed 24 November 2016. European Stability Initiative. (2001, November 26). Politics, interests and the future of Yugoslavia: An agenda for dialogue (ESI Discussion Paper). Berlin, Brussels, Sarajevo: European Stability Initiative. http://www.esiweb.org/ pdf/esi_document_id_24.pdf. Accessed 3 August 2016. Fraser, M. (2013). European integration and postwar political relations between Croatia and the Bosnian Croats and Serbia and the Bosnian Serbs. In T. J. Mabry, J. MacGarry, & M. Moore (Eds.), Divided nations and European integration (pp. 210–250). Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press. Friis, K. (2007). The referendum in Montenegro: The EU’s ‘postmodern diplomacy’. European Foreign Affairs Review, 12(1), 67–88. Government of Montenegro. (2000, December 28). Platform for talks with government of Serbia on new relations between the two states. http://www.cap.unimuenchen.de/download/2002/2002_Serbia_Montenegro.pdf. Accessed 24 November 2016. Huszka, B. (2003). The dispute over Montenegrin independence. In F. Bieber (Ed.), Montenegro in transition: Problems of identity and statehood (pp. 43–62). Baden-Baden: Nomos. International Pressure on Montenegro to Remain within Yugoslavia. (2001). Agence France-Presse. Podgorica. Keane, R. (2004). The Solana process in Serbia and Montenegro: Coherence in EU foreign policy. International Peacekeeping, 11(3), 491–507. Koprivica, V. (2001). The second round of Serbian-Montenegrin negotiations. Podgorica: AIM Press. Lajcak, M. (2006). Serbia and Montenegro after the referendum. Südosteuropa Mitteilungen, 4, 6–11. Lyon, P. (2004). Montenegro and Serbia: Disassociation, negotiation, resolution? In B. Bartmann, H. F. Srebrnik, & T. Bahcheli (Eds.), De facto states: The quest for sovereignty (pp. 52–73). London: Routledge.

106  J. BERGMANN Montenegro Set for Independence Vote. (2001, October 26). BBC News. http:// news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/1621046.stm. Accessed 3 August 2016. Morrison, K. (2011, February). Change, continuity, and consolidation: Assessing five years of Montenegro’s independence (LSEE Papers on South East Europe 2). London: London School of Economics and Political Science. http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/48039/1/__Libfile_repository_Content_LSEE_ Change,%20continuity(author).pdf. Accessed 14 August 2016. Mulkins, C. (2001). Differences between the FRY/Kostunica and Montenegrin perspectives. In N. Whyte (Ed.), The future of Montenegro: Proceedings of an expert meeting, 26 February 2001 (pp. 97–102). Brussels: Centre for European Policy Studies. Niksic, A. (2001). Montenegrin independence bloc wins poll, but only just. Agence France Press. Podgorica Noutcheva, G. (2012). European foreign policy and the challenges of Balkan accession: Sovereignty contested. London and New York: Routledge. Noutcheva, G., & Huysseune, M. (2004). Serbia and Montenegro. In B. Coppieters, M. Emerson, M. Huysseune, T. Kovziridze, & G. Noutcheva (Eds.), Europeanization and conflict resolution: Case studies from the European periphery (pp. 107–147). Gent: Academia Press. OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe). (2006, March 14). Referendum 21 May 2006: OSCE/ODIHR needs assessment mission report, 7–9 March 2006. Warsaw: OSCE. http://www.osce.org/odihr/elections/ montenegro/18431?download=true. Accessed 11 August 2016. Patten, C. (2002, July 3). The Rt Hon. Chris Patten, Commissioner for external relations: Statement to the press in Belgrade (Statement to the Press SPEECH/02/318). Belgrade: European Commission. http://europa.eu/ rapid/press-release_SPEECH-02-318_en.htm. Accessed 18 August 2016. Patten, C. (2004, April 28). The Western Balkans: The road to Europe: Speech by the Rt. Hon. Chris Patten to the German Bundestag, ‘European Affairs Committee’. Berlin. http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/archives/ear/publications/main/pub-speech_berlin_20040428.htm. Accessed 8 September 2016. Pippan, C. (2004). The rocky road to Europe: The EU’s stabilisation and association process for the Western Balkans and the principle of conditionality. European Foreign Affairs Review, 9(2), 219–245. SDA (Schweizerische Depeschenagentur). (2005). Belgrad lehnt Montenegros Idee fuer Bund unabhaengiger Staaten ab. Belgrade: Schweizerische Depeschenagentur. Serbians Reject EU Proposal on Preserving Yugoslavia. (2002, February). Associated Press. Belgrade: Associated Press International. Solana, J. (2001, November 27). EU pressures Montenegro against independence (Quoted by Associated Press). Associated Press International.

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Solana, J. (2002, February 22). The fastest way to full European integration. Vijesti, Podgorica. Stahl, B. (2011). The EU as a peace-making power in the Western Balkans: Solana’s focal point? In G. Müller-Brandeck-Bocquet & C. Rüger (Eds.), The High Representative for the EU foreign and security policy—Review and prospects (pp. 145–173). Baden-Baden: Nomos. Sukovic, D. (2001). On the eve of the new round of Serbian-Montenegrin negotiations. Podgorica: AIM Press. Sukovic, D. (2002, January 27). Serbian & Montenegrin experts on the future of Yugoslavia: They achieved next to nothing. Podgorica: AIM Press. Tocci, N. (2007). The EU and conflict resolution: Promoting peace in the backyard. London: Routledge. Van Meurs, W. (2002, March). Serbia and Montenegro: One small step for mankind, one giant leap for the Balkans? (CAP Working Paper). Munich: Center for Applied Policy Research. http://www.cap.uni-muenchen.de/download/2002/2002_Serbia_Montenegro.pdf. Accessed 20 September 2016. Van Meurs, W. (2003). The Belgrade Agreement: Robust mediation between Serbia and Montenegro. In F. Bieber (Ed.), Montenegro in transition: Problems of identity and statehood (pp. 63–82). Baden-Baden: Nomos. Venice Commission. (2005, September 28). Draft report of the European Commission for Democracy through Law (Venice Commission) on parliamentary assembly recommendation 1704 (2005) on referendums: Towards good practices in Europe (Council of Europe Study No. 341, 2005). Strasbourg. https://www.venice.coe.int/webforms/documents/default.aspx?pdffile=CDL-EL(2005)032-e. Accessed 9 January 2019.

CHAPTER 4

The EU as a Mediator in the Kosovo–Serbia Conflict

On 17 February 2008 the government of Kosovo declared the independence of Kosovo. The unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) followed after failed international mediation efforts between 2005 and 2007 did not bring about a negotiated agreement between the authorities in Pristina and the Serbian government. Although a large part of the international community promptly recognised Kosovo’s independence, the conflict with Serbia over Kosovo’s status persisted and led to the initiation of further mediation efforts, this time managed by the EU. Although the EU-mediated Belgrade–Pristina dialogue has led to a number of remarkable successes since it began in 2011, tensions between Kosovo and Serbia have remained high, which has also resulted in a considerable deadlock in the mediation process. The territory of Kosovo has been an issue of conflict between Serbs and Albanians for hundreds of years.1 Albanians have always represented the large majority of the population of Kosovo, but Serb nationalists have claimed the territory to be the “cradle of their nation” (Ker-Lindsay 2009, pp. 2–3). Within the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Kosovo first had the status of an autonomous territory and was upgraded in 1974 to the status of an autonomous province, although it still enjoyed considerably less autonomy than the six Yugoslav republics (Noutcheva and Huysseune 2004, pp. 112–113). When the Serbian People’s Assembly abolished Kosovo’s status as an autonomous province and subjected it to direct rule from Belgrade, the conflict © The Author(s) 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0_4

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further escalated into a full-blown armed conflict between the Kosovo Liberation Army and the Yugoslav Army/Serbian military police (Baker 2015, pp. 80–81). Following Serbia’s rejection of the proposal for a ceasefire agreement at the January 1999 Rambouillet peace conference, NATO intervened militarily and forced Milosevic to accept a ceasefire and the establishment of an interim political framework for Kosovo on 2 June 1999 (KerLindsay 2009, pp. 13–15; 2010, pp. 179–180). Seven days later, the Military Technical Agreement between the International Security Force (KFOR) and the governments of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia was signed in Kumanovo, confirming the withdrawal of all Yugoslav forces from Kosovo and the deployment of a security force under NATO control and a UN civilian mission: the United Nations Interim Administration in Kosovo (UNMIK). UNMIK took over the administration of Kosovo with the aim of “establishing and overseeing the development of provisional democratic self-governing institutions for a peaceful and normal life for all inhabitants of Kosovo” (United Nations Security Council 1999, p. 3). In this period, the international community pursued a ‘standards before status’ policy towards Kosovo, implying a focus on the development of democratic institutions, rule of law, and the protection of minority rights before taking any decisions on Kosovo’s status (Tannam 2013, pp. 948–949). This policy, however, proved to be flawed against the background of growing unrest among Kosovo’s population due to a severe frustration with the political and economic situation in Kosovo, and the realisation that UNMIK had failed to provide for the security of the Serb population in Kosovo (Hughes 2013, p. 1008). The mediation efforts, led by UN Special Envoy Martti Ahtisaari from November 2005 until March 2007, as well as the ‘Troika Process’ led by the United States, Russia, and the EU between August and December 2007, failed to bring about a negotiated settlement (Economides 2011; Economides and Ker-Lindsay 2010).2 Due to Russia’s refusal to back any UN Security Council resolution that would allow for Kosovo’s independence, the government in Pristina decided to move forward with a UDI. The UDI was announced on 17 February 2008 and received the support of many Western states, including all EU member states except Cyprus, Slovakia, Greece, Romania, and Spain, which have been opposing Kosovo’s recognition ever since (Economides 2011, p. 198; Tannam

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2013, pp. 949–950).3 Anticipating Kosovo’s UDI, the Council of the EU had decided two weeks earlier to deploy the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) to assist Kosovo’s institutions in their efforts to strengthen democratic accountability and the rule of law (Council of the European Union 2008). Against the outspoken opposition of many EU member states, Serbia decided to refer Kosovo’s UDI to the International Court of Justice and succeeded in convincing the UN General Assembly on 8 October 2008 to formally request an ICJ advisory opinion on the issue (United Nations General Assembly 2008).4 Almost two years after the formal opening of the advisory opinion procedure, the ICJ concluded in July 2010 that Kosovo’s UDI in February 2008 “did not violate any applicable rule of international law” (International Court of Justice 2010, p. 53). The Serbian government responded to this by drafting a UN General Assembly resolution stating that unilateral secession was unacceptable and called for renewed Kosovo status talks (van der Borgh et al. 2017, p. 39). On the European Union side, the advisory opinion provoked a considerable debate within the Political and Security Committee among the member states about how to respond to it (Cooper 2015, p. 1). In the end, the result of the discussions within the PSC was a draft of an alternative resolution calling for a dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade facilitated by the EU (Bergmann and Niemann 2018, pp. 430–433). Based on the consensus among EU member states reached in the PSC, High Representative Catherine Ashton declared the following on behalf of the European Union on 22 July 2010: The EU welcomes the publication of the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice. We are studying it with great care. The advisory opinion opens a new phase. The focus should now be on the future. The future of Serbia lies in the European Union. The future of Kosovo also lies in the European Union. […] The EU is therefore ready to facilitate a process of dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade. This dialogue would be to promote cooperation, achieve progress on the path to Europe and improve the lives of the people. The process of dialogue in itself would be a factor for peace, security and stability in the region. (European Union 2010)

In the weeks before the UN General Assembly session in September 2010, EU diplomats put enormous efforts into persuading the Serbian

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government to accept the EU’s draft resolution and to drop its own. Serbia’s acceptance of the EU draft resolution was both the result of considerable EU pressure and the understanding in Belgrade that not participating in a dialogue with Pristina would have blocked Serbia’s path towards EU membership (Bieber 2015, p. 296). Consequently, on 9 September 2010 the UN General Assembly adopted resolution 64/298, welcoming the readiness of the European Union to facilitate a process of dialogue between the parties; the process of dialogue in itself would be a factor for peace, security and stability in the region, and that the dialogue would be to promote cooperation, achieve progress on the path to the European Union and improve the lives of the people. (United Nations General Assembly 2010, p. 2)

The resolution provided the basis and main mandate for a mediation process between Kosovo and Serbia under the auspices of the EU and was soon followed by the Serbian government’s announcement of a ‘Belgrade–Pristina dialogue’ on technical issues (Tannam 2013, p. 956). Since March 2011 the EU has mediated this Belgrade–Pristina dialogue, which turned into a high-level political mediation process in autumn 2012. This chapter analyses the effectiveness of the EU as a mediator between Serbia and Kosovo and provides an explanation of its achievements and the challenges it has faced in this endeavour. It argues that the EU’s effectiveness, both in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment, does not exceed a medium degree. Although the EU has managed to broker major settlements of various issues and has been successful in committing the parties to the mediation process, unresolved issues related to the governance of North Kosovo have prevented it from achieving a higher degree of effectiveness. The EU’s mediation strategy of manipulation in terms of providing incentives is a key factor in explaining the EU’s ability to achieve a partial settlement of several conflict issues and the partial achievement of its mediation goals. The EU’s strategy of using European integration as an incentive for the parties has strongly resonated with their domestic priorities, but it has not changed fundamentally their reservation points, and thus their willingness to compromise (Table 4.1).

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Table 4.1  Chronology of major events in Kosovo–Serbia conflict 1999–2010 February 1999 March–June 1999 June 1999 October 2000 June 2003 March 2004 November 2005–March 2007 August–December 2007 February 2008 February 2008 April 2008 October 2008 December 2009 July 2010 September 2010

Rambouillet conference NATO air campaign against Serbia (Operation Allied Force) UN Security Council Resolution 1244 Overthrow of Milosevic European Council in Thessaloniki Large-scale riots throughout Kosovo Kosovo status talks led by UN Special Envoy Matti Ahtisaari ‘Troika process’ led by United States, EU, and Russia Council of the EU agrees to deploy EULEX to Kosovo Unilateral declaration of the independence of Kosovo Stabilisation and Association Agreement signed with Serbia UN General Assembly requests ICJ advisory opinion Serbia applies for EU membership ICJ issues advisory opinion on Kosovo UN General Assembly resolution 64/298 calls for EU-facilitated dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia

Source Own compilation

4.1  Mediation Format and Setting The first round of the EU-mediated talks between Kosovo and Serbia was held in Brussels on 8–10 March 2011. Three different phases of the mediation efforts can be distinguished: the technical dialogue phase (2011–2012), the high-level political dialogue mediated by High Representative Ashton (2012–2014), and the high-level political dialogue mediated by High Representative Mogherini (since 2015).5 In the first phase of the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue, Kosovo’s delegation was headed by Deputy Prime Minister Edita Tahiri, whereas the political director of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Boris Stefanovic, led the Serbian delegation. Both delegations were only composed of a few officials, usually ranging from three to six members (Interview EU 4). Depending on the issue under discussion in the individual negotiation rounds, the delegations brought some additional experts to the talks (Interview Kosovo 4). The EU’s mediation efforts were managed by a core EU mediation team composed of three officials from the

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European External Action Service. Senior EU diplomat Robert Cooper led the team and served as the chair of the negotiations. The other two EEAS officials were Fernando Gentilini, who became the EU Special Representative in Kosovo on 1 May 2011, and Kosovo desk officer Anna-Maria Boura. In addition, one rotating member of the European Commission’s Directorate-General Enlargement (DG Enlargement) attended the dialogue meetings and acted as co-chair. In some negotiation rounds—and depending on the issue under discussion—there were also representatives of UNMIK and the International Civilian Office present in the talks (Blockmans 2014, p. 434; Interviews EU 1, EU 4). In this first mediation phase, the parties met for nine rounds of negotiations in Brussels and achieved nine agreements on seven different issues between March 2011 and February 2012.6 To finalise the terms of implementation of the agreements and monitor the parties’ compliance with them, the parties decided to establish an individual working group for every issue (Interviews Serbia 1, Kosovo 1, 3, 4). The mediation process became stalled in February 2012, partly due to a deadlock in the implementation of the achieved agreements, and partly due to Serbia’s local, parliamentary, and presidential elections, which resulted in the formation of a new government under the lead of Prime Minister Ivica Dacic (Socialist Party of Serbia, SPS). After an eight-month break, the mediation resumed in October 2012. The parties agreed to continue the dialogue talks at the level of the heads of government, mediated by High Representative Ashton. The start of these high-level negotiations in October 2012 marks what is considered the second phase of the mediation process. Between October 2012 and September 2014, the prime ministers of Kosovo and Serbia, Hashim Thaci and Ivica Dacic, convened under the mediation of High Representative Ashton. In these high-level negotiations, both prime ministers were accompanied by a small number of officials and advisors. On the Kosovo side, Tahiri remained a key figure in the negotiations as the coordinator of the Kosovo delegation at the working group level. On the Serbian side, Marko Djuric, who was already a member of the Serbian delegation in the technical dialogue phase, continued to play a key role as the director of the Serbian government’s Office for Kosovo and Metohija. A third phase of EU mediation began when High Representative Mogherini succeeded Catherine Ashton on 1 November 2014. At that time, the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue had already been at a halt for seven

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months. Due to Serbian parliamentary elections in March, European Parliament elections in May, and Kosovo parliamentary elections in June 2014, no high-level meetings were possible, although the working groups continued their negotiations until September 2014 (van der Borgh et al. 2017, p. 62). Mogherini initiated the first meeting of the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue in February 2015. Following a 10-month halt of the high-level dialogue in 2016, the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue saw the increased involvement of the heads of state of the two countries from January 2017 onwards, when the presidents of Kosovo and Serbia joined the high-level meetings and led the two delegations in the mediation. The involvement of the two presidents since then signals the significance that both parties attribute to the mediation process.

4.2   Assessing EU Mediation Effectiveness Conflict Settlement in the First Mediation Phase (2011–2012) In the ‘technical dialogue’ phase, 11 conflict issues were on the agenda— cadastres, civil registry, customs and trade, freedom of movement, border management, recognition of university diplomas, missing persons, cultural heritage, telecommunications, electricity/energy, and Kosovo’s regional representation. On seven of those issues, agreements were struck (see Table 4.2). In terms of conflict settlement, the EU’s effectiveness in this first mediation phase can be judged as medium to high. A first set of agreements on the return of civil registry books, recognition of university diplomas, and freedom of movement was struck on 5 July 2011. When leaving Kosovo’s territory in 1999, Serbian authorities took away the civil registry books of all municipalities, amounting to more than 12,000 books that were deposited in ‘parallel’ municipalities around Serbia, leaving many Kosovo municipalities without necessary documentation (Aliu 2011; Todoric and Malazogu 2011, p. 16). The agreement struck on 2 July 2011 entailed the compromise that Serbia would hand over copies of the civil registry books to EULEX officials, who would certify them in consultation with experts from both sides (Agreed Conclusions 2011b, p. 1). Beforehand, a tripartite ‘joint committee’, in which civil registry experts from the two parties and EULEX are represented, was tasked with identifying the missing original documents for completion of Kosovo’s civil registry (European Union 2011a, p. 1).

Civil registry books Kosovo’s participation in regional institutions

Customs and trade Exchange of liaison officers Police integration

‘Technical dialogue’ phase (March 2011–Febuary 2012)

‘High-level political dialogue’ I (October 2012–Febuary 2014)

Source Own compilation

‘High-level political dialogue’ II Integration of Civil Protection (Febuary 2015–) Corps

Full settlement

Degree of conflict settlement/ mediation phase Recognition of university diplomas Cadastral records Freedom of movement Customs and trade Integrated border management (IBM) Integration of judiciary Association/community of Serb-majority municipalities Energy supply and distribution Telecommunications Integrated border management (IBM) Freedom of movement Integration of judiciary Energy supply and distribution Telecommunications Association/community of Serb-majority municipalities

Partial settlement

Table 4.2  Conflict settlement in the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue

Preservation of cultural and religious heritage Return of missing persons

Preservation of cultural and religious heritage Return of missing persons

Preservation of cultural and religious Heritage Return of missing persons Energy supply and distribution Telecommunications

No settlement

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The mutual recognition of university diplomas was another conflict issue addressed in the first mediation phase. The Agreed Conclusions of 2 July 2011 document the conflict parties’ principle willingness “to resolve the question of the acceptance of university diplomas either through a mutually agreed international body or through a third party academic institution” (Agreed Conclusions 2011a, p. 1). The Agreed Conclusions of 21 November 2011 tasked a specific committee established by the European University Association with verifying university diplomas issued by universities in Kosovo and Serbia (Agreed Conclusions 2011f). However, the agreement leaves it to the conflict parties to ultimately decide on the validity of diploma supplements and transcripts of records attached to the certified diplomas, which implies, in reality, that the conflict issue remains only partially settled. The agreement on freedom of movement of 2 July 2011 established a travel regime between the two territories that clarifies the rules for travel, enabling Kosovo citizens to travel to Serbia using their Kosovo ID cards (Agreed Conclusions 2011c). Due to Serbia’s unwillingness to allow cars using the ‘RKS’ (Republic of Kosovo) licence plates crossing its borders, the agreement reintroduces the already abolished ‘KS’ (Kosovo) vehicle licence plates.7 The agreement enables the citizens of Kosovo and Serbia to travel to and through each other’s countries, and thereby partially settled the conflict over the freedom of movement. However, as the conflict parties introduced a car insurance scheme that rendered travel between the two territories very costly (Malazogu and Bieber 2012, pp. 16–18), the issue could only be settled in the second mediation phase through a Memorandum of Understanding between the Association of Serbian Insurers and the Kosovo Insurance Bureau signed on 25 June 2015 (Memorandum of Understanding 2015). Similar to civil registry books, the Agreed Conclusions of 2 September 2011 on cadastral records resolved the issue of missing documents taken away by Serbian authorities in 1999. The settlement mechanism was similar to the civil registry agreement: a tripartite implementation group chaired by the EU monitored a technical agency that was tasked with identifying gaps in the original pre-1999 cadastral records. The Serbian side was obliged to deliver scanned copies of all those original cadastral records removed from Kosovo to the EU Special Representative for Kosovo. In case of property claims based on disparities between the original cadastral records and the reconstructed Kosovo cadaster, an

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adjudication mechanism was established, involving the Kosovo Supreme Court (Agreed Conclusions 2011d, p. 1). Another agreement reached on 2 September 2011 provided for a partial settlement of the conflict issue of customs and bilateral trade (Agreed Conclusions 2011e). According to the agreement, the customs stamps stating ‘Kosovo Customs’, which had been used by Kosovo since the establishment of UNMIK, is to be accepted by all sides. The agreement also preserves the Kosovo government’s right to use its constitutional name, Republic of Kosovo, in sanitary and veterinary documents (Deda and Qosaj-Mustafa 2013, p. 19). However, the mutual acceptance of customs stamps was only a first important step in building a functioning bilateral trade regime. The questions of how and by whom customs shall be collected at the crossing points between North Kosovo and Serbia were only addressed in the second mediation phase, when a final deal could be struck on the collection of customs, duties, and taxes for goods from Serbia entering the northern part of Kosovo (Conclusions of the Chair 2013a). The agreements that gained broad public attention in the first mediation phase were the agreement of December 2011 on integrated border/boundary management (IBM) and the agreement of February 2012 on Kosovo’s regional representation (Bergmann and Niemann 2015, p. 965). The IBM agreement foresaw the establishment of joint Kosovar–Serbian border management points on all crossings between the two territories. Those “joint, integrated, single and secure posts” are to be located “within a ‘common area of IBM crossing points’, jointly delineated, where officials of each party carry out relevant controls” (Agreed Conclusions 2011g, p. 1). The EU pledged to contribute to the implementation of the agreement by funding the necessary facilities and deploying EULEX officials to the respective crossing points (Council of the European Union 2011a). The agreement, however, was rather vague on the practical terms of implementation. The latter could only be sorted out in an additional protocol signed in February 2012. As one interview partner explained, however, what has been achieved should rather be described as ‘co-located border management’ via separated border posts, as the full operation of joint, integrated border posts is “politically not feasible due to Serbia’s unwillingness to recognise Kosovo” (Interview EU 6). In addition, settling on the term IBM—meaning integrated border management to Kosovo officials and integrated administrative boundary management

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to Serbian officials—in the end “allowed the negotiation process to continue, but it could not resolve different views that were not merely semantic” (Bieber 2015, p. 302). For these reasons, the agreements provide only a temporary solution for the issue of border management and is evaluated as a partial settlement of this conflict issue. On Kosovo’s international representation, the so-called Asterisk Agreement provided Kosovo with the possibility to represent itself in regional institutions and no longer be officially represented by UNMIK as a proxy. This was made possible through the use of a nameplate that refers to ‘Kosovo*’ with an asterisk, which points to a footnote that reads: “This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo Declaration of Independence” (Council of the European Union 2012a, p. 1). At least on paper, the agreement provided a settlement of the conflict issue, although Serbia continues to contest Kosovo’s representation in regional and international fora such as UNESCO and Interpol. In sum, the EU successfully brokered a set of agreements between Kosovo and Serbia in the first mediation phase, which fully or partially settled the majority of conflict issues discussed. However, several conflict issues were either not settled or even discussed in the first phase, including Kosovo’s energy supply, telecommunications and Kosovo’s international dialling code, property rights, the preservation of religious and cultural heritage, and the fate of missing persons from the 1998/1999 war (Deda and Qosaj-Mustafa 2013). Several of those conflict issues that were not fully settled in the technical dialogue phase were again presented at the negotiation table in the second mediation phase. Conflict Settlement in the Second Mediation Phase (2012–2014) When the mediation process resumed in October 2012 as a high-level political dialogue, governance issues related to the Serb-majority northern part of Kosovo and its integration into Kosovo’s legal and political framework clearly moved to the top of the mediation agenda. In this mediation phase, High Representative Ashton and her team brokered the First Agreement of Principles Governing the Normalization of Relations, which addressed several conflict issues related to North Kosovo. However, most of those issues are only partially settled through the agreement. Moreover, partial settlements have also been achieved with regard to energy supply and telecommunications. Several of the

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agreements struck in this mediation phase have not been fully implemented as of spring 2019. The First Agreement of Principles Governing the Normalization of Relations of 19 April 2013, which is also known as the ‘Brussels Agreement’, entails 15 provisions that centre on governance issues related to North Kosovo and aim to abolish parallel security and justice structures set by Kosovo Serbs after the 1998/1999 war (Bieber 2015, p. 306). Essentially, it refers to three main issues: (1) the establishment of an association/community of Serb-majority municipalities in Kosovo (provisions 1–6), (2) the integration of police forces in North Kosovo into the Kosovo police (provisions 7–9), (3) the integration of judicial authorities into Kosovo’s legal framework (Brussels Agreement 2013, p. 1). The main points of contention in the Brussels Agreement are the six provisions on the establishment of the association/community of Serbmajority municipalities.8 According to the agreement text, the association/community shall have “full overview of the areas of economic development, education, health, urban and rural planning […] will exercise other additional competences as may be delegated by the central authorities” and “shall have a representative role to the central authorities” (Brussels Agreement 2013, p. 1). The ambiguity of terminologies such as ‘full overview’ and ‘representative role’ has created diverging interpretations as to the association/community’s legal and political competencies (Beysoylu 2018, pp. 9–13). Apart from the association of Serb-majority municipalities, the document stipulates the integration of local Serbian Ministry of Internal Affairs units having operated in North Kosovo since 1999 into the regular Kosovo police force and the establishment of a Kosovo Police Regional Command North (Bjelos and Elek 2014, pp. 5, 7–9). With regard to judicial structures in North Kosovo, the Brussels Agreement foresees the integration of judicial authorities into Kosovo’s legal framework. According to the agreement, the Appellate Court in Pristina establishes a panel composed of a majority of Kosovo Serb judges that is responsible for all matters related to the Kosovo Serb-majority municipalities (Deda and Qosaj-Mustafa 2013, p. 12). Previously established courts in North Kosovo are to be closed and replaced by new courts now operating under Kosovo’s legal framework. Finally, the Brussels Agreement also entails a provision on the exchange of liaison officers between Belgrade and Pristina, thus setting the stage for the initiation

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of bilateral diplomatic relations between the two countries. On 30 May 2013, the parties signed an agreements that specifies the modalities regarding the exchange of liaison officers between Belgrade and Pristina (Conclusions of the Chair 2013b). Taken together, the Brussels Agreement is an important milestone in Kosovo–Serbia relations, but it does not provide a detailed implementation plan and can thus only be judged as a partial settlement with regard to the main issues related to North Kosovo. EU mediation under the lead of High Representative Ashton also focussed on energy supply issues and telecommunications. On 8 September 2013, the conflict parties agreed on the Arrangements regarding Energy that commit both parties to meet “all their obligations under the Energy Community Treaty and to apply the EU energy acquis” (Conclusions of the Chair 2013c, p. 1).9 The agreement calls on the electricity transmission system operators of both sides—Kosovo Electricity Transmission System (KOSTT) and Elektromreza Srbije (EMS)—to sign a bilateral agreement that formally establishes and regulates relations between the two system operators and commits them to becoming a member of the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity (ENTSO-E). The agreement is a first step in settling the various sub-topics related to the issue of energy supply. However, it does not provide clear guidelines for implementation and does not fully settle the conflict over ownership of Kosovo’s energy supply system. Similarly, the Arrangements regarding Telecommunications of 8 September 2013 are primarily a declaration of intent to settle the issue over Kosovo’s international dialling code. In principle, both parties agree that Kosovo “shall be allocated a 3-digit dial code from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) in line with the standards and principles and timetable of the ITU” (Conclusions of the Chair 2013d, p. 1). However, the modalities to achieve this goal are not further specified. In the past, Serbia had blocked any attempts by Kosovo to receive its own country code and suggested granting Kosovo a four-digit dialling code (+3815) similar to Serbia’s country code (+381). The agreement on a three-digit dialling code is a step forward itself, but only partly settles the dispute over this issue due to the open question of how Kosovo shall apply for, and receive, the country code allocated by the ITU.10 In sum, the second mediation phase under the lead of High Representative Ashton was characterised by tackling highly politicised

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and complex issues, in particular with regard to the governance of North Kosovo. The Brussels Agreement has been hailed as “groundbreaking and historic” in this regard (European Commission 2013a, p. 1). However, the analysis demonstrates that the agreement only provides for a partial settlement of the conflict issues, as its ambiguous provisions leave many questions open and have impeded the implementation of the agreement. Therefore, many of the conflict issues addressed in the second mediation phase have been the subject of re-negotiations in the third mediation phase, led by High Representative Mogherini. Conflict Settlement in the Third Mediation Phase (2015–2019) Starting with the first meeting of prime ministers Vucic and Mustafa in February 2015, Mogherini’s round of the EU-mediated BelgradePristina dialogue has primarily centred on the implementation of previously concluded agreements. This has proven to be a challenging task, as most of the agreements brokered by her predecessor had not been (fully) implemented when she took office. Since 2015 the EU mediation team has managed to broker two agreements that settle the conflicts over the integration of North Kosovo police forces and judiciary, and two agreements on energy and telecommunications that make further progress towards the settlement of these issues. However, the parties have not been able to achieve major progress on the establishment of the association of Serb-majority municipalities, and other conflict issues such as missing persons and property rights remain unresolved. EU effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement has thus not exceeded a medium degree. On 26 March 2015, the parties agreed on the integration of the so-called Civil Protection Corps (CPC; in Serbian: Civilna Zastita) into Kosovo’s institutions (Conclusions of the Chair 2015a). Operating in North Kosovo for years, the CPC units have formally been regulated by the Serbian Law on Emergency Situations and are officially tasked with humanitarian affairs and rescue operations. Pristina has perceived them as illegal parallel structures that are serving as the ‘long arm’ of the Serbian government in the north (Hajidari 2015a). Although the agreement does not provide for the integration of all former CPC personnel, it nevertheless constitutes a full settlement to an issue which had for a long time been a major obstacle to North Kosovo’s integration into Kosovo’s legal and political framework (BIG DEAL 2015a, pp. 35–36; Stakic and Bjelos 2015, pp. 16–20). Additionally, interview partners emphasised

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that police integration is one of the main success stories of the BelgradePristina dialogue due to the full implementation of the agreement (Interviews Kosovo 4; OSCE 1; EU 6; USA 1). Similarly, the conflict parties could agree on the implementation of the provisions related to the judiciary in the Brussels Agreement. The February 2015 agreement specifies the ethnic composition of judges and prosecutors in the Mitrovica Basic Court and the division of the Appellate Court in Mitrovica (Hajidari 2015b; Hajidari and Andric 2015). Through this deal, the parties managed to settle one important sub-issue of the whole conflict nexus revolving around the governance of North Kosovo. The implementation of the agreements on energy and telecommunications proved more difficult. The ‘Conclusions of the EU Facilitator on the Implementation of the 2013 Energy Agreement’ of 25 August 2015 complement the agreements on the respective issues signed on 8 September 2013. However, no progress towards a full settlement could be reached, as the foreseen establishment of new power trade and supply companies in Kosovo by the Electric Power Industry in Serbia (EPS) operating in Mitrovica does not resolve the conflict over the ownership of the energy system (Vukojcic 2015). The ‘Telecoms Action Plan’, adopted on 25 August 2015, brings about a solution to the long-standing conflict over Kosovo’s country code. The action plan specifies that Austria will be applying on behalf of Kosovo and Serbia for a three-digit dialling code for Kosovo (+383 or +384) with the ITU. After a certain migration period, during which time the Serbian code will remain functional in the northern Serb-majority municipalities, the dialling code shall be used by all telecommunications operators in Kosovo (Reljic 2015, p. 2). Although the Telecoms Action Plan settles, in principle, the conflict over Kosovo’s country code and telecommunication services, it leaves it to future negotiations to find an agreement on postal services and technical details such as the use of spectrum for GSM and television signal (Telecoms Action Plan 2015, pp. 1–3), and thus can only be considered a partial settlement. The most contested issue remains the foreseen creation of the association of Serb-majority municipalities. The ‘General Principles/Main Elements’ document, signed on 25 August 2015, specifies the legal framework, organisational structure, main competencies, and envisaged funding of the institution (Conclusions of the Chair 2015b, p. 1). In addition, the agreement calls for the establishment of an Assembly,

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a President to represent the association/community, a Council as advisory body, and a Management Board. Although the five-page document represents the first agreement on the main elements of the envisaged institution, it is still full of ambiguity (Krasniqi 2015, p. 1). In particular, it leaves open the fundamental question as to whether the association/ community is only tasked with coordinative functions—which is in line with Kosovo’s constitution—or whether it will also have executive powers, which conflicts with Kosovo’s legal framework (Zeqiri et al. 2016, p. 13). The agreement certainly represents a move forward towards resolving this conflict issue, but it provides only a partial settlement that “has yet to be developed into a detailed statute” for creating the association/community of Serb-majority municipalities (Krasniqi 2015, p. 1). As of spring 2019, the agreement has not been implemented, yet. Taking the three mediation phases together, the degree of EU mediation effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement is medium. Although several conflict issues on the mediation agenda have been fully settled, the empirical results demonstrate that many of the conflict issues remain partially settled or unsettled. In particular, the governance of North Kosovo and its integration into Kosovo’s legal framework continue to be the most contested conflict issues and have negatively affected the overall progress, both with regard to the mediation process and the implementation of concluded agreements. Moreover, the implementation of many agreements has become stuck during the second and third mediation phases, which were both characterised by increasing difficulties in finding compromise agreements between the conflict parties, which is further explored later in the chapter. The EU’s Mediation Objectives What goals has the EU sought to achieve as a mediator between Belgrade and Pristina? The analysis of the various empirical data sources reveals that the EU has pursued two goals related to the process and outcome of the mediation. First, one key EU motivation to initiate the mediation was to bring the parties together in a single negotiation format, thus enabling direct communications between the two sides (Interviews EU_MS 4, 5, 16). The EU has shown a strong interest in keeping the mediation process going and preventing its breakdown. For example, in the period between February and October 2012, when the process became stalled, the EU

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High Representative repeatedly called for resuming the talks “as swiftly as possible” (European External Action Service 2012a).11 In a similar vein, in the period between March 2014 and February 2015, when no high-level talks were held, it was a key EU priority to resume the dialogue (Balkan Insight 2014; European External Actions Service 2014). Second, being aware of the conflict’s potential for escalation in relation to the tense situation in North Kosovo, the EU has perceived the mediation also as a short-term instrument, both to prevent a violent escalation in the North and to enable the EU to quickly address violent incidents in a forum where all relevant parties are present (Interview EU 4; EU_MS 2, 6). Although Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence in 2008 did not lead to major violent incidents, the risk of violent escalation has always been lurking in the background. A major concern of the international community has been a division of territorial control along ethnic lines that could create favourable conditions for violent escalation (Crisis Group 2008, pp. 3, 10), a recurring theme that has flared up again in summer 2018 when both Kosovo and Serbian officials publicly speculated about a possible land swap. Consequently, a core EU goal in the mediation efforts has been to prevent the parties from returning to violent means to achieve their objectives. As one EU official emphasised regarding the first phase of the mediation process, “another objective was to try and prevent the possibility of violence in the North of Kosovo. Actually, the real objective in this regard was to protect the Serbs [in Kosovo]” (Interview EU 4). The EU’s goals concerning the outcome of the mediation process were less clear at the start of the process and have just become more concrete during the course of the mediation (Bieber 2015, p. 297). When the dialogue was initiated, the initial idea on the side of the EU was that the mediation efforts should result in the settlement of issues that would lead to immediate improvements in the living conditions of all people residing in Kosovo, including the Serbian population in North Kosovo (Interviews EU 1, EU_MS 6, 7). By resolving practical issues and removing concrete obstacles to cooperation between Belgrade and Pristina, the EU aimed to deliver tangible results that would build the basis for reaching agreement on more sensitive issues (Visoka and Doyle 2016, pp. 9–10). Interviews with EU officials and representatives of the conflict parties suggest that there was a clear understanding on the side of the EU that issues such as freedom of movement and goods needed to be resolved to facilitate the relations between Belgrade and Pristina

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and to ease the tensions existing between them (Interviews EU 2, EU 4, Serbia 1, Kosovo 4). At a later stage—and in the framework of the high-level political dialogue—the EU then moved to declare the ‘normalisation of relations’ between Kosovo and Serbia as its main goal. In official EU documents, the term ‘normalisation of relations’ first occurs in the Council Conclusions on Enlargement and the Stabilisation and Association Process of December 2012: In this context, this process should gradually result in the normalisation of relations between Serbia and Kosovo with the prospect of both being able to fully exercise their rights and fulfill their responsibilities. (…) the Council urges further progress on this point, including irreversible progress towards delivering structures in northern Kosovo which meet the security and justice needs of the local population in a transparent and cooperative manner, and in a way that ensures the functionality of a single institutional and administrative set up [sic] within Kosovo. (Council of the European Union 2012c, p. 11)

In particular, the document points to the political and legal ‘limbo’ in North Kosovo, where the existence of parallel security and justice structures sponsored by Serbia had led to a de facto detachment of the four northern municipalities from the control of the government in Pristina (Crisis Group 2011a). As one EU official explained, Ultimately, it became clear that the situation in northern Kosovo was the main problem discussed in the talks. In the course of the dialogue process, we recognised that from time to time, in almost every issue, there was some Northern angle to it. Thus, eventually the ultimate objective became to find a settlement for northern Kosovo. (Interview EU 4)

This statement indicates that the EU mediators gradually realised that a solution to the problems in North Kosovo was a key prerequisite to move forward in the mediation efforts. At the same time, it seems that the EU purposively does not define an ‘end state’ of the normalisation of relations in order to adhere to the principle of status neutrality as long as possible. Taken together, improving the lives of the people by resolving practical obstacles to cooperation between Belgrade and Pristina as well as finding a settlement for the governance of North Kosovo have been the main outcome goals the EU has sought to achieve.

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Evaluating EU Goal-Attainment To what extent has the EU achieved its goals as a mediator in the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue? The analysis suggests that EU effectiveness in terms of goal-attainment is medium, particularly concerning the EU’s outcome goals (Table 4.3). Through the establishment of direct lines of communication between the parties in the format of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue over more than seven years, the EU has achieved the goal of committing the parties to the mediation process to a high degree. The initiation of the high-level political dialogue in 2012 demonstrated that both parties have become amenable to the idea of opening diplomatic communication channels at the highest political level: “The fact that high-level officials from Serbia and Kosovo have come together to hold talks and reach consensus about a number of agreements represents a groundbreaking step in Kosovo– Serbia relations” (Group for Legal and Political Studies 2014, p. 1). In a similar vein, interview partners emphasised the significance of this achievement, bearing in mind that before the start of the mediation, “It was impossible to imagine that the two prime ministers officially meet and talk to each other” (Interview Serbia 1; similarly, Interview Kosovo 1, EU 1). Despite several longer-term breaks to the mediation process, the EU has managed to bind the parties to the process. As one Kosovo official put it, one “main achievement is that the dialogue is perceived as something normal, something that is needed” by both sides (Interview Kosovo 7).

Table 4.3  EU goals and degrees of goal-attainment in Belgrade–Pristina dialogue Degree of goal-attainment/ type of goal

High

Medium

Low

Process goals

Keep parties committed to mediation –

Preventing violence

–

Outcome goals

Source Own compilation

Improving lives of people – by resolving practical obstacles in daily life Finding settlement for governance of North Kosovo

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The empirical evidence suggests that the EU’s goal of preventing a violent escalation of the conflict through the mediation initiative has only been achieved to a medium degree. In particular in 2011 and 2012, recurring violent incidents and clashes were reported, with most of them taking place in Mitrovica and other parts of North Kosovo (HIIK 2011, pp. 23–24; 2012, pp. 24–25; 2013, p. 38). Some of the most violent escalations occurred at the border crossings between Serbia and Kosovo as a result of a Kosovar trade boycott of Serbian goods in July 2011, which further increased the tensions between the disputants (Crisis Group 2012, p. 1). Several other incidents of small-scale violence at the border crossings of the two countries occurred, for example, in March 2016 when Kosovo nationalists attacked a Serbian lorry (Amadio Viceré 2018, p. 172). Overall, establishing direct talks between Belgrade and Pristina did not fully remove the risk of violent clashes in the north. However, it is also important to mention that the dispute over customs and border crossings in 2011, which had led to the escalation in the first place, was settled at a later stage of the mediation process through the Agreed Conclusions on Customs Stamps and the agreement on IBM (Agreed Conclusions 2011e, g). Although there were reports about violent incidents between Kosovar authorities and the Serb population in the north in 2014 and 2015, the overall level of violence between Serbs and Kosovo Albanians seems to have further decreased over the years since its peak in 2011 (HIIK 2014, p. 38; 2015, p. 52). This trend can also be attributed to the implementation of agreements reached in the BelgradePristina dialogue, since a functioning travel regime and the integration of police and justice structures in the north into Kosovo’s political and legal system may have contributed to defusing the tensions between the Serb and Albanian populations of Kosovo (BIG DEAL 2015a, pp. 22–24). Nevertheless, the risk of violent escalation is still existent, rendering the prevention of the outbreak of violence a constant challenge for the EU and the conflict parties. Regarding the outcome of the mediation efforts, the EU has sought (1) to resolve practical obstacles to cooperation between Kosovo and Serbia in order to improve the lives of the people, and (2) to find a settlement for the governance of North Kosovo. On both objectives, the EU’s balance sheet in terms of goal-attainment is mixed.

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There has been progress in improving the living conditions, which is primarily related to the freedom of movement of people and goods. When the implementation of the freedom of movement agreement started in May 2013, “the situation improved tremendously” (BIG DEAL 2015b, p. 25) because the new travel regime in place allows Kosovo citizens to travel with their Kosovo ID cards through Serbia. In addition, the costs of travelling by car from Kosovo to Serbia have been significantly reduced. A 2015 report on the state of play of the implementation of the Belgrade-Pristina agreements concludes: “The situation is much better today, especially after removing the exorbitant insurance fees” (BIG DEAL 2015b, p. 25). Nevertheless, little progress has been made on several other issues (BIG DEAL 2014, p. 39). The implementation of agreements on cadastral records, the recognition of university diplomas, as well as telecommunications and energy has been very slow. Concerning the settlement of the set of conflict issues revolving around the governance of North Kosovo, the analysis above demonstrated that the association/community of Serb-majority municipalities remains the main point of contention, and an agreement on the full settlement of this issue has not been achieved, yet. In sum, out of the four goals identified—two relating to the mediation process and two aiming at the mediation outcome—three have been attained to a medium degree and one to a high degree. Although the EU has managed to keep the parties committed to the mediation efforts and encouraged their return to the negotiation table despite various breaks in the negotiations, the goal of preventing outbreaks of violence through the mediation initiative has not been fully attained. The two outcome goals—settling issues that improve the lives of the people and finding a settlement for the governance of North Kosovo—have also been only partially attained.

4.3  Conditions of EU Mediation Effectiveness in the Belgrade–Pristina Dialogue To explain these findings, I investigate the influence of five conditions on EU mediation effectiveness: (1) mediator leverage, (2) mediation strategy, (3) EU policy coherence, (4) conflict parties’ willingness to compromise, and (5) their internal cohesiveness.

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Leverage The degree of the EU’s leverage is relatively high in the case of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue. Both Kosovo and Serbia are part of the Western Balkans, a region in which all countries have been offered the prospect of EU accession by the Thessaloniki European Council Conclusions in June 2003 (European Council 2003). It is this prospect of EU membership that provides the EU with great leverage visà-vis the two conflict parties (Interviews EU 4, EU_MS 2, 6, 9, 11). By gradually bringing Kosovo and Serbia closer towards EU membership in the context of the Stabilisation and Association Process, the EU has established a powerful instrument to apply conditionality vis-à-vis both sides. Certainly, in the case of Serbia, EU association had moved forward a bit faster in the period between 2003 and the start of the mediation process in 2011 compared to Kosovo. Important milestones were the signing of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement in 2008 and the lifting of visa requirements for Serbs travelling to Schengen countries (Kostovicova 2014, pp. 72–74; Tannam 2013, pp. 951–954). Through the Instrument of Pre-accession Assistance, the EU has provided financial assistance to Serbia for approximately €170 million per year (European Court of Auditors 2014, p. 5). As regards Kosovo, the pending status issue prevented it from being eligible for a long time both for signing an SAA and being granted EU membership (Economides and Ker-Lindsay 2010, p. 506). To enable Kosovo to participate in the SAP, the EU introduced a Stabilisation Tracking Mechanism for Kosovo in 2002. The mechanism was established “to orient Kosovo’s policy in line with the acquis” (Hamilton and Merja 2013, p. 5), circumventing the issue that it was not possible to enter into any contractual relations with Kosovo (Krasniqi and Musaj 2015, p. 145). Since then, the EU’s Kosovo policy has followed the mantra of “diversity on recognition, but unity in engagement” (van Elsuwege 2017, p. 398). The latest example of this is the 2016 SAA with Kosovo, which was signed as an EU-only agreement, circumventing the necessary ratification by individual EU member states that have not recognised Kosovo. The fact that the SAA with Kosovo does not provide a clear EU membership prospect—in contrast to the SAA with Serbia, which clearly recognises the country as a potential EU membership candidate—is another indication that Kosovo’s path towards the EU is less certain.

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Nevertheless, moving forward on their path towards European integration is an equally strong priority of the governments of both countries, which provides the EU with considerable leverage (Interviews Serbia 1, 4; Kosovo 4, 6, 8). As an EU official summarised, “Enlargement is the big pull factor, is the big carrot. They [Kosovo and Serbia] want to join the club […] they do not want to be outside, because they know in the long term, they will be worse off” (Interview EU 1). EU Leverage and Mediation Effectiveness The EU possesses strong leverage towards Serbia and Kosovo, which is both a function of the its enlargement policy and the parties’ aspiration of EU membership. This leverage provides the EU with favourable conditions to move the parties towards agreement in settling their conflict. It also allows the EU great flexibility concerning the use of different mediation strategies and the necessary resources to sustain the effort over a longer time-scale. The fact that the EU has been successful in committing the parties to the mediation effort over a period of more than seven years also points to the importance of EU leverage. The evidence supports the argument that leverage is an important precondition for effective EU mediation, but whether it translates into mediation effectiveness depends on to what extent and how the EU makes use of it. Thus, the next section turns to mediation strategy to determine how the EU’s leverage influenced its mediation behaviour and thus its effectiveness. Analysing the EU’s Mediation Strategy: Formulation and ‘Manipulation’ at Play EU policy-makers describe their efforts to mediate between Kosovo and Serbia as ‘facilitation’ and ‘dialogue’ and avoid using the terms ‘mediation’ and ‘negotiations’.12 Throughout the different phases of the mediation process, EU officials kept up the official terminology of ‘EU-facilitated dialogue’ (European External Action Service 2015a; European Union 2011b, 2013). Although the EU’s mediation strategy has indeed reflected patterns of facilitation, it has also included elements and tactics that go beyond facilitation and suggest a mediation strategy of formulation and manipulation.

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To start with, particularly in the technical dialogue phase, the EU applied several facilitative tactics. The EU, as initiator of the mediation efforts, made initial contact with the parties and sorted out what their interests and preferences were concerning the substance of the talks. Even before starting negotiations, Robert Cooper travelled several times to Belgrade and Pristina and asked the parties to draw up a list of issues they wanted to discuss (Interviews EU 4, Kosovo 4). In the high-level dialogue phase, High Representative Ashton arranged several informal meetings between the two prime ministers alongside the formal rounds of talks to increase the mutual interaction and provide them an opportunity to openly exchange their positions and views (Interviews EU 4). By reducing the transaction costs of information exchange between the disputants, the EU contributed to the revelation of information—a key element of a facilitative mediation approach (Beardsley 2011, pp. 102–103). Apart from these facilitative elements, however, there is substantial evidence for the claim that the EU’s mediation strategy can be best described as ‘manipulation’, including strong elements of formulation. Beginning with patterns that correspond to tactics of a strategy of formulation first, one key observation is that the EU mediation team took up a strong organisational role. It chose the site of the meetings and controlled their pace and formality. The technical dialogue talks were deliberately organised in a rather low-key setting, choosing Cooper’s office in the EEAS building as a meeting room for the sessions with all parties. The rationale behind choosing this site was to provide a rather informal setting and to “create an atmosphere that was less of an incentive for people to make speeches” (Interview EU 4). In a similar informal fashion, the meetings between the two prime ministers and the High Representative were held in a smaller-sized conference room in the EEAS building (European External Action Service 2012b). Second, the EU has played a strong role in structuring the mediation process. Apart from the plenary sessions chaired by Cooper or the High Representative in the respective mediation phases, each meeting on the working group level has been chaired by an EU official. For example, the working group on the Mitrovica Bridge had been chaired by the EUSR Samuel Zbogar in Kosovo, the one on the implementation of the IBM agreement by senior EULEX official Bernd Thran and the working groups on energy and telecommunications by European Commission officials (European External Action Service 2015b; Interviews EU 1, Kosovo 4).

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The EU chairs have held important agenda-setting powers. Obviously, setting the agenda without taking the conflict parties’ preferences into account would have made little sense (Interview Kosovo 4). Nevertheless, EU mediators have had a certain degree of room for manoeuvre in determining the issues under discussion, in particular in the first mediation phase: “It was not that this was a real kind of authoritarian power, but nevertheless it was probably better to have it” (Interview EU 4). Another example of agenda-setting is High Representative Ashton having presented the two sides with a list of issues to be addressed in a high-level political dialogue in an attempt to revive the negotiations between the parties (Interview Serbia 1; Crisis Group 2013, p. 2). The competence of drawing up the agenda is a typical characteristic of a strategy of formulation through which the mediator seeks to simplify the agenda by eliminating, limiting or combining issues (Beardsley et al. 2006, pp. 63–64). Third, another key feature of a strategy of formulation is the mediator’s attempt to make substantial suggestions for concessions and potential compromises, thus formulating alternatives to settle the conflict (Touval and Zartman 1985, p. 12). In principle, EU officials have been rather reluctant to speak about how they substantially contributed to the negotiations (Interviews EU 1, 2, 4). However, there is clear evidence that EU officials—at certain stages—went beyond facilitation and acted as “an active mediator and initiator of concrete agreements reached within the dialogue process, seeking compromises, and proposed solutions” (Interview Serbia 1; similarly, Serbia 4, Kosovo 1, 8; EU_MS 7, 9; UN 1). For example, when discussing integrated border management, the EU mediation team made proposals on the arrangements for the joint management of their border, drawing also on experiences from handling integrated border management between Hungary and Austria before Hungary’s accession to the Schengen area (Interview EU 4, 6). Moreover, on some technical issues discussed in the working groups, EU officials proposed concrete solutions and drafted agreements: In some instances, the EU also assumed the role of a formulator, and made some proposals for agreement. For example, the agreement on vehicle assurances was an EU proposal. And also the agreement on telecommunications was based on an EU proposal. (Interview Serbia 4)

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Yet, the most important feature of the EU’s mediation strategy has been the creation of a strong incentive structure for the parties to make concessions by linking the disputants’ EU membership prospects to the mediation process (Bergmann and Niemann 2015, p. 967). In other words, the EU has drawn on its leverage to move the parties towards making concessions and achieving agreements, a core characteristic of a strategy of ‘manipulation’. From the beginning of the effort, the mediation process has been linked to EU enlargement policy (Bieber 2015, p. 299). Incorporating the long-term goal of “achieving progress on the path to Europe” formulated by UN General Assembly resolution 64/298, the EU publicly signalled its intention to situate its efforts in the dialogue within the broader context of EU enlargement policy (United Nations General Assembly 2010, p. 2). After the first agreements had been reached between Belgrade and Pristina, the European Commission issued its ‘Opinion on Serbia’s application for Membership of the European Union’ (European Commission 2011). In this document, progress in the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue was made a key condition for further integrative steps in relation to Serbia. The document explicitly states that the Commission therefore recommends that negotiations for accession to the European Union should be opened with Serbia as soon as it achieves further significant progress in meeting the following key priority: - Further steps to normalise relations with Kosovo in line with the conditions of the Stabilisation and Association Process by: fully respecting the principles of inclusive regional cooperation; fully respecting the provisions of the Energy Community Treaty; finding solutions for telecommunications and mutual acceptance of diplomas; by continuing to implement in good faith all agreements reached; and by cooperating actively with EULEX in order for it to exercise its functions in all parts of Kosovo. (European Commission 2011, p. 12, emphasis added)

From this point on, making Serbia’s and Kosovo’s EU accession conditional upon progress in the mediation process has been a key element of all EU documents related to the two countries.13 The EU has gradually strengthened the link between the accession process and the EU’s mediation efforts, leading to its formal incorporation into the accession negotiations with Serbia. The EU’s ‘Opening Statement for Accession Negotiations with Serbia’, adopted on 9 January

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2014, lists five categories of requirements for Serbia to meet in preparing for accession, one of them directly referring to the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue and calling for a “visible and sustainable improvement in relations with Kosovo*” (European Union 2014, p. 10). The document envisions that the mediation process should lead to the comprehensive normalisation of relations between Serbia and Kosovo “in the form of a legally binding agreement by the end of Serbia’s accession negotiations” (European Union 2014, p. 10).14 Moreover, the EU addresses the issue of Kosovo–Serbia relations in Chapter 35, “Other issues” (European Union 2014, p. 11). The European Union Common Position in this chapter adopted in November 2015 reiterates the EU’s demand for acting in good faith concerning the normalisation of relations with Kosovo and implementing all the previously concluded agreements. Stating that the chapter is not intended to replace the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue but rather provide the link between this effort and the accession process, the document even more strongly emphasises the conditionality implied with this linkage: If “progress in the normalisation of relations with Kosovo significantly lags behind progress in the negotiations overall, due to Serbia failing to act in good faith, in particular in the implementation of agreements reached between Serbia and Kosovo”, the Commission will on its own initiative or on the request of one third of the Member States, in accordance with point 25 of the negotiating framework, propose to withhold its recommendations to open and/or close other negotiating chapters, and adapt the associated preparatory work, as appropriate, until this imbalance is addressed. (European Union 2015, p. 3, original emphasis)

By including this provision in Chapter 35, the EU cemented the link between the mediation efforts and the accession process, making progress on all other issues conditional upon progress in the Belgrade– Pristina dialogue and the implementation of achieved agreements. Concerning the latter, the document defines specific interim benchmarks on a wide range of conflict issues that have to be met by Serbia (European Union 2015, pp. 4–8). The fact that the EU has purposefully used enlargement policy both as an incentive and reward for concessions made in the mediation framework is also apparent if one looks at the parallel sequence of steps in

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both processes. On a regular basis, EU decisions to move to the next stage of the parties’ accession process have followed the signing of agreements in the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue. For example, the ‘Commission Opinion on Serbia’s application for Membership of the European Union’ was issued only a month after the first agreements had been signed in the framework of the technical dialogue (European Commission 2011). Against the background of the tense security situation in northern Kosovo, the European Council postponed the decision on granting Serbia candidate status in December 2011, allegedly due to the opposition of Germany and other countries such as Austria, the Netherlands, Poland and the United Kingdom (Hamilton 2012, p. 20; Tannam 2013, p. 968; Vutz 2011, p. 2). Moreover, the ‘Council Conclusions on Enlargement and the Stabilisation and Association Process’ of 5 December 2011 emphasises that “the Council expects Serbia to address the question of regional cooperation” in the dialogue (Council of the European Union 2011b, pp. 11–12). The conclusion of the agreement on regional representation of 24 February 2012 meant that the parties had met an important condition set out by the Council in December 2011. Four days later, the Council recommended granting candidacy status to Serbia and welcomed the launch of a feasibility study on an SAA between the EU and Kosovo (Council of the European Union 2012b). Two days later, the European Council adopted these decisions and granted Serbia candidacy status (European Council 2012, p. 14). In a similar way, the First Agreement of Principles Governing the Normalization of Relations of 19 April 2013 was followed by joint reports from the European Commission and the High Representative three days later. The report on Serbia’s progress on meeting EU membership criteria recommended opening accession negotiations with Serbia (European Commission 2013b). The ‘Report on Kosovo’s Progress in Addressing Issues Set Out in the Council Conclusions of December 2012 in View of a Possible Decision on the Opening of Negotiations on the Stabilisation and Association Agreement’ concluded that “Kosovo has engaged seriously and constructively in taking steps towards a visible and sustainable improvement of relations with Serbia” (European Commission 2013c, p. 11). As a result, the Commission submitted a recommendation to the Council to open SAA negotiations with Kosovo (European Commission 2013d).

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The finalisation of the SAA negotiations were, again, a response to achievements in the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue. When the parties struck the August 2015 agreements on freedom of movement over the Mitrovica Bridge, energy, telecoms, and the status of Serb-majority municipalities in Kosovo, High Representative Mogherini praised them as “landmark achievements” that would “enable both sides to advance on their European path” (EEAS 2015a, p. 1). In October 2015, the SAA with Kosovo was officially signed. Two months later in December 2015, the first negotiation rounds with Serbia were opened (van Elsuwege 2017, p. 399). In sum, the mediation behaviour of the EU mediation team in all three phases of the effort has predominantly reflected a strategy of formulation, though sometimes it has edged towards manipulation. However, the context of the enlargement policy in which the EU has placed the mediation efforts constitutes an important incentive structure from which the EU has actively drawn to move the parties towards agreement. Taking these two aspects together, the EU’s overall mediation approach can justifiably be categorised as ‘manipulation’. EU Mediation Strategy and Mediation Effectiveness The EU has made extensive use of its leverage, which has allowed it both to keep some degree of flexibility in its mediation role and “to pull the strings if necessary” (Interview Kosovo 1; similarly, EU 1, 5, 6). The EU’s mediation approach has been a key factor in moving the conflict parties towards agreeing on compromise solutions for many of their conflict issues. The active formulation role, coupled with the strong use of conditionality, has been decisive for achieving agreement on several conflict issues. According to a Kosovo official, It is not that we were put directly under pressure by the EU, but let’s say the EU became more active on certain occasions, especially prior to June and December Council meetings. It was communicated to us that we have to deliver something for these Council meetings in order to move forward on the path towards European integration. (Interviews Kosovo 4; similarly, Kosovo 2)

A similar kind of argument has also been made on the side of the EU, as a statement by an EU official illustrates:

138  J. BERGMANN Even if we should not fully overplay the EU perspective in all of that, actually at each step it was our leverage which helped the parties. It is not that it is as a miracle to make them decide, but it helped them to focus and put the different arguments on the table, and then finally make a choice. (Interview EU 5)

Formulation and manipulation were also important to attain the goal of brokering a (partial) settlement of the conflict over the governance of North Kosovo. Indeed, a key element of the EU’s mediation approach was to commit the parties to signing agreements in the first place, even if these agreements were formulated in a rather vague way. This strategy of ‘creative ambiguity’, however, focussed primarily on hammering out formal agreements and less so on their implementation (Bieber 2015, pp. 313–315; Reljic 2015, p. 1). Only when there was a growing realisation that the implementation of agreements would not come about on its own did the EU increasingly begin to include progress on implementation into its conditionality strategy, as the opening of accession negotiations with Serbia demonstrated (European Union 2015, p. 3). EU Policy Coherence: Divided over Status, United in Mediation Support Despite the EU member states’ disagreement over Kosovo’s status, the EU managed to hammer out a common position on Serbia’s draft UN resolution in summer 2010 after the ICJ issued its advisory opinion on Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence. According to Robert Cooper, there were “two difficult debates in the EU Political and Security Committee, lasting about eight hours in total” (Cooper 2015, p. 1). The EU’s common position that emerged was the 22 July 2010 declaration made by High Representative Ashton, announcing the EU’s readiness to initiate a negotiation process between Kosovo and Serbia (European Union 2010). The High Representative had played a crucial role in crafting the EU’s decision to initiate the mediation process (Bergmann and Niemann 2018, p. 432). The consensus of the 28 member states for supporting the dialogue has been kept, so far, throughout the different phases of this process (see Amadio Viceré 2016, pp. 561–566). All EU member states, including the five non-recognisers, have welcomed and supported the mediation efforts by the EEAS and the High Representative—a perception that

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is shared equally by EU institutions, the member states, and external observers (Interview EU 4, 5; EU_MS 1, 3, 9, 13, 14; Serbia 1; CS 6). According to a European Commission official, there is a broad consensus “on accepting that there is a link between the accession negotiations and the normalisation process” which is itself an achievement, given that some years ago, you would have had long philosophical discussions with a number of the five non-recognisers about the nature of the dialogue process and also on this link to enlargement policy. And this is over now. The dialogue is now just seen as a necessity by all member states. (Interview EU 5)

Hence, the EU initiated the mediation efforts by building on a collectively decided common position. The mediating institutions (EEAS/ High Representative/Commission) could be assured that they had the member states’ principle support for their efforts to broker agreements between Kosovo and Serbia. To what extent have the EU member states themselves been actively supportive in the conduct and management of the mediation process? In general, EU member states have not been participating in the meetings of the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue. They have been briefed about the progress of the EU-mediated talks on a regular basis, primarily in the Political and Security Committee and COWEB,15 but also in regular meetings of ambassadors with the EU Special Representative in Kosovo and the head of the EU delegation in Belgrade (Interviews EU 4, EU_ MS 1, 6, 9, 10). However, the analysis reveals some tensions between the member states because of the asymmetry of information available to them. Representatives of small member states seem to have been less informed about the substance and progress of the mediation efforts (Interviews EU_MS 1, 4, 6). Apart from the PSC and COWEB as the main EU-internal coordination platforms on the Kosovo–Serbia issue, there is the informal ‘Quint’ group. Four EU member states (Germany, UK, France, Italy)—sometimes called ‘the Big Four’ (Gegout 2002, p. 331)—together with the United States, form the ‘Quint’, a loose and informal intergovernmental cooperation platform with regard to the Western Balkans. The Quint group has its roots in the former UN Contact Group on Kosovo, but it does not include Russia, which had been a previous member of the UN Contact Group (Gegout 2002, p. 335). Although the Quint is an

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informal institution outside the EU’s political system, the evidence suggests that it has played an important role in the dialogue concerning coordination with the United States. There have been regular meetings of the Quint ambassadors, both in Belgrade and Pristina, in which the progress of mediation has been discussed (Interviews EU_MS 4, 5, 9, 10, 11). Most of the coordination with the United States on the Kosovo–Serbia issue has been done within the Quint framework (Interviews EU_MS 2, 11, 16). However, the Quint platform has also been met with a certain degree of scepticism by several EU member states that see it “as an institution of the past” (Interview EU_MS 9) and as an obstacle to genuine EU coordination with the United States (Interviews EU_MS 6, 8, 9). The critique of the Quint framework notwithstanding, it has not negatively influenced the degree of coordination between the EU mediation team and EU member states. Interview partners reported about close coordination between the High Representative/EEAS and the four EU members of the Quint group (Interviews EU 4, EU_MS 5, 11, 16), which has presumably led to a higher degree of information being provided to these member states. A particularly prominent role in supporting the EU’s mediation efforts has been played by Germany (Bassuener and Weber 2013, p. 7; Lehne 2012, pp. 6–7). When Chancellor Angela Merkel visited Belgrade in August 2011, she surprised many, both in the EU and on the side of the conflict parties, by making the dismantling of parallel structures in North Kosovo an additional condition of Germany’s agreement to grant Serbia candidate status (Bassuener and Weber 2013, p. 1; Vutz 2011, p. 3). The credibility of Germany’s demand for progress in the dialogue negotiations and the implementation of agreements was underscored by the German Bundestag resolution of 26 June 2013, which called on the German government to make its approval to the start of accession negotiations with Serbia in the European Council conditional on Serbia’s full implementation of the April 2013 agreement (Deutscher Bundestag 2013; Interviews EU_MS 3, 4). The individual Quint members’ efforts to move the conflict parties towards agreement have been of a complementary and supportive nature and well-coordinated with the High Representative and the EEAS (Interviews EU 4, EU_MS 2, 11, 16). In addition to the efforts of the Quint, a few other member states, such as Austria and the Netherlands, have also been actively engaged in supporting the EU’s mediation efforts

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(Interviews EU_MS 5, 13; Serbia 4). For example, Austria played an important role in the negotiations on the issue of telecommunications, as it offered to apply on behalf of Kosovo for a Kosovo country code with the ITU. In fact, this offer built the main basis for the compromise in August 2015 on an issue that had been under discussion for four years (Interview Serbia 4). In sum, the degree of coordination between EU member states and EU institutions on the EU-mediated talks between Belgrade and Pristina has been relatively high. Despite the divide among EU member states about the recognition of Kosovo’s independence, “the lack of recognition of Kosovo by five member states has not prevented the EU generating a relatively consistent policy aimed at stabilising the area” (Amadio Viceré 2016, p. 566). The findings on horizontal coherence are in line with this conclusion. Coordination between the different EU institutions involved in the mediation efforts has been intense, particularly between the High Representative and the EEAS, the European Commission, and EULEX. In all three phases of the mediation, the EU’s efforts have been primarily organised by the EEAS and led by the High Representative in the highlevel political dialogue. The High Representative and the EEAS have been the main EU institutions responsible for hosting, chairing, and coordinating the negotiations (Interviews EU 1, 4; EU_MS 4, 5, 6, 9). In addition, European Commission officials have been an incremental part of the EU mediation team. In the technical dialogue, there was always one DG Enlargement representative who was present in the meetings and co-chaired them (Interview EU 1, 4).16 The contributions by representatives of DG Enlargement or other Directorate-Generals to the mediation process very much depended on the topic under discussion. As one Interview partner stressed, on issues such as telecommunications and energy, for example, The Commission was 90 per cent involved. In one instance, a Commission official sat together with the parties, explaining, “This is the acquis, this is required on the Energy Community Treaty, etc.” On issues such as civil registry and cadasters, where there is little acquis, it was the EEAS doing the job. So we worked very much together. (Interview EU 1)

To prepare the technical dialogue meetings and to ensure coordination, EEAS and Commission officials have held weekly meetings (Interview

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EU 1, 4). The coordination between the EEAS and the Commission was “on a different level” compared to the relationship with other actors involved in the negotiations (Interview EU 4; Tannam 2013, p. 963). In addition, there has been close coordination between the EU mediation team and EULEX. EULEX officials have been participating in the negotiations and chairing the working groups on civil registry and IBM (Interview EU 4, EU 6). Furthermore, EULEX has played a key role in the implementation of agreements. In particular, it has certified more than 12,000 copies of civil registry books, assisted the Serbian and Kosovo governments in setting up six crossing points, and facilitated the integration of the Civil Protection Corps into Kosovo’s security structures (EULEX 2015, pp. 1–2). Thus, in terms of horizontal coherence, the evidence suggests that there has been a high degree of coordination between the different EU institutions involved in organising and conducting the EU’s mediation efforts. EU Coherence and Mediation Effectiveness The empirical results suggest a high degree of vertical and horizontal coherence concerning the EU’s mediation role, which has sent a clear signal to the parties that the EU is very much committed to helping them resolve their conflict (Interview Serbia 2, 4; Kosovo 1, 4). Despite the EU’s internal division on the issue of Kosovo’s international status, EU member states have managed to create consensus on the position that the EU’s mediation efforts must be supported and linked with the accession process. Thus, they have reinforced the general agreement of the 2003 European Council in Thessaloniki that the Western Balkans should be part of the European Union in the near to medium-term future (European Council 2003). The delegation of competence to the High Representative and the EEAS to mediate between Belgrade and Pristina is a clear expression “of their general alignment of preferences regarding the normalisation of ties between Kosovo and Serbia” (Amadio Viceré 2018, p. 16). Moreover, individual member states have further backed up the EU’s mediation efforts and strengthened the EU’s conditionality policy vis-à-vis the two disputants. In addition, the high degree of horizontal coherence has proven decisive for exploiting the technical expertise that EU institutions have on many of the issues discussed in the dialogue (Amadio Viceré 2018, p. 153). As a senior Kosovo official remembers,

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Every time we had some impasse or moments where we could not move further to achieve something, we looked at what are the EU’s standards and solutions for the particular issue, and that enabled us in the end to find a solution. (Interview Kosovo 8)

Taken together, a high degree of coherence has sent a strong signal of determination concerning the mediator’s commitment to helping the warring parties settle their conflict and has not left much room for interpretation about the mediator’s preferences. It has also facilitated the mobilisation of the EU’s resources, which can be drawn upon to move the parties towards agreement. Serbia’s Willingness to Compromise: Between Red Lines and European Aspirations The cornerstone of Serbia’s policy vis-à-vis Kosovo has been the rejection of Kosovo’s independence, a firm stance that has been defended publicly by all governments of Serbia since Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence in 2008. From the perspective of the Serbian government, Kosovo’s status is an open question that still must be resolved through “a mutually acceptable compromise, not an imposed outcome where one side gets everything it has ever wanted, and the other side gets nothing” (Tadic 2011, p. 8). Although the election of Boris Tadic as president of the Republic of Serbia in 2008 marked a shift in Serbia’s foreign policy towards a stronger pro-European orientation, the Serbian government continued to rely on the narrative that Kosovo was an incremental part of the territory of the Republic of Serbia (Subotić 2016, p. 11). Nevertheless, since the beginning of the EU-mediated negotiations with Pristina, the Serbian government has gradually abandoned the claim of effective territorial control over Kosovo (Subotić 2016, p. 13).17 In turn, Serbia’s foreign policy has shifted away from the goal of re-establishing effective control over the whole territory of Kosovo towards the objective of minimising the interference of Pristina in North Kosovo, which is populated by a Serb majority (Crisis Group 2012, p. 8; Lehne 2012, p. 9). When Tadic and his Democratic Party lost the elections in 2012 and a new government was formed by the nationalist Serbian Progressive Party and the Socialist Party of Serbia, observers assumed that Serbia would return to its traditional stance towards Kosovo (Crisis Group 2013,

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p. 8). However, the platform for talks with Pristina that was presented by the Serbian government in January 2013—and subsequently adopted by the National Assembly of Serbia—endorsed the path entered by the previous government (Armakolas and Maksimovic 2013, p. 1). More specifically, the platform calls for the creation of an autonomous community of the Serb majority municipalities in Kosovo that would enjoy broad self-governing powers within Kosovo’s legal framework (Crisis Group 2013, pp. 8–9). In other words, the core of the strategy is to establish an autonomous entity formed by all Serb-majority municipalities throughout Kosovo that is incorporated into Kosovo’s legal system. At the same time, the strategy is intended to reduce the level of Pristina’s control over Kosovo Serbs to a minimum. Although Serbia has modified its approach towards the governance of North Kosovo, non-recognition remains a firm red line that Belgrade defends in the talks. According to some observers, the opposition against recognition has even hardened (Crisis Group 2013, p. 10). Economides and Ker-Lindsay (2015) find “no evidence to suggest that Serbian decision-makers had simply accepted the loss of Kosovo for the sake of being more European. Quite the contrary, even now most appear to believe that ‘Kosovo is Serbia’” (2015, p. 1038). Thus, the Serbian government is walking on a thin line between remaining firm when it comes to the rejection of Kosovo’s independence and achieving progress in the negotiations with Pristina (Interview Serbia 1). However, despite Belgrade’s firm line on the issue of recognition, the Serbian government has been willing to participate in the talks and has made several concessions vis-à-vis Pristina in the negotiations. It has also cooperated on the implementation of some agreements such as civil registry, customs stamps, and integrated border management. These concessions have occurred even despite the fact that the status quo in Kosovo prior to the initiation of EU mediation largely suited Belgrade’s interests (Malazogu and Bieber 2012, p. 36). How can these concessions be explained? Serbia’s willingness to compromise is primarily related to incentives external to the substance of the mediation process. The Serbian government’s main motive to participate in the talks and to reach compromise agreements with Pristina is the expected benefit of becoming a member state of the European Union in the near to medium-term future. A Serbian official openly notes that, “EU accession is our strategic goal and that is why we participate in this dialogue” (Interview Serbia 4). In fact, Serbian governments since 2008 have publicly declared that EU accession is their top priority and number

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one strategic goal. Serbian government officials have realised that normalising relations with Pristina is key to moving forward towards EU membership (Interview Serbia 4; Economides and Ker-Lindsay 2015, pp. 1036–1039). Apart from political reasons for aspiring to EU membership, economic motives are another important driver behind the Serbian government’s willingness to make concessions in the mediation process (Interviews Serbia 1; CS 8). Serbian officials have repeatedly stated that they perceive the EU as being the key driving force behind national economic growth. To understand the context of Serbia’s economic motives, it is important to acknowledge that EU mediation between Belgrade and Pristina was initiated at a time when Serbia was facing a significant economic downturn (Economides and Ker-Lindsay 2015, p. 1036). According to the World Bank’s overview of Serbia’s economic situation, the international financial crisis “led to a 50% spike in poverty and a similar jump in unemployment in the country” (World Bank 2013, p. 1). The difficult economic situation in Serbia has immensely increased the desire for joining the EU as soon as possible. In sum, the Serbian government’s willingness to compromise is primarily a function of the expected political and economic gains derived from EU accession in return for making concessions to normalise relations with Pristina. Concerning the substance of the negotiations, there are few immediate gains Belgrade can hope to achieve, aside from solidifying its influence on Serb-majority communities throughout Kosovo via the creation of the Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities. The Serbian government’s willingness to compromise has its limits when it comes to possible solutions that would imply recognition of Kosovo’s independence. The rejection of Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence remains Belgrade’s red line, and domestic opposition against the recognition of Kosovo seems to have increased in the past few years, as is to be explored later in the chapter. Thus, Belgrade is willing to compromise, but only if the concessions made fall within the parameters defined by its non-recognition policy. Analysing Kosovo’s Willingness to Compromise: Preserving Independence, Moving Closer Towards the EU The cornerstone of the Kosovo government’s approach towards the EU-mediated negotiations with Belgrade has been the understanding that these talks are negotiations between two independent and

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sovereign states to establish good neighbourly relations (Assembly of the Republic of Kosovo 2011, p. 1). Consequently, the territorial and constitutional integrity of Kosovo are non-negotiable for Pristina. In its ‘Resolution for Dialogue between Republic of Kosovo and Republic of Serbia’, adopted on 10 March 2011, the Assembly of Kosovo provides the government with a mandate to negotiate with Belgrade, stating firmly that the negotiation agenda “shall include only technical issues of a common interest, without touching at any moment Kosovo’s sovereignty, subjectivity, territorial integrity and internal constitutional arrangements of Kosovo” (Assembly of the Republic of Kosovo 2011, p. 1; emphasis added). To the Kosovo government, the country’s constitution and the Comprehensive Proposal for the Kosovo Status Settlement, proposed by UN special envoy Martti Ahtisaari in 2007, provide the framework in which agreements with Belgrade are legally possible (Interview Kosovo 8). The 2012 ‘Resolution on Normalization of Relationships Between Republic of Kosovo and Republic of Serbia’, adopted by the Assembly of Kosovo, defines three main goals: normalisation of relations between the parties, “improvement of citizens’ lives, and advancing the European agenda for two states and the region” (Assembly of the Republic of Kosovo 2012, p. 1). Apart from these officially stated goals, another key objective of the Kosovo government has been to fully integrate the northern, Serb-majority municipalities into Kosovo’s political and legal framework (Baliqi 2013, p. 7; Interviews Kosovo 1, 4, 8). Although few Kosovo government officials seem to somewhat accept that there is a link between the Serbian government and the Serb-majority municipalities, they fear that the establishment of an autonomous Serbian institution within Kosovo’s territory with executive and legislative powers would severely undermine and put into question Kosovo’s constitution. The situation in the north of Kosovo with Serbian interference in domestic politics has been a constant and uncomfortable thorn in the side of Kosovo’s government. Consequently, establishing full control over the whole territory of Kosovo would be a major gain for Pristina. However, even more important to Kosovo’s government are the expected gains that are external to the negotiation process. Similar to the motives on the side of Serbia, advancing on its path towards EU membership is a top priority of the government of Kosovo: “Kosovo has a clear prospect of joining the EU and this remains the highest priority of the Government. Obtaining EU membership in a shortest possible time period is the conviction and

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orientation of the citizens of Kosovo” (Government of the Republic of Kosovo 2011, p. 3). Being fully aware that the European perspective on Kosovo is less straight forward than it is for Serbia due to Kosovo’s disputed status, Kosovo officials have stated that the short-term goal for Kosovo is to gain visa liberalisation and a Stabilisation and Association Agreement, with the latter objective having been accomplished in October 2015 (Interview Kosovo 1, 2). Kosovo government officials are also well aware that the recognition of Kosovo’s independence by all EU member states is a precondition for being provided with a precise timeline for joining the EU (Interview Kosovo 1, 4). Increasing the number of states that have recognised Kosovo’s independence has been a key objective of Kosovo’s foreign policy since the unilateral declaration of independence in 2008 (Hoxhaj 2014; Visoka 2017). In addition, gaining membership in international and regional organizations is a key objective that is, at least implicitly, also being pursued in the framework of the mediation effort (Interview Kosovo 4). Although UN membership is the ultimate goal, Kosovo has sought to increase the number of its memberships in regional organisations and to overcome Belgrade’s resistance against Kosovo’s participation in these organisations (Crisis Group 2013, p. 6). In sum, there are three major benefits that the Kosovo government expects to gain in the mediation process: (1) full control over the whole territory of Kosovo and integrating the north into its political and legal framework; (2) increased access to regional and international organisations and being recognised by a growing number of states; (3) contractual relations with the EU and advancing on the path towards EU accession. The constitution of Kosovo and the Comprehensive Proposal for the Kosovo Status Settlement constitute the red lines beyond which Pristina is not willing to move. The Conflict Parties’ Willingness to Compromise and EU Mediation Effectiveness It has been hypothesised that the greater the parties’ expected gains from mediation, the more effective the EU is as a mediator in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment. For both parties, the expected gains are high. At the same time, the two conflict parties have firm red

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lines that render the potential zone of agreement between them relatively small. For Serbia, the primary motives for participating in the mediation efforts are EU membership and the prospect of strengthening its influence on Serb-majority communities throughout Kosovo. For Kosovo, the main motives are to advance on its path towards EU membership and integrate the Serb-majority municipalities in the north into its legal and political framework. For both parties, the chances of gaining these benefits are highest when participating in the mediation process led by the EU. Considering the deadlock in the conflict parties’ relationship that existed before 2011, it is plausible to assume that these goals cannot be achieved by any other means than through mediation. Additionally, the EU has made progress in the mediation a key condition of parties’ integration into the EU, which leaves Kosovo and Serbia hardly any other choice than to seek compromise solutions within the framework of the talks in Brussels if they want to advance their EU agendas. Acknowledging that the EU-mediated talks in Brussels are the first negotiation format in which the parties have managed to reach agreements on their conflict issues, it is also unlikely that they can achieve their goals concerning the governance of northern Kosovo by any other means, including the use of violence. As the 2011 violent clashes in Mitrovica and other parts of North Kosovo demonstrated, the use of violence and unilateral measures would, in turn, severely damage the parties’ interests related to EU accession. This cost-benefit calculation explains to a considerable extent the high degree of EU effectiveness concerning the goal of keeping the parties committed to the mediation process. In other words, the conflict parties’ understanding that the EU-mediated talks are the only viable way through which they can achieve (most of) their goals is key to understanding how the EU has managed to keep them committed to the process. The analysis above demonstrates that there is a small zone within the bargaining space where agreement is possible. There is a mutual interest in improving the lives of the people in Kosovo (both in the north and south) and in finding a governance arrangement for North Kosovo, although the conflict parties have opposing views on the design of such an arrangement. The agreements reached within the mediation process demonstrate that Serbia is willing to make concessions if it does not have to recognise Kosovo. The Asterisk Agreement on Kosovo’s regional representation is a good example in this regard because the reference to

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both the ICJ’s advisory opinion and UN Security Council Resolution 1244 leaves the agreement in legal ambiguity and allows for different interpretations on each side (Lepore 2012, pp. 4–5). In fact, most of the agreements between Belgrade and Pristina are characterised by this ‘creative ambiguity’, which has been decisive for making them possible in the first place (Bieber 2015, pp. 313–315; Reljic 2015, p. 1). In turn, the ‘creative ambiguity’ is also the result of the incompatibility of the conflict parties’ red lines on the question of Kosovo’s status. This is an important factor for understanding why the EU has been less successful in attaining the goal of improving the lives of the people. Due to diverging interpretations of the agreements by Kosovo and Serbia, implementation has been moving forward very slowly, resulting in a situation in which measures that were aimed to improve the living conditions of the population in Kosovo have not materialised yet. The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness: Serbian Political Parties Between Broad Support and Spoiler Risks in North Kosovo The majority of Serbian political parties have been supportive of the mediation process and European integration, with both regarded as being very much intertwined (Interview Serbia 1; CS 8). However, this support has evolved over the course of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue and experienced several fluctuations. When the government under the lead of President Tadic and his party was formed in 2009, there was little opposition to a more progressive policy towards Kosovo (Pond 2013, pp. 16–19). Nevertheless, in the first phase of the mediation, the government’s approach to the negotiations with Pristina was met with criticism by Serbian conservatives and nationalists. Most prominently, the leader of the Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS), Vojislav Kostunica, and the leader of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), Tomislav Nikolic, heavily criticised the government at that time (Baliqi 2013, p. 7; Development Group 2012, pp. 14–15). Since the start of the mediation process, Serbian nationalists have sought to put pressure on the government not to make any concessions in the negotiations concerning the parallel governance structures in North Kosovo (Hamilton 2012, p. 21). Given their previous criticism, particularly fuelled by SNS party leader Nikolic, it was rather surprising to many international observers that the new government formed

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in 2012 by SNS and SPS showed itself to be very committed both to EU accession and the dialogue with Pristina (Economides and KerLindsay 2015, p. 1035; Huszka 2013, p. 11). In an effort to achieve broad national consensus on the government’s mandate in the BelgradePristina dialogue, the government coalition successfully managed to gain the support of the National Assembly for the January 2013 resolution and the platform for the negotiations (Armakolas and Maksimovic 2013, p. 1). After the conclusion of the Brussels Agreement in April 2013, the Serbian government submitted a report on the agreement to the National Assembly.18 A large majority of the members of the Assembly—174 out of 250 members—voted in favour of accepting the government report. In the course of the mediation, however, there has been an increase in the nationalist rhetoric in Serbia in addition to opposition parties’ objection to the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue due to a fear that it would gradually lead to a recognition of Kosovo’s independence and the loss of Belgrade’s control on politics in the north of Kosovo (Visoka 2017, p. 189). Nevertheless, as far as the Serbian political parties are concerned, there has been limited spoiler behaviour and the effects of criticisms from Serbian ultra-nationalists have not been felt. In contrast, there have been spoiler problems related to North Kosovo Serbs. In general, Serbs in North Kosovo fiercely reject Kosovo’s independence and perceive Pristina’s claim to govern them as illegal and illegitimate. From their point of view, the line between Serbia and North Kosovo is an administrative boundary within Serbia (BPRG 2015, p. 5; Crisis Group 2012, p. 6). Traditionally, the political elites in North Kosovo have been aligned to the nationalist-conservative DSS. However, the DS government under President Tadic gradually weakened the strong ties between DSS cadres and authorities in the North, and it tried to reduce the influence of hardliners in the region, albeit with limited success (Crisis Group 2011b, p. 4). The Kosovo Serbs, particularly the 50,000–65,000 living in the north,19 form the main group affected by EU mediation between Belgrade and Pristina. However, they are not formally represented in the negotiations and have been confronted with most of the agreements as faits accomplis. Local opinion is largely against the dialogue because Kosovo Serbs perceive it as running against their interests (Crisis Group 2013, p. 10). As Malazogu and Bieber (2012) explain,

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there is a widespread view among Kosovo Serbs that they stand to lose from the outcomes of the dialogue – they believe that Belgrade entered the talks for its own national interests and not to defend the interests of Serbs in Kosovo. Many Serbs see the dialogue as a result of pressure from the international community, and a prelude to Serbia’s recognition of Kosovo’s independence. (Malazogu and Bieber 2012, p. 30)

The frustration among Kosovo Serbs about being largely neglected as a stakeholder group in the negotiations in Brussels erupted into violence in July 2011, when Pristina sent special police forces to the border crossings between Serbia and Kosovo following the trade boycott of Serbian goods (Prelec 2011). In the weeks after the conclusion of the Brussels Agreement in April 2013, several thousand people gathered a couple of times in Belgrade’s main square to protest against what they perceived as treason, following a call by an organisation committee comprised of Serbian leaders from northern Kosovo, the Orthodox Church, and ultra-nationalist groups (Al Jazeera 2013; Cabric 2013). These incidents notwithstanding, it seems that the Serbian government has managed to contain the pressure exerted by the Kosovo Serbs and limited their influence on the mediation process (see Huszka 2013, pp. 12–14). The efforts of the Serbian government to grant Kosovo Serbs the right to be consulted before any agreement is signed demonstrate that the Serbian government has made the attempt to reach out to the Kosovo Serbs and signal awareness of their concerns (Armakolas and Maksimovic 2013, p. 2). In the November 2013 local elections in Kosovo, the government set up the ‘Srpska’ electoral list of parties loyal to Belgrade and strongly encouraged Kosovo Serbs to participate in the elections, arguing that the Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities was in their interest (Bieber 2015, p. 309). The same calls for participating in the elections to defend Serbian interests in Kosovo occurred in the 2014 general elections (Nikolic 2014). The main motivation behind these efforts has been to dampen Kosovo Serbs’ frustration over the mediation process, although the communication with Kosovo Serb leaders has become more difficult and less frequent since the initiation of the mediation process (Crisis Group 2012, p. 7). Nevertheless, the Serbian government managed to gain Kosovo Serbs’ acquiescence for the mediation process and its outcomes by replacing their political leaders with individuals loyal to Belgrade. As Bieber (2015) argues,

152  J. BERGMANN in fact, Kosovan Serbs had a great chance of being the “spoilers” of the agreement. However, the tight control by Belgrade and the dependence of financial support from Belgrade enabled the parties to impose the agreement on Serbs in northern Kosovo, albeit with considerable difficulties. (Bieber 2015, p. 317)

In other words, the Serbian government has managed to reduce the spoiler potential of the Kosovo Serbs and contained the risk of them derailing the settlements agreed with Pristina.20 The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness: Kosovo’s Elites’ Dwindling Support for the Mediation The domestic political context for Kosovo’s participation in the EU-mediated negotiations with Belgrade was far from ideal when the process started. In the 2010 parliamentary elections, the two biggest political parties—the Democratic Party of Kosovo (DPK) led by Prime Minister Thaci and the Liberal Democratic Party (LDK)—secured similar results compared to the 2007 elections. However, their power position was, in fact, relatively weakened by the nationalist Movement for Self-Determination (LVV) gaining more than 12% of the votes in their first-ever participation in parliamentary elections. The rise of LVV, which had strongly campaigned against the governing parties, demonstrated that there was an increasing breeding ground for nationalist thought and huge dissatisfaction with the government among Kosovo’s population (Crisis Group 2012, pp. 4–5). In the first phase of the mediation, all major political parties except for the LVV supported the government’s participation in the negotiations in Brussels. However, the opposition parties criticised the government for not being adequately prepared for the dialogue and sending an inexperienced negotiation team to Brussels (Malazogu and Bieber 2012, pp. 32–33). In addition, there was fierce criticism of the government’s approach to manage the mediation efforts “from above” without consulting the parliament and establishing a broad national consensus ex ante (Bieber 2015, pp. 316–318). As the third-largest party in the parliament, the LVV initially rejected the EU-mediated dialogue with Serbia in principle, following its line on the UN-led Kosovo status talks that the movement had categorically objected to a few years earlier (Visoka 2011, p. 111). In the course of the mediation process, the LVV leaders changed their position and

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demanded that a set of conditions be fulfilled before a dialogue with Belgrade was acceptable—including full recognition of Kosovo’s independence by Serbia and a formal apology for crimes committed by Serbs in Kosovo (Bieber 2015, p. 307). The Kosovo government’s decision to send special police forces to the crossing points in the north in July 2011 “brought rare unity across the political spectrum” in Kosovo (Crisis Group 2012, p. 6). It resonated well with the opposition parties’ demand for full reciprocity with Serbia on the customs issue, implying that Kosovo should apply the same conditions on Serbian goods that had been imposed on Kosovo goods by Serbia. However, this consensus disintegrated again a few months later (Deda and Qosaj-Mustafa 2013, p. 5; Malazogu and Bieber 2012, p. 33). After the signing of the Brussels Agreement, the Kosovo government succeeded in securing the support of 84 out of 120 members of the Assembly who voted in favour of ratification of the agreement. Attempts by around 300 protesters organised by the LVV to block the session in the Assembly failed (Peci 2013, p. 1). However, the resistance against the Brussels Agreement and follow-up agreements has significantly increased since 2014, leading to a radicalisation of political discourse and months of political turmoil in Kosovo. After the biggest opposition party, the LDK, formed a new coalition government with the Democratic Party of Kosovo, led by Prime Minister Isa Mustafa (LDK), the remaining opposition parties—the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK), the Social Democratic Initiative (NISMA), and the LVV—rallied against the government’s approach to the negotiations, organising protests and petitions to stop the implementation of agreements (Collaku 2015a, b). Protests against the mediation process spread, in particular, after the August 2015 agreements, which were met by massive resistance from the opposition parties both on the streets and in the parliament. The opposition accused Prime Minister Mustafa of political treason and claimed that the envisaged creation of the Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities undermined Kosovo’s independence (van der Borgh et al. 2017, p. 66). Among other violent tactics, the LVV representatives set off tear gas canisters during parliamentary sessions, paralysing and blocking the work of the parliament for several weeks (Visoka 2017, p. 61). In an attempt to de-escalate the situation, Kosovo’s president, Atifete Jahjaga, asked the Constitutional Court to examine the compatibility of the August 2015

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agreement on the Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities with the country’s constitution. In its decision of December 2015, the Constitutional Court approved the agreement but ruled that several provisions did not fully comply with Kosovo’s constitution and needed to be corrected (Constitutional Court of Kosovo 2015). However, the Court’s ruling could not calm the tense political atmosphere. When Hashim Thaci was elected president of Kosovo on 26 February 2016, members of the parliament from the opposition again released tear gas in the parliament, accompanied by protests on the streets (BBC News 2016). In 2017, the political quarrel about Kosovo’s approach towards the EU-mediated dialogue with Serbia led to a no-confidence vote against Prime Minister Mustafa, who was replaced by the leader of the centre-right AAK, former Kosovo Liberation Army commander Ramush Haradinaj. Although Haradinaj immediately pledged to maintain the dialogue with Serbia, the confrontation over the agreements reached with Belgrade between Kosovo’s government and the opposition parties, particularly the LVV, has continued. In sum, the evidence suggests that the Kosovo government has experienced considerable opposition against its participation in the mediation efforts. The political resistance against the mediation has thus gradually increased over the course of the process, making it more difficult for the Kosovo government to sell Kosovo’s participation in the mediation as a necessity for advancing Kosovo’s Euro-Atlantic integration. The opposition parties have increasingly taken their protest to the streets, while the Kosovo government has managed, at least, to secure a majority in the parliament that supports its stance and behaviour in the negotiations. The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness and EU Mediation Effectiveness How do the findings on the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness relate to EU mediation effectiveness? The relatively cohesive positioning of Serbia’s political parties concerning the objective of EU accession has been essential to the government’s ability to establish domestic support for the compromises made in Brussels. The broad consensus among political parties on the necessity of participating in the EU-mediated talks with Pristina has been a key condition of the Serbian government being able to stay committed to the negotiation process. In other words, the high degree of EU goal-attainment concerning the objective

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of committing the parties to the mediation process was only possible because Serbian political parties rallied behind their government and provided it with a clear mandate to negotiate in Brussels. Moreover, Serbian governments from 2011 to 2017 managed to control and contain the influence of ultra-nationalists on the government’s agenda to normalise relations with Pristina in exchange for immediate steps towards EU accession. Containing Kosovo Serbs’ spoiler potential has been vital for the agreement to work and for several sub-issues to be implemented, such as integration of the judiciary and the police (Bieber 2015, p. 317). At the same time, the exclusion of Kosovo Serbs from the mediation has increased their concerns as well as their mistrust against Pristina, the EU, and even Belgrade. Kosovo Serbs fear that Serbian political elites may sell out their interests in exchange for receiving EU membership. In a situation where the communication between Belgrade and Kosovo Serb leaders has gradually deteriorated, Serbia’s long-time policy of using Kosovo Serbs to eschew violence in North Kosovo when deemed politically appropriate has backfired (Crisis Group 2013, p. 11). With regard to Kosovo, the support of the majority of political parties for the government’s participation in the mediation process has contributed to the EU achieving the goal of maintaining the mediation efforts in the long run. The different Kosovo governments within the period under investigation have faced considerable strains due to the opposition’s criticism of their mediation approach. Nevertheless, the necessity of conducting the EU-mediated talks with Belgrade has been largely taken for granted by most political parties. However, the pressure on the Kosovo government, both in the parliament and from the public, has considerably increased since the signing of the Brussels Agreement in 2013. The mediation efforts have produced domestic resistance and contributed to the radicalisation of the political discourse in Kosovo. The limited degree of internal cohesiveness has profoundly impacted the negotiation dynamics between Kosovo and Serbia, as the pace of progress has considerably decreased since August 2015 (Visoka 2017, pp. 183–220). Parts of this trend can also be related to the top-down character of the negotiations and the fact that the Kosovo government—similar to the Serbian government—only gradually revealed information about the mediation process and achieved agreements. The mediation efforts have been widely criticised for their lack of transparency, both by the opposition and civil society in Kosovo (Development Group 2012, p. 17; Interview CS 5).

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In sum, the findings demonstrate that the two governments’ ability to secure sufficient domestic support for the mediation and the various agreements has been vital for the EU’s effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment. At the same time, the increasing opposition against the mediation has put a strain on the willingness of Kosovo’s government to compromise and has thus negatively affected the pace of progress in the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue since 2015.

4.4  Explaining EU Mediation Effectiveness in the Belgrade–Pristina Dialogue Since 2011 the EU has acted as a mediator between Kosovo and Serbia in the framework of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, leading the effort through various phases and brokering a series of agreements between the two sides. Despite this achievement, the analysis in this chapter suggests a medium degree of EU effectiveness, both in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment. Although the EU managed to broker major settlements of various issues in the first mediation phase, the unresolved issue of the governance of North Kosovo has prevented it from achieving a higher degree of effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement. Moreover, several agreements have not been (fully) implemented yet, including those on cadasters, and university diplomas, which were struck in the first mediation phase (Visoka 2017, p. 200). A similar picture emerges with regard to goal-attainment. Although the EU effectively managed to commit the parties to the mediation process and enabled their return to the negotiation table despite various breaks to the negotiations, it has not fully attained its goal of preventing the use of violence in the conflict. The EU’s balance sheet is equally mixed when it comes to the goals of brokering agreements that directly improve the lives of the people in Kosovo and finding a final compromise settlement for the status of the northern part of Kosovo. Relating the values of the five conditioning factors to the medium degree of EU mediation effectiveness leads to two main conclusions (Table 4.4). First, the conditioning factors related to mediator characteristics and behaviour—leverage, mediation strategy, and policy coherence—take on high values, suggesting favourable conditions for a high degree of EU mediation effectiveness. Second, the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise and their internal cohesiveness, however, do not exceed a medium degree, suggesting a constraining effect on how the

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Table 4.4  Conditions of EU mediation effectiveness in the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue Conditions of EU mediation effectiveness

Degrees/values of conditions

Mediator leverage Mediation strategy EU coherence Conflict parties’ willingness to compromise Conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness

High ‘Manipulation’ High Medium Medium

Source Own compilation

EU’s leverage, mediation strategy and high degree of policy coherence translate into effectiveness. A closer look at EU mediation strategy and its interaction with the conflict parties’ characteristics and behavior confirms these conclusions. The EU’s mediation strategy of manipulation in terms of providing incentives is a key factor for explaining the EU’s ability to achieve a partial settlement of several conflict issues and the partial achievement of its mediation goals. As it was demonstrated above, the EU has actively drawn on its leverage and incentivised the conflict parties towards compromise agreements. At the same time, the empirical results also point to the significance of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise to explain the medium degree of EU mediation effectiveness. The high degree of control the EU has exerted on the mediation process has not proven sufficient to broker a final resolution to the conflict. In other words, a high degree of leverage, an active mediation style, and a high degree of policy coherence do not guarantee the EU’s mediation success. Rather, the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise is a key factor influencing EU mediation effectiveness. The empirical findings demonstrate that the expected gains of both parties have been high, which explains their willingness to find compromise solutions to various conflict issues. The expected gains are primarily external and relate to the prospect of EU membership. The EU’s strategy of using European integration as a key incentive for the parties has strongly resonated with their domestic priorities. However, the compromises made have all fallen within the ZOA that is delineated by the parties’ red lines—Serbia’s firm rejection of Kosovo’s independence, and Kosovo’s insistence on its territorial integrity and the principle that every agreement must be in line with its constitution.

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The fact that most of the agreements achieved during the mediation process have been interpreted by one side as going beyond the other side’s red line explains why the parties have been far less willing to implement the agreements than to sign them in the first place. In fact, the diverging interpretations of various agreements—often due to ambiguous formulations in the agreement texts—and the lack of their implementation have prevented a higher degree of EU mediation effectiveness. Moreover, increasing spoiler behaviour, primarily on the part of Kosovo’s opposition, has slowed the pace of progress that the parties have made in settling their conflict. Finally, the increasing tensions between the two conflict parties since August 2015 demonstrate that the bilateral relations between Kosovo and Serbia have only marginally improved, pointing to a low degree of trust built between the two sides of the negotiation table. The latter finding is worrying in the way that the continuously low level of trust between decision-makers on both sides of the negotiation table makes any progress in the mediation less likely and seriously endangers the continuation of the mediation process as such.

Notes





1. For an overview of the modern roots and dynamics of the conflict over Kosovo, see Ker-Lindsay (2010, pp. 176–177) and Perritt (2011, pp. 15–24). 2. For a first-hand account of the Kosovo Status Talks and their failure, see Perritt (2011, pp. 141–209); for a systematic analysis of the factors that led to the failure of the mediation processes, see Bergmann (2018) and Fridl (2009). 3. The latter are referred to as the ‘five non-recognisers’, pointing to the split among EU member states concerning the status of Kosovo. 4. The resolution was backed by 77 states, while 6 states voted against it (Albania, Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, United States) and 74 states abstained. 5. As Robert Cooper (2015, p. 2) emphasises, however, the term “technical dialogue” is misleading given that “all issues have both political and technical aspects”. For reasons of simplicity, the terms ‘technical dialogue’ and ‘high-level/political dialogue’ will also be used in this thesis for the purpose of differentiating between the first and second phase of the mediation effort, being aware of the indeterminacy of the two designations. 6. For a detailed analysis of each issue under discussion, see Sect. 4.2.

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7. The plates had been issued by UNMIK and were supposed to be valid for an interim period of five years to be used by “all car owners residing in Kosovo” (Agreed Conclusions 2011c, p. 1). 8. The term association/community already alludes to the parties’ different interpretations of the competencies of this institution. The term community as used by Belgrade suggests that the institution has executive powers, while Pristina calling it association refers to their interpretation of the institution as a kind of NGO without any executive powers; see also Reljic (2015, p. 1). 9.  Both Kosovo and Serbia are contracting parties to the Energy Community. The Energy Community Secretariat found Serbia violating Article 6 of Regulation (EC) 1228/2003 in 2010 and opened a dispute settlement procedure (Case ECS-3/08); see Crisis Group (2013, p. 23). 10. Furthermore, the agreement includes provisions on the interconnection and roaming between Serbian and Kosovo operators in order to allow Kosovo mobile users to use their phones in Serbia. 11. See also Crisis Group (2011b). 12. See, for example, Cooper (2015) and EUROPP (2015). 13.  Examples include the European Commission’s progress reports (European Commission 2012, 2013d, 2014, 2015) and the General Affairs Council Conclusions on Enlargement (Council of the European Union 2012c, 2013, 2014, 2015). 14. However, the envisaged substance of such an agreement is not further specified in the document. 15. COWEB is the Working Party on the Western Balkans Region, a preparatory body within the Council structure responsible for EU relations with the Western Balkans region. 16.  In late 2014 and following the establishment of a new European Commission under President Jean-Claude Juncker, DG Enlargement was transformed into the Directorate-General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations, DG NEAR. 17. As Subotić (2016, p. 12) argues, the Serbian claim to Kosovo, however, has never really been about the territory of Kosovo, but rather the idea of Kosovo that comprises the memory of Serbia’s past greatness and elements of victimization. 18. The Brussels Agreement was not ratified by the Assembly because this would have meant that the Serbian government understood it as an agreement between two states; see Bieber (2015, p. 307). 19.  There are no reliable official population figures for Serbs in northern Kosovo, but only some estimates that revolve around similar numbers. According to the Crisis Group (2013a, p. 10), there are between 55,000 and 65,000 Serbs living in the four northern municipalities of

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Kosovo. Another estimate by BPRG (2015, p. 4) counts 63.293 Serbs in North Kosovo. These numbers seem to be more realistic than the official Kosovo Statistics Agency’s estimate of 37.625; see BPRG (2015, pp. 4–5). 20. From the European Union’s point of view, there is a dilemma concerning Serbia’s control on Kosovo Serbs that was put by an EU official in the following way: “on the one hand, we are asking them [the Serbian government] to be in control of the North, to take influence. But we are also asking them not to interfere with Kosovo’s internal matters. So we need to be consistent with what we ask of them and be realistic about what they can deliver” (Interview EU 5).

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Hajidari, U. (2015a). Kosovo Serb civil protection force faces disbanding. Balkan Insight, Pristina, http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/north-kosovo-civilna-zastita-to-be-dissembled-2. Accessed 13 June 2016. Hajidari, U. (2015b). Kosovo Serbs rush to be judges in the North. Balkan Insight. http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/kosovo-serbia-justice-agreementwill-be-implemented-reps-say-1. Accessed 16 June 2016. Hajidari, U., & Andric, G. (2015). Kosovo and Serbia reach key deal on judiciary. Balkan Insight. http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/belgrade-pristina-reach-deal-on-judiciary. Accessed 16 June 2016. Hamilton, A. (2012). From technical arrangements to political haggling: The Kosovo-Serbia dialogue and the North of Kosovo (Policy Report 02/2012). Group for Legal and Political Studies. http://legalpoliticalstudies.org/download/Policy%20Report%2002%202012%20english.pdf. Accessed 3 July 2016. Hamilton, A., & Merja, A. (2013, March). Readying Kosovo for SAA Negotiations: A blueprint of achievements, slow reforms and the path ahead (Policy Analysis 02/2013). Pristina: Group for Legal and Political Studies. http://legalpoliticalstudies.org/download/Policy%Analysis%2002%202013. pdf. Accessed 27 June 2016. HIIK. (2011). Conflict barometer 2011. Conflict barometer 20. Heidelberg: Heidelberger Institut für Internationale Konfliktforschung. http://www.hiik.de/ de/konfliktbarometer/pdf/ConflictBarometer_2011.pdf. Accessed 27 May 2016. HIIK. (2012). Conflict barometer 2012. Conflict barometer 21. Heidelberg: Heidelberger Institut für Internationale Konfliktforschung. http://www.hiik. de/de/konfliktbarometer/pdf/ConflictBarometer_2012.pdf. Accessed 27 May 2016. HIIK. (2013). Conflict barometer 2013. Conflict barometer 22. Heidelberg: Heidelberger Institut für Internationale Konfliktforschung. http://www.hiik. de/de/konfliktbarometer/pdf/ConflictBarometer_2013.pdf. Accessed 27 May 2016. HIIK. (2014). Conflict barometer 2014. Conflict barometer 23. Heidelberg: Heidelberger Institut für Internationale Konfliktforschung. http://www.hiik. de/de/konfliktbarometer/pdf/ConflictBarometer_2014.pdf. Accessed 27 May 2016. HIIK. (2015). Conflict barometer 2015. Conflict barometer 24. Heidelberg: Heidelberger Institut für Internationale Konfliktforschung. http://www.hiik. de/de/konfliktbarometer/pdf/ConflictBarometer_2015.pdf. Accessed 27 May 2016. Hoxhaj, E. (2014, January 14). Smart power of small states: Kosovos approach to Foreign Affairs: Lecture at the Institute of International and European Affairs (IIEA). Dublin, Ireland. Government of the Republic of Kosovo. http:// www.iiea.com/events/smart-power-of-small-states-kosovos-approach-to-foreign-affairs. Accessed 15 July 2016.

170  J. BERGMANN Hughes, J. (2013). Russia and the secession of Kosovo: Power, norms and the failure of multilateralism. Europe-Asia Studies, 65(5), 992–1016. Huszka, B. (2013, February 21). The EU-Serbia-Kosovo triangle: An enduring impasse (HIIA Papers 6/2013). Budapest: Magyar Külügyi Intézet— Hungarian Institute of International Affairs. http://kki.gov.hu/ download/f/79/b0000/Tanulmanyok_2013_06_%5B%C3%BAj_publik%C3%A1ci%C3%B3_%5D_.pdf. Accessed 18 July 2016. International Court of Justice. (2010). Accordance with International Law of the Unilateral Declaration of Independence in Respect of Kosovo. Advisory Opinion of 22 July 2010 (I.C.J. Reports 2010). The Hague: International Court of Justice. Ker-Lindsay, J. (2009). Kosovo: The path to contested statehood in the Balkans. London, New York, NY: I.B. Tauris. Ker-Lindsay, J. (2010). The final Yugoslav issue: The evolution of international thinking on Kosovo, 1998–2005. In D. Djokić & J. Ker-Lindsay (Eds.), New perspectives on Yugoslavia: Key issues and controversies (pp. 176–192). Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, New York, NY: Routledge. Kostovicova, D. (2014). When enlargement meets common foreign and security policy: Serbias europeanisation, visa liberalisation and the Kosovo Policy. Europe-Asia Studies, 66(1), 67–87. Krasniqi, G. (2015, November 19). Kosovos political impasse and the limits of the EUs creative ambiguity approach. Commentary. European Council on Foreign Relations. http://www.ecfr.eu/article/commentary_kosovos_political_impasse_and_the_limits_of_eus_5020. Accessed 16 June 2016. Krasniqi, G., & Musaj, M. (2015). The EUs limited sovereignty—Strong control approach in the process of member state building in Kosovo. In S. Keil & Z. Arkan (Eds.), The EU and member state building: European foreign policy in the Western Balkans (pp. 140–162). Abingdon: Routledge. Lehne, S. (2012, March). Kosovo and Serbia: Toward a normal relationship. Policy Outlook. Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Lepore, P. (2012, July). Beyond the asterisk agreement (IAI Working Papers 12|21). Rome: Instituto Affari Internazionali. http://www.iai.it/sites/ default/files/iaiwp1221.pdf. Accessed 31 May 2016. Malazogu, L., & Bieber, F. (2012, September). The future of interaction between Pristina and Belgrade. Series: Confidence Building Measures in Kosovo 3. Project on Ethnic Relations Kosovo. Memorandum of Understanding. (2015, June 25). Agreement on mutual recognition of vehicle insurances. http://www.kryeministri-ks.net/repository/ docs/Signed_MoU_Border_Vehicle_Insurance.pdf. Accessed 2 December 2016. Nikolic, I. (2014, June 4). Serb leaders end prevarication over Kosovo Election. Belgrade. Balkan Insight. http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/kosovo-serb-leaders-decided-to-participate-in-election. Accessed 21 July 2016.

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Noutcheva, G., & Huysseune, M. (2004). Serbia and Montenegro. In B. Coppieters, M. Emerson, M. Huysseune, T. Kovziridze, & G. Noutcheva (Eds.), Europeanization and conflict resolution: Case studies from the European periphery (pp. 107–147). Gent: Academia Press. Peci, E. (2013, June 28). Kosovo MPs Defy protests to ratify Serbia deal. Pristina. http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/kosovo-ratifies-eu-brokered-dealwith-serbia. Accessed 20 July 2016. Perritt, H. H. (2011). Road to independence for Kosovo: A chronicle of the Ahtisaari plan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Prelec, M. (2011, September 6). North Kosovo meltdown: The Balkan Regatta. http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/europe/balkans/kosovo/ north-kosovo-meltdown.aspx. Accessed 21 June 2016. Pond, E. (2013). Serbia reinvents itself. Survival, 55(4), 7–30. Reljic, D. (2015, August 28). EU facilitated dialogue: Another exercise in constructive ambiguity. CEPS Commentary. Brussels: Centre for European Policy Studies.  https://www.ceps.eu/system/files/CEPS%20Commentary%20 Dusan%20Reljic%20EU%20Facilitated%20Dialogue.pdf. Accessed 14 June 2016. Stakic, I., & Bjelos, M. (2015). The future of civil protection in North Kosovo. Belgrade, Pristina: Belgrade Centre for Security Policy. http://www.bezbednost.org/upload/document/the_future_of_civil_protection_in_north_ kosovo.pdf. Accessed 13 June 2016. Subotić, J. (2016). Narrative, ontological security, and foreign policy change. Foreign Policy Analysis, 12(4), 610–627. Tadic, B. (2011, September 26). Serbia wants dialogue and opposes aggressive policy. Press release. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Serbia. http://mfa.gov.rs/en/press-service/daily-news?year=2011&month=09&day=26&modid=62. Accessed 9 January 2019. Tannam, E. (2013). The EUs response to the International Court of Justices judgment on Kosovos declaration of independence. Europe-Asia Studies, 65(5), 946–964. Telecoms Action Plan. (2015, August 25). Kosovo Ministry of Foreign Affairs. http://kryeministri-ks.net/wp-content/uploads/docs/Joint_Action_Plan_ telecoms_25082015_(2).pdf. Accessed 11 Febuary 2019. Todoric, V., & Malazogu, L. (2011, November). Belgrade-Prishtina dialogue: Transformation of self-interest required. Pristina: New Policy Center and Project on Ethnic Relations Kosovo. http://d4d-ks.org/assets/2012/09/2011-11-16PER-Beograd-Pristina-Dialogue.pdf. Accessed 30 May 2016. Touval, S., & Zartman, I. W. (1985). Introduction: Mediation in theory. In S. Touval & I. W. Zartman (Eds.), International mediation in theory and practice (pp. 7–17). Boulder, CO: Westview Press. United Nations General Assembly. (2008, October 8). Resolution adopted by the General Assembly. Request for an advisory opinion of the International Court

172  J. BERGMANN of Justice on whether the unilateral declaration of independence of Kosovo is in accordance with international law. http://www.worldlii.org/int/other/ UNGARsn/2008/43.pdf. Accessed 2 June 2015. United Nations General Assembly. (2010, October 13). Resolution adopted by the General Assembly 64/298. Request for an advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on whether the unilateral declaration of independence of Kosovo is in accordance with international law (Press Release A/ Res/64/298). New York: United Nations General Assembly. United Nations Security Council. (1999, June 10). Resolution 1244. https:// documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N99/172/89/PDF/ N9917289.pdf?OpenElement. Accessed 18 April 2016. van der Borgh, C., le Roy, P., & Zweerink, F. (2017, June). EU peacebuilding capabilities in Kosovo after 2008: An analysis of EULEX and the EU-facilitated Belgrade-Pristina dialogue. WOSCAP: Enhancing EU Peacebuilding Capacities (Policy Report). https://woscap.eu/documents/131298403/131299900/Kosovo%2brepor t_PU%2b(5).pdf/ Kosovo%20report_PU%20(5)/index.pdf. Accessed 9 January 2019. van Elsuwege, P. (2017). Legal creativity in EU external relations: The stabilization and association agreement between the EU and Kosovo. European Foreign Affairs Review, 22(3), 393–410. Visoka, G. (2011). International governance and local resistance in Kosovo: Thin line between ethical, emancipatory and exclusionary politics. Irish Studies in International Affairs, 22, 99–125. Visoka, G. (2017). Shaping peace in Kosovo: The politics of peacebuilding and statehood. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Visoka, G., & Doyle, J. (2016). Neo-functional peace: The European Union way of resolving conflicts. JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, 54(4), 862–877. Vukojcic, S. (2015). Belgrade and Pristina interpret new agreement differently. http://www.euractiv.com/section/enlargement/news/belgrade-and-pristina-interpret-new-agreement-differently/. Accessed 16 June 2016. Vutz, C. (2011, December 15). Serbias prospects of EU accession (Library Briefing). Library of the European Parliament. http://www.europarl.europa. eu/RegData/bibliotheque/briefing/2011//LDM_BRI(2011)110230_ REV2_EN.pdf. Accessed 3 July 2016. World Bank. (2013). Serbia overview. http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/ serbia/overview. Accessed 13 July 2016. Zeqiri, A., Troch, P., & Kabashi, T. (2016). The association/community of SerbMajority Municipalities: Breaking the impasse. Pristina: European Centre for Minority Issues Kosovo. http://www.ecmikosovo.org/wp-content/ uploads/2016/06/English1.pdf. Accessed 14 June 2016.

CHAPTER 5

The EU as a Co-mediator in the Geneva International Discussions on South Ossetia and Abkhazia

The conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia—two separatist regions in Georgia—have their origins in the history and politics of the Soviet Union. In the Soviet Union, both Abkhazia and South Ossetia were part of the Socialist Soviet Republic of Georgia. Abkhazia had the status of an autonomous republic, whereas South Ossetia was only an autonomous region (oblast). Both conflicts are ethno-political in nature, in the sense that the Abkhaz and the South Ossetians perceive themselves as being culturally and linguistically different from Georgians and have fought for their secession from Georgia. More precisely, while Abkhaz have sought to gain full independence, South Ossetians have aspired towards a unification with the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania, a part of the Russian Federation (König 2005, pp. 239–240; Tocci 2007, p. 129). Although Georgia experienced ethnic tensions both before and throughout the Soviet rule, it was not before the end of the 1980s that the conflicts over Abkhazia and South Ossetia escalated into violent confrontations and a civil war in the early 1990s (Whitman and Wolff 2012, p. 92). In South Ossetia, the tensions escalated into a full-blown war in January 1991 after South Ossetians had boycotted the Georgian 1990 elections and Georgia responded by abolishing South Ossetia’s status as an oblast. The war caused more than 1000 deaths and the displacement of 60,000 people (König 2005, p. 241). The fighting ended through a

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ceasefire agreement signed by Russian President Boris Yeltsin, Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze, and representatives of South and North Ossetia in Sochi in June 1992 (Agreement on Principles of Settlement of the Georgian-Ossetian Conflict 1992). To implement the ceasefire agreement, Joint Peacekeeping Forces composed of Georgian, Russian and Ossetian troops were deployed. The OSCE took over the monitoring of the implementation process in December 1992 (König 2005, pp. 241–242). Additionally, the ceasefire agreement provided for the initiation of a mediation platform, the Joint Control Commission, focussing on refugee return, economic rehabilitation, and security (German 2006, p. 7). In Abkhazia, the tensions with the Georgian government escalated into war in August 1992 when the Georgian army crossed the border into Abkhazia. The military operation was preceded by the suspension of the 1978 Georgian constitution and the restoration of the 1925 Abkhazian constitution by the Abkhazia parliament—which implied de facto a unilateral declaration of independence of Abkhazia. The following military confrontation finally led to a defeat of Georgian forces and the signing of a ceasefire agreement in Sochi in July 1993 (Auch 2005, pp. 230–234; Coppieters 2004, pp. 198–199). Subsequently, a Commonwealth of Independent States peacekeeping force, predominantly composed of Russian soldiers, was deployed to Abkhazia. The UN Security Council established the United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG) in November 1993 to monitor the implementation of the ceasefire agreement. Parallel to the Georgian– South Ossetian conflict, the international community initiated a mediation process under the auspices of the UN—the so-called Geneva Process— bringing together representatives of Abkhazia, Georgia, and Russia, and granting observer status to the OSCE and the members of the UN Secretary-General’s Group of Friends of Georgia (Stewart 2003, p. 3).1 Although the OSCE- and UN-led mediation efforts did not lead to the resolution of the two conflicts, they contributed to their stabilisation and the prevention of their re-escalation until the early 2000s. The situation changed when the 2003 Rose Revolution led to the resignation of President Shevardnadze and the formation of a new government under President Mikheil Saakashvili. Saakashvili pushed for a re-integration of the two separatist regions and the isolation of the political authorities

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in South Ossetia and Abkhazia (Aphrasidze and Siroky 2010, p. 132). In addition, the Georgian government identified Russia as the main obstacle to the resolution of the conflicts, blaming it for its support of the political elites in Sukhumi (Abkhazia’s capital) and Tskhinvali (capital of South Ossetia). Unsurprisingly, this turn in Georgia’s policy towards the regions gradually increased the tensions between Tbilisi, Moscow, and the separatist regions and led to a flare-up of hostilities in the period between 2004 and 2008, including hostage-takings, cross-border shootings, and mutual economic embargos imposed by Georgia and Russia (Merlingen and Ostrauskaite 2009, pp. 6–7). Put under strong domestic pressure due to increasing social unrest and the polarisation of Georgia’s political elite, the Saakashvili government finally decided to reintegrate South Ossetia forcefully, launching a military operation against Tskhinvali and the surrounding areas in the night of 8 August 2008 (Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Conflict in Georgia 2009, p. 19).2 Georgia’s military attack on South Ossetia started what became known as the ‘Five-Day War’, lasting from 8 to 12 August 2008. Russia responded to the Georgian attack with a massive intervention of its troops into Georgia proper. Indeed, Russian troops entered deep into Georgian territory, setting up military positions in major Georgian towns such as Gori and Zugdidi and moving towards Tbilisi.3 Although Russia justified its operation as a humanitarian intervention to protect the people of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Georgia called it an aggression and asked the international community to stop the Russian intervention (Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Conflict in Georgia 2009, pp. 21–25). In this situation, the French government—at that time holding the Presidency of the Council of the EU—took the initiative. Together with the OSCE chairman, Finland’s foreign minister, Alexander Stubb, the French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, flew to Tbilisi on 9 August and drafted a tentative ceasefire proposal, which was immediately accepted by President Saakashvili. The draft focussed on three main points: the cessation of hostilities, the return to the status quo ante, and recognition of Georgia’s territorial integrity (Forsberg and Seppo 2010, p. 125). Although Kouchner and Stubb had planned to meet Russian foreign minister Lavrov in Moscow to talk to him about the draft, French President Sarkozy decided to go to Moscow himself to negotiate

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a ceasefire agreement with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, which also meant an end to Kouchner and Stubb’s mission. However, Sarkozy travelled to Moscow with a different draft prepared by the French National Security Council, as he “didn’t want his hands tied by a paper negotiated in Tbilisi without his input and with someone the Russians hated” (Asmus 2010, p. 196). In their bilateral meeting on 12 August, Sarkozy and Medvedev negotiated the final ceasefire agreement, which became known as the Six-Point Plan. The document was signed by Georgian President Saakashvili on 15 August and by Russian President Medvedev on 16 August 2008, whereas Saakashvili signed a French version and Medvedev a Russian version of the agreement. The six points of the agreement read as follows: 1/ no resort to force; 2/ a definitive halt to hostilities; 3/ provision of free access for humanitarian assistance; 4/ Georgian military forces must withdraw to the places they are usually stationed; 5/ the Russian armed forces will be pulled back on the lines preceding the start of hostilities. While awaiting an international mechanism, Russian peacekeeping forces will implement additional security measures; 6/ opening of international discussions on security and stability modalities in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. (Le President de la Republique 2008a, p. 1; own translation from French original)

Given the vagueness of the formulation of the agreement, further negotiations on the terms of implementation were necessary (Asmus 2010, pp. 209–213). On 8 September 2008, President Sarkozy managed to convince President Medvedev to agree to additional measures on implementing the Six-Point Plan. The Implementing Measures specified the terms of withdrawal of Russian troops from areas in Georgia outside Abkhazia and South Ossetia within a month. Additionally, the agreement called for OSCE observers to return to Tskhinvali and UN observers to remain in Abkhazia, while 200 EU observers were to be deployed from 1 October 2008 onwards (Le President de la Republique 2008b, p. 1). Concerning the sixth provision of the ceasefire agreement, the Implementing Measures specified the purpose of the international discussions envisaged to start on 15 October 2008 in Geneva as to deal with “modalities of security and stability in the region, the question of refugees and displaced persons on the basis of recognised international

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principles and the practice of post-conflict order, and any other issues on the consensus of the parties” (Le President de la Republique 2008b, p. 2; own translation from French original). The September document thus implicitly stipulates the agenda and format of the Geneva International Discussions.4 Importantly, negotiations about the status of South Ossetia and Abkhazia are not part of the official mandate of the GID, as the Georgian government had rejected this (Asmus 2010, p. 201; Interview EU 12). In addition, neither the Six-Point Plan nor the Implementing Measures specified the participants of the international discussions, including the question of who should serve as chair of the negotiation format. Due to the prominent role played by France in brokering the ceasefire agreement, it was evident to policy-makers in Brussels and European capitals that the EU had to continue its engagement in managing the conflicts in Georgia. Although President Sarkozy’s efforts of shuttle diplomacy were a genuine French initiative without any formal EU mandate, the Council of the EU defined it ex post as “mediation efforts carried out by the Union” (Council of the European Union 2008b, p. 2). Consequently, whereas the EU had only been reluctantly involved in conflict management activities before the August war, it now found itself in the driving seat of the international efforts to manage the conflicts and prevent their renewed escalation (Bardakci 2010, pp. 222–228). At an extraordinary European Council meeting in Brussels on 1 September 2008, the EU committed itself, “including through a presence on the ground, to support every effort to secure a peaceful and lasting solution to the conflict in Georgia” (European Council 2008, p. 2). Following this commitment, the Council took two decisions within the same month. On 15 September, the Council adopted the Joint Action 2008/736/CFSP to establish a European Union Monitoring Mission in Georgia (EUMM Georgia), to be deployed by 1 October 2008 (Council of the European Union 2008c). Ten days later, the Council appointed Pierre Morel as EU Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia, a newly created position “to enhance the effectiveness and visibility of the European Union (EU) in helping to resolve the conflict in Georgia” (Council of the European Union 2008d,

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p. 1). In 2003, the EU had established the position of an EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus whose mandate also included the involvement in conflict resolution activities in Georgia. In September 2008, the Council took the strategic decision to appoint a Special Representative exclusively responsible for the situation in Georgia. The key task of EU Special Representative Morel, a French diplomat, was defined as preparing for the international talks to be held in Geneva and assisting with the implementation of the Implementing Measures concluded on 8 September 2008 (Council of the European Union 2008d, p. 1). Although there were initial discussions within the EU on whether the EU should manage the mediation process alone without the participation of the UN and the OSCE as co-chairs, in the end the EU did not insist on being the sole mediator in the GID (Interview EU 9). The EU Special Representative and his team decided to go for an inclusive approach vis-à-vis the OSCE and UN, being particularly responsive to the OSCE, which had also called for the establishment of a mediation platform to ensure security and stability in the Caucasus (Mikhelidze 2010, p. 2). In addition, including the OSCE and the UN in the talks was considered as a way of strengthening the legitimacy of the format and as a possible opportunity to tap into the rich field experience of these two organisations on the ground (Merlingen and Ostrauskaite 2009, p. 23). This chapter analyses the EU’s effectiveness as co-mediator in the GID on the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia since 2008. The main finding of the case study is that the EU’s effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement and goal-attainment does not exceed a low to medium degree. The conflict parties’ unwillingness to compromise is the primary explanatory factor for the EU’s relative ineffectiveness as a mediator in the GID. As the ZOA on the two most important issues discussed in the GID—the non-use of force and the return of refugees and internally displaced persons—is virtually zero, the negotiations have not made any substantial progress since their inception. The very limited space for compromise agreements strongly constrains the impact that the EU’s (limited) leverage, mediation strategy, coherence and mediator coordination can have on mediation effectiveness (Table 5.1).

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Table 5.1  Chronology of major events in the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia 1991–2008 January 1991 June 1992 August 1992 December 1992 July 1993 November 1993 November 2003 January 2004 8–12 August 2008 15–16 August 2008 8 September 2008 15 September 2008 25 September 2008 15 October 2008

Escalation of Georgian–Ossetian tensions into war Signing of ceasefire agreement in Georgian–Ossetian conflict Escalation of Georgian–Abkhaz tensions into war Establishment of OSCE Mission to Georgia Signing of ceasefire agreement in Georgian–Abkhaz conflict Establishment of UNOMIG Rose Revolution in Georgia and resignation of President Shevardnadze Election of President Saakashvili Five-Day War Ceasefire agreement (Six-Point Plan) signed by Russia and Georgia Implementation plan signed Council of the EU decides to establish EUMM Georgia Council of the EU appoints Pierre Morel as new EU Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia First round of the Geneva International Discussions

Source Own compilation

5.1  Mediation Format and Setting After the end of the August war and before the start of international negotiations in Geneva, South Ossetia and Abkhazia pressed ahead with their quest for international recognition of their independence. On 26 August 2008, Russia officially acknowledged the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and called on other states to follow their decision (Civil Georgia 2008a). This unilateral step, unsurprisingly, provided a bad start for the GID. The first GID meeting on 15 October 2008 was immediately suspended due to disagreement on the specific format of the talks. While the role of the EU, UN, and OSCE as co-chairs was non-controversial, the participation of representatives from South Ossetia and Abkhazia was heavily disputed. The three co-chairs had invited officials from Georgia, Russia, and the United States as well as representatives of South Ossetia and Abkhazia to the talks. They had initially planned to conduct plenary sessions in the 3 + 3 format (EU, UN, OSCE, United States, Russia, Georgia) and additional informal sessions with participation of

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Abkhazian and South Ossetian representatives (Civil Georgia 2008c). This plan, however, did not materialise because the Abkhaz and South Ossetians demanded to be accepted as equal participants in the official plenary sessions—a proposal that was immediately rejected by the Georgian side (Mikhelidze 2010, p. 3). In the run-up to the second round of discussions on 18–19 November 2008, the three co-mediators managed to persuade the parties to agree on the set-up of two informal working groups, in which South Ossetian and Abkhazian representatives would also participate, but without mentioning Abkhazia and South Ossetia explicitly to avoid the impression of international recognition of these regions’ independence. Hence, representatives from all sides are identified by name plates only in the GID (Mikhelidze 2010, pp. 3–4). The European Union delegation to the GID has been led by the EU Special Representatives for the South Caucasus5 and the Crisis in Georgia: Pierre Morel (2008–2011), Philippe Lefort (2011–2014), Herbert Salber (2014–2017), and Toivo Klaar (since 2017). While the size of the EU delegation has varied, a few staff members usually accompany the EU Special Representative: his Chief of Cabinet; two to three political advisors working in the EU Special Representative’s office in Brussels and the EU Special Representative Regional Office in Tbilisi; a representative of the European Commission; and an EUMM official (Grono 2010, p. 19; Interviews EU 9, 10). The United Nations is represented by the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative to the Geneva International Discussions and a few senior political advisors to the Special Representative (United Nations Security Council 2010). The OSCE is represented by the Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-inOffice for the South Caucasus. As the OSCE chairmanship rotates on a yearly basis, the OSCE Special Representative attending the Geneva talks has usually changed annually. On the side of the conflict parties, the Russian and Georgian delegations have been led by their deputy foreign ministers, while the Abkhazian and South Ossetian authorities have sent their foreign ministers to the GID meetings. The United States—participating in the GID primarily in the role of an observer of the talks and reinforcing the messages conveyed by the co-mediators—is usually represented by an Assistant Secretary of State. The informal working groups have become the main negotiation format of the GID because an official plenary session without the participation of the two breakaway regions has never been held (Grono 2010, p. 24). The first working group deals with issues related to security and

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stability in the region and is co-chaired by the special envoys of the EU, the OSCE, and the UN. The agenda of the first working group includes usually five points: (1) opening remarks of the co-chairs, (2) review of the security situation, (3) discussion on the non-use of force and security arrangements, (4) best practices, and (5) any other issues the parties want to talk about (Interviews EU 7, 9, 10). The second working group discusses the return of IDPs/refugees, humanitarian aid, and human rights issues and is co-moderated by a representative of the European Commission and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), both being members of the EU and UN delegations to the GID. The agenda of meetings of the second working group usually includes (1) opening remarks of the three co-moderators, (2) review of the humanitarian situation, (3) update on the fate of missing persons, (4) discussion on return of refugees and IDPs, (5) water and gas, and (6) any other issues (Interview EU 7, 10; Georgia 3). The discussions are held behind closed doors and usually on two days. The first day involves informal bilateral consultations between the co-chairs and the participants, while the second day is devoted to the discussions in the working groups (Mikhelidze 2010, pp. 3–4; Turunen 2011, p. 2). From October 2008 until spring 2019, 47 negotiation rounds were held. Except for the first three meetings, which occurred monthly between October and December 2008, there have been four rounds of negotiations a year. Before each negotiation round, the co-chairs hold regular consultations with the parties and undertake preparatory field trips to the region (Interviews EU 9, 10). The mediation efforts can be divided into four phases alongside the terms of the office of the EU Special Representatives leading the mediation efforts: a first phase from 2008 to 2011 (under Special Representative Morel), a second phase from 2011 to 2014 (Special Representative Lefort), a third one from 2014 to 2017 (Special Representative Salber), and a fourth phase starting with Special Representative Klaar, who took office in mid-2017.

5.2  The EU’s Effectiveness as a Mediator Conflict Settlement The only tangible agreement struck in the GID is the one on the establishment of two Incident Prevention and Response Mechanisms (IPRMs) for South Ossetia (in Ergneti) and Abkhazia (in Gali). The agreement was struck in the first working group during the fourth round of the

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GID on 18 February 2009 (Geneva International Discussions 2009). The IPRMs represent confidence-building measures and serve to prevent a future escalation of violence at the administrative boundary/border lines (ABLs) between Georgian-controlled and Abkhaz/South Ossetiancontrolled territories.6 In the framework of these mechanisms, representatives of all parties meet on a regular basis to discuss potential security risks, adequate responses to criminal activities, free access to humanitarian aid, and/or the exchange of information on incidents and outcomes of investigations. Those incidents may include detentions, forest fires, illegal travel across the ABLs, hostage-takings, smuggling, and/or exchanges of gun fire (Turunen 2011, p. 3; Interview EU 11). Moreover, a 24-hour ‘hotline’ to the EUMM headquarters has been established to enable direct communication and information-exchange between the relevant actors in crisis situations. In the case of the IPRM in Ergneti, the meetings are held under co-facilitation of the EUMM Head of Mission and the OSCE Special Representative at the ABL between Georgian-controlled and South Ossetian-controlled territory. The IPRM meetings in Gali are facilitated by the UN Special Representative and take place in a former UNHCR office building at the Georgia-Abkhazia ABL. Participants of the IPRM meetings are representatives of state ministries and law enforcement officials of Georgia, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia, representatives of the Russian embassies in Sukhumi and Tskhinvali, as well as Russian security and military officials (Turunen 2011, p. 3). 7 The IPRMs are primarily confidence-building measures and do not resolve the tense security situation at the ABL between Georgia proper and the territories controlled by the separatists. The agreement on the establishment of the IPRMs thus does not provide a substantial settlement of the issue of security at the ABLs. Rather, it represents a process agreement on how to further deal with incidents that threaten the ceasefire between the conflict parties. On the most contested issue related to security matters—a mutual pledge to the non-use of force in the conflict—no agreement has been reached. On 23 November 2010, Georgian President Saakashvili announced in a speech given to the European Parliament that “Georgia will never use force to restore its territorial integrity and sovereignty, that it will only resort to peaceful means in its quest for de-occupation and reunification” (Saakashvili 2010). This unilateral pledge on the non-use

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of force was officially documented by the Georgian government’s letters sent to the UN Secretary-General, the OSCE Secretariat, and the EU High Representative on the same day (Civil Georgia 2010d). Georgia expects reciprocity from Russia and for them to sign a bilateral agreement on the non-use of force (Interviews Georgia 1, 2, 3). However, the Russian government has continuously argued that it is not party to the conflict and thus cannot sign such an agreement with the Georgian government. Rather, Russia is urging Tbilisi to sign an agreement on the non-use of force with Sukhumi and Tskhinvali, which, in turn, is not acceptable to the Georgian government (Mikhelidze 2010, p. 4). The negotiations on the non-use of force have thus remained in a deadlock, with no tangible progress having been made since Georgia’s unilateral pledge in 2010 (Interviews EU 7, EU_MS 17, Georgia 3). Similar to the first working group, the parties have not achieved any substantial settlement of their conflict issues in the second working group. The most contested issue is the situation of refugees and IDPs, a topic that is particularly important to Georgia (Interview Georgia 3).8 Since the violent outbreak of the secessionist conflicts in the 1990s, more than 220,000 people, most of them ethnic Georgians, have fled the regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia (UNHCR 2009, p. 5). Some of them have lived for more than 20 years as IDPs in Georgia. The discussion of this issue in the GID has led to regular walk-outs by the Abkhazian and South Ossetian participants and a subsequent suspension of the negotiations, such as in June 2010 and June 2014 (Civil Georgia 2010d, 2014). The authorities in Sukhumi and Tskhinvali as well as the Russian negotiators argue that Georgia keeps politicising the issue by pushing for a UN General Assembly resolution on IDPs and refugees in Georgia every year. From their point of view, Georgia’s initiatives in the UN General Assembly undermine any constructive discussion of the topic.9 Based on this argument, they have blocked any negotiations on possible arrangements for the return of ethnic Georgian IDPs to their homes within the GID. The negotiations on this issue have thus remained in a deadlock (Interviews EU 7, Georgia 1, 3). The most tangible outcomes of the negotiations in the second working group are a few confidence-building measures. One example is the Archives Without Borders project, initiated in 2011 (Interview Georgia 3; EU_MS 19). In the context of this project, the Georgian authorities hand over copies of Abkhazian archive documents restored in the Georgian State Archives to the Abkhazian authorities, thus helping them to rebuild their

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archives in Sukhumi that were burnt during the 1992 war (Mikhelidze 2012, p. 12). The project is implemented through the Confidence Building Early Response Mechanism (COBERM), which is funded by the EU and managed by the United Nations Development Programme (United Nations Development Programme 2018; Interview EU 10). In meetings of the GID, the Georgian delegation handed over copies of archive documents to the Abkhazian negotiators (Apsny Press 2015b). Another example of confidence-building measures initiated in the GID framework is the agreement between the parties to cooperate on the fight against the box tree moth, an environmental threat to the box tree woods bordering the Russian federation, Abkhaz-controlled territory, and Georgia. The forest pest has spread since the Winter Olympics in Sochi and has severely damaged the flora in the region. The issue was raised by the Abkhazian side in a meeting of the second working group during the 32nd round of the GID in July 2015. Based on the discussions on the topic in the GID format, the parties agreed to conduct a spraying operation on the ground, to which the EU, the OSCE, and the UN jointly contributed (Salber 2016, p. 4). A third example is the exchange of prisoners between Georgian, Abkhazian and South Ossetian authorities that was undertaken on 10 March 2016. In informal sessions during the 2015 rounds of the GID, Georgian participants initiated the discussion about a possible prisoner swap. The negotiations on the release of detainees were then continued through direct channels between the parties and involved security and intelligence authorities of Georgia, South Ossetia, and Abkhazia. Georgian authorities released four South Ossetian prisoners, while the Abkhazian and South Ossetian authorities handed over 12 Georgian prisoners to Tbilisi (Civil Georgia 2016a). The prisoner swap of 10 March 2016 provides a good example that the GID have recently become a platform for bilateral initiatives of cooperation that aim to build a certain level of confidence and trust between the conflict parties (Interview EU 12). Apart from these confidence-building measures on humanitarian and ecological issues, however, the GID have not led to any agreement that partly or fully settles one of the main conflict issues between the parties. There is neither an agreement on the non-use of force nor on the return of refugees and IDPs—the two major points of contention, apart from the status issue, which is not even being discussed at the GID. Taken together, the analysis suggests that the agreement on the establishment of the IPRMs and the few confidence-building measures neither represent a full nor partial settlement of the main conflict issues. Rather,

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the agreements on the establishment of the IPRMs in 2009 and the resumption of the IPRM meetings in Gali in March 2016 constitute process agreements to hold further rounds of negotiations in a different format on the ground, but they do not represent a settlement of individual conflict issues. In sum, the GID have not led to any kind of settlement of the conflict over South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Translating this into an evaluation of the degree of effectiveness, the EU’s mediation effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement in this case is judged as low. Assessing the EU’s Mediation Goals The EU has pursued four objectives as a mediator in the GID: (1) committing the parties to the Geneva talks, (2) preventing a renewed escalation of the conflicts, (3) improving the living conditions of the affected populations on the ground and thereby building confidence between the parties, and (4) contributing to a peaceful settlement of the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia. First, the European Union has been the key initiator of the GID based on the Six-Point Plan and the Implementing Measures brokered by French President Sarkozy. Since September 2008, a core part of the mandates of the EU Special Representatives for the South Caucasus and the Crisis in Georgia has been “to help prepare for the international talks held under point 6 of the settlement plan of 12 August 2008” (Council of the European Union 2008d, p. 1). As the Georgian-Russian war in August 2008 brought an end to the multilateral talks under the auspices of the UN and the OSCE in the format of the Joint Control Commission (1992–2008) and the Geneva Process (1997–2008), the GID remain the only format in which all the conflict parties regularly meet. As an EU member state official explained, “the Geneva Talks are the only forum we have to deal with these conflicts. It is the only format where the parties are in the same room […] it is a positive fact itself that we have this format” (Interview EU_MS 22). In a similar way, an EU official emphasised that “sure, the Geneva talks have not led to major results and remain somehow in a deadlock. But the most important thing about Geneva is the process itself, as a kind of incremental confidence-building process between the parties” (Interview EU 8). To establish contacts and build some degree of confidence between the parties, one key objective of the EU has been to preserve the GID as a forum for negotiations and discussions (Interviews EU 8, 12; EU_MS

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18, 21). This goal may have become less salient in the course of the mediation efforts because the parties have proven their commitment to the format over a couple of years. Nevertheless, it has been a primary objective ever since the EU initiated the mediation process (Merlingen and Ostrauskaite 2009, p. 24). EU Special Representative Morel emphasised in 2009 that “a permanent link must be maintained between the parties. This is the major concern of the Co-Chairmanship [of the GID]” (Morel 2009, p. 2). Second, another related goal of the EU has been to prevent a renewed escalation of the conflict and to stabilise the security situation on the ground (Merlingen and Ostrauskaite 2009, p. 24). To achieve this objective, EU member states have tasked the EU Special Representative with helping the parties to find “arrangements for security and stability in the region” (Council of the European Union 2008d, p. 1). Interview partners emphasised the importance of this goal, which derived from the mandate of the Geneva talks defined by the Six-Point Plan and the Implementing Measures (Interviews EU 7, 9, 10, 12). As one EU official put it, “the mandate, however, is not to find a settlement to the conflict, but to enhance stability and security in the region” (Interview EU 10). A third goal of the EU has been to improve the living conditions of the affected populations and promote trust between the conflict parties on the ground (Interviews EU 7, 8, 9, 10; EU_MS 18, 21). In other words, the EU, as co-mediator in the GID, seeks “to make sure that the effects of the conflict on the people and local populations living in the conflict region are to some extent mitigated” (Interview EU 10). The most concrete deliverable in this respect would be to solve the issue of refugees and displaced persons—a key component of the EU Special Representative’s mandate with regard to the GID (Council of the European Union 2008d, p. 1; 2011, p. 2). A key rationale behind this objective is to promote confidence and trust between the conflict parties, on which future agreements could be built. A statement by an EU member state official reflects this line of reasoning: “We promote dialogue between the parties; we aim to establish an open atmosphere for conversation; we seek to build trust that is strong enough not to be easily shattered by any unforeseen incidents” (EU_MS 18; similarly, EU_MS 17). Although this overall objective could be categorised both as a process and an outcome goal, it is here primarily understood as a process goal that the EU seeks to achieve through confidence-building measures and agreements on humanitarian issues.

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Fourth, the EU’s objectives concerning the outcome of the GID are pronounced less clearly. The mandates of the EU Special Representatives for the South Caucasus and the Crisis in Georgia since 2008 have included the task “to contribute to a peaceful settlement of conflicts in the region, including the crisis in Georgia” (Council of the European Union 2013, p. 1). In addition, EU officials and EU member state representatives emphasised in the interviews that the settlement and resolution of the conflicts is a long-term goal of the EU’s engagement in the GID (Interviews EU 9; EU_MS 21, 24, 26). At the same time, however, EU negotiators are also aware that the mandate of the GID, as spelt out in the Six-Point Plan and the Implementing Measures of summer 2008, do not explicitly task the parties with finding a settlement to the conflict (Interviews EU 7, 9, 12). EU Special Representative Herbert Salber pointed out in a speech during the OSCE’s Annual Security Review Conference in 2016 that the major ambiguity of our Geneva process is that we are tasked to address a dispute, but are not mandated to discuss the core of this dispute, which is the political status of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. We are mandated to deal with the “security and stabilities in/of Abkhazia and South Ossetia”. (Salber 2016, p. 2)

In addition, it seems that the EU has been cautious about publicly formulating its preferences out of a concern of being perceived as partial, which could shatter the EU’s position as a mediator in the GID (Interviews EU 10, 12; EU_MS 22, 26). Given that it would be too high a standard to judge the EU along the criterion of whether it has brokered a settlement of all conflict issues, I argue to take the settlement of the main two issues actually discussed in Geneva—that is, the non-use of force and the return of refugees and IDPs—as reference points for the EU’s ability to achieve its main outcome goal. Evaluating EU Goal-Attainment The empirical evidence suggests that the EU’s degree of effectiveness in terms of goal-attainment has been medium. Although the EU has been relatively effective in committing the parties to the mediation process— and thus ensuring its continuity—it has been less effective with regard to the other objectives (see Table 5.2).

188  J. BERGMANN Table 5.2  EU goals and degrees of goal-attainment in the GID Degree of goalHigh attainment/type of goal

Medium

Low

Process goals

Preventing violence and stabilising security situation

Improving lives of people by resolving practical obstacles to daily life

–

Contributing to a peaceful settlement of the conflicts

Outcome goals

Keep parties committed to mediation process and prevent breakdown of negotiations –

Source Own compilation

First, the EU—together with the OSCE and UN co-chairs—have managed to commit the parties to the GID as the primary negotiation mechanism to resolve their conflict. The co-chairs have succeeded in keeping the parties at the table for more than 10 years. There were several critical junctures during the negotiations when the conflict parties walked out of the negotiations or threatened to withdraw from the talks (Civil Georgia 2010a, 2014). Nevertheless, all sides have returned to the GID meetings and stated their continuing commitment to the process. For example, when Abkhazian negotiators suspended their participation in the GID in June 2010 and blamed the co-chairs for siding with Tbilisi, Abkhazia’s president, Sergej Bagapsh, still insisted on the overall value of the GID and hailed the format for enabling direct communications with the United States and international organisations (Civil Georgia 2010c). In a similar vein, Abkhazian negotiator Nadir Bitiev publicly stated that “my government believes the concept of the Geneva talks is sound, and we want to be active participants in a series of discussions which are productive” (Civil Georgia 2010b, p. 1). The insistence of the Abkhaz to continue the mediation efforts despite heavy quarrels with the Georgian side demonstrates that the mediators have developed a mediation format that is acceptable to all parties and rests on a solid basis of support. Second, the EU has partly achieved the goal of stabilising the security situation on the ground. Since the major escalation of violence in August 2008, the secessionist conflicts have deescalated to a certain degree. In the period between 2009 and 2011, several violent incidents at the South Ossetian and Abkhazian ABL occurred, including shootouts

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between security forces and/or alleged criminals, mine blasts, and the burning of houses. In addition, there were frequent detentions of Georgian citizens at the crossing points controlled by Russian and South Ossetian/Abkhazian forces (HIIK 2009, pp. 13–14; 2010, pp. 14–15; 2011, p. 19). Between 2012 and 2015, there were no major violent incidents reported, implying a significant stabilisation of the security situation. However, detentions of Georgian citizens along the ABL continued (HIIK 2013, p. 34). Since summer 2013, the Georgian security forces have witnessed an increasing ‘borderisation’ at the South Ossetian ABL—including the widespread installation of barbed wire fences along the ABL—by Russian troops (Civil Georgia 2013; HIIK 2013, p. 34). On 19 May 2016, an Abkhazian border guard shot a Georgian citizen. The incident marked the first fatal shooting along the ABL in years and was the main topic discussed at the first IPRM meeting in Gali after its resumption. In addition, the incident was discussed intensively at the 36th meeting of the GID (Civil Georgia 2016b). At the same time, these examples also demonstrate that the IPRMs provide a reliable mechanism for preventing individual incidents from leading to a major escalation of violence between the parties. Moreover, the EUMM has also significantly contributed to the stabilisation of the security situation on the ground. However, given South Ossetia’s and Abkhazia’s refusal to allow the mission to enter their territory, the IPRM meetings and the GID are indispensable for defusing tensions arising from violent incidents at the two ABLs. Third, the EU has set itself the goal of contributing to improvements in the living conditions of the affected populations and building confidence between the conflict parties on the ground. The degree of EU goal-attainment concerning this objective is relatively low. Apart from the stabilisation of the security situation, there have not been significant improvements in the living conditions of people in the conflict zones. The fates of more than 200,000 refugees and IDPs remain unresolved. In addition, there are many legal and political problems that put a burden on the lives of the local people. A report authored by the NGO Conciliation Resources concludes about the situation of the population of the Gali region along the ABL between Georgia and Abkhazia that “as a consequence of unresolved conflict, legal grey areas and unpredictable practice with regard to living conditions, security and long-term

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integration, people on the ground struggle to shape a sustainable future” (Conciliation Resources 2015, p. 7). Tangible improvements in the living conditions of the populations in South Ossetia and Abkhazia are only observable with regard to the reconstruction of infrastructure, which has also come about through Russian investments in Abkhazian infrastructure, such as railways and airports (Khintba et al. 2010). In terms of confidence-building, cooperation on low-key issues, such as the fight against the box tree moth, has certainly sent a positive signal to all sides that an agreement on solving very practical issues is possible (Interviews EU 10; EU_MS 18). So far, however, these confidence-building measures have not translated into intensified cooperation on more politically salient issues. Attempts undertaken by EU Special Representatives Morel and Lefort to introduce cooperation on economic issues as a third agenda item of the GID were blocked by the conflict parties (Interview EU 7). Fourth, the degree of EU goal-attainment concerning the contribution to a peaceful settlement of the conflicts is also evaluated as low. As the analysis of conflict settlement has demonstrated above, the GID have not led to any kind of settlement of the conflicts and only resulted in process agreements between the disputants. Negotiations on the two most important issues discussed in the GID framework—the non-use of force and the return of refugees and IDPs—have not brought about any compromise agreement between the parties. The assessment demonstrates that the EU’s record of accomplishment in attaining its goals as a mediator in the GID is mixed. The EU has been successful in committing the parties to the mediation process and has partly attained the goal of stabilising the security situation. However, the fact that the GID have not significantly contributed to improvements in the living conditions of the affected populations also points to the challenge of brokering agreements on practical, low-key issues without touching upon the core conflict issue: the status of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. This challenge also prevents the three co-chairs from moving the parties towards a peaceful settlement of the conflicts. In sum, taking the two dimensions of EU mediation effectiveness together yields the following results. The degree of the EU’s effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement has been evaluated as low based on the assessment that the mediation has not led to the settlement of any conflict issue. In contrast, the EU has been more effective in terms of goal-attainment, achieving a medium degree of goal-attainment.

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However, the attainment of the EU’s objectives of improving the lives of the people by resolving practical obstacles to their daily lives, and, ultimately, settling the conflicts in a peaceful manner, is currently a distant prospect.

5.3  Conditions of EU Mediation Effectiveness The EU’s Limited Leverage vis-à-vis the Conflict Parties To assess the nature and degree of the EU’s leverage vis-à-vis Georgia, the breakaway territories, and Russia, we have to scrutinise the political and economic relations between the EU and the conflict parties in order to identify resources that the EU could draw upon to incentivise the parties to make concessions in the mediation framework. Since Georgia’s independence in 1991, the EU has established itself as an important provider of financial assistance to Georgia, including the two breakaway regions. In the period between 1992 and 2006, the European Commission committed €505 million to Georgia through its various financial assistance instruments, including Technical Assistance to the Commonwealth of Independent States (TACIS), the Food Security Programme (FSP), the EC Humanitarian Office (ECHO),10 the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR), and others. In the framework of the European Commission’s rehabilitation programme in Georgia, €23 million was spent to support rehabilitation and confidence building activities in the conflict zones, allocating €15 million to Abkhazia and €8 million to South Ossetia (European Commission 2007, p. 33). In the period between 2007 and 2013, the EU provided a total of €454 million to Georgia through its various funding instruments, including €176 million to support projects related to confidence-building, IDPs, and conflict settlement under the Instrument for Stability (IfS) and the European Neighbourhood Instrument (ENI) (Particip et al. 2015, p. 8). Although most of the money was spent on projects implemented by the Georgian government, the EU also funded several initiatives implemented by UNDP and international NGOs that directly engage in confidence-building activities in the conflict regions. As an evaluation report commissioned by the European Commission on the EU’s cooperation with Georgia in the period between 2007 and 2013 concluded,

192  J. BERGMANN a range of EU-funded projects, the largest being COBERM I (EUR 4.5 million) and II (EUR 5 million) but also smaller projects totalling EUR 2.4 million implemented by specialist INGOs (International Alert, Conciliation Resources, Saferworld, IISS, Berghof, Pax Christi) with long track records in conflict-related work have enabled direct and indirect contact between stakeholders to the conflict, particularly at the grass-roots and meso levels. (Particip et al. 2015, p. 45)

Particularly, the EU has sought to facilitate dialogue within and between the divided communities and to foster a peaceful transformation of the conflicts through the COBERM mechanism. In the period between 2012 and 2015, the EU spent around €5 million to fund more than 553 confidence-building initiatives (United Nations Development Programme 2018, p. 1). EU assistance to Georgia is centred around a much broader range of priority areas, including democratic development; rule of law and governance; economic development and European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) action plan implementation; poverty reduction and social reforms; education; and support for peaceful settlement of the territorial conflicts (Particip et al. 2015, p. 8). In the period between 2014 and 2017, the EU has provided more than €100 million to Georgia in the framework of the ENP (European Commission 2014, p. 4; 2015, pp. 4–5). Apart from financial assistance, the EU is the largest trading partner of Georgia, with 31% of Georgia’s trade being conducted with the EU in 2015 (European External Action Service 2016b, p. 1). Consequently, maintaining and advancing strong economic relations with the EU is a key priority of the Georgian government. On 27 June 2014, Georgia and the EU signed an Association Agreement that went into force on 1 July 2016. The agreement introduces a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area that establishes a preferential trade regime between the EU and Georgia. By establishing contractual relations with Georgia in the framework of the ENP and the Eastern Partnership, and thereby bringing the country closer to the EU, the Union has developed a powerful instrument to apply conditionality visà-vis Georgia (Dembinski 2011, pp. 135–140). These ties provide the EU with a high degree of leverage in terms of resources, the delivery of which could be made conditional upon Georgia’s demonstrated willingness to make concessions in the GID. In contrast, the EU’s degree of leverage vis-à-vis Abkhazia and South Ossetia is very limited. Due to the EU’s non-recognition of South

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Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states, establishing contractual relations with the entities is very problematic. Certainly, there is some leverage available to the EU stemming from its financial assistance to the two breakaway regions mentioned above. Since the 1990s, the EU has established a considerable track record of supporting confidence-building measures in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, making the European Commission the largest donor in the breakaway regions (European Commission 2007, p. 34). The 2008 Georgian-Russian war, however, tremendously changed the environment for EU assistance to the two separatist entities. Since 2008, EU assistance has been primarily directed at Abkhazia, whereas there has been almost complete foreclosure of EU-funded projects in South Ossetia due to Russia’s blocking of any engagement by international donors in the region (Smolnik 2012, pp. 3–4). In Abkhazia, the EU’s approach of focussing on confidence-building and civil society support is challenged by Russia’s large economic investments in the region. In her comprehensive study on the engagement of the EU, Georgia, and Russia in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Kirova (2012) concludes that even though the EU remains the largest international donor in Abkhazia, financing about 80% of international projects there, its funding of about €15-16 million in the period after the war doesn’t come anywhere close to the almost €460 million provided by Russia since 2009. (Kirova 2012, p. 45)

Russia’s large investment in the regions decreases the attractiveness of the EU’s assistance to them, which puts the EU in a weaker position to demand conciliatory moves towards Georgia from the two entities in return (Interview EU 9; EU_MS 22). EU member state representatives and EU officials dealing with EU–Georgia matters agree that the EU’s degree of leverage vis-à-vis South Ossetia and Abkhazia is thus very limited (Interviews EU_MS 17, 18, 21; EU 8, 9). Additionally, having signed the Association Agreement with Georgia and maintaining the non-recognition policy towards Abkhazia and South Ossetia has further weakened the EU’s leverage vis-à-vis the two entities. EU policy-makers are aware that “the EU’s non-recognition policy is painful to them” (Interview EU 12) and that “we have clearly taken sides and it is also perceived by Abkhazian and South Ossetian authorities in the way that we are on the side of Georgia” (Interview EU 8). Finally, the extent of the EU’s leverage vis-à-vis Russia is disputed among scholars and policy-makers (Leonard and Popescu 2007;

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McKillop 2014; Interviews EU_MS 21, 24). From an economic point of view, there is a strong interdependence between the EU and Russia, particularly in trade and energy relations. The EU is Russia’s main trading partner and the largest investor in Russia. In turn, Russia is the EU’s fourth-largest trading partner and the largest exporter of oil, gas, uranium and coal to the EU (European External Action Service 2016a, p. 1). Due to this strong interdependence between Russia and the EU, some have argued that the EU does not possess any real leverage vis-à-vis Russia because coercive measures such as economic sanctions would have a tremendously negative effect on the EU’s economy (see McKillop 2014). However, the EU’s reaction to the Ukraine crisis in 2014—which led to the imposition of restrictive measures on Russia, including the banning of long-term EU loans for five Russian state-owned banks, the freezing of assets, and visa bans on individuals—has demonstrated that the EU possesses resources that it can use to incentivise or coerce Russia towards a potential change in its foreign policy behavior (Dolidze 2015a, pp. 1–2). Additionally, the EU could use its political relations with Russia that are based on the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement and a number of sectoral agreements to put additional pressure on the Kremlin (Forsberg and Seppo 2010, p. 131). Hence, the EU possesses a certain degree of leverage vis-à-vis Russia that it could use in the context of its mediation and conflict resolution efforts in the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia. At the same time, the fact that “the EU did not want to introduce economic sanctions or other heavier sticks in order to force Russia to withdraw its troops more quickly or to rescind its recognition of the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia” (Forsberg and Seppo 2010, p. 131) after the August war of 2008 demonstrates that the EU has been reluctant to link its bilateral relations with Russia with its conflict resolution policies in the South Caucasus (Interview EU_MS 22, 24). In terms of institutional capacities, the EU has created two important instruments that add to its leverage vis-à-vis the parties, particularly towards Georgia and the two separatist regions. First, the EU Special Representative is one of the few international representatives that is regularly allowed to travel to Sukhumi and Tskhinvali to consult with the Abkhazian and South Ossetian authorities in order to prepare for the next round of the GID (Interview EU 9). Additionally, the Special Representative can draw on the support of a field office in Tbilisi that is composed of up to five advisors who are supporting him in his activities and maintaining close contact with the EU delegation in Georgia and

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the Georgian government (Interview EU 10). Second, the EU deployed the Common Security and Defence Policy mission EUMM Georgia in October 2008. Following the non-extension of the mandates of the OSCE Monitoring Mission and the UNOMIG mission in 2008/2009 (Stöber 2011, pp. 203–205), the EUMM has been the only international peacekeeping mission on the ground, which gives the EU some kind of monopoly on first-hand information from the conflict zones (Whitman and Wolff 2010, p. 93). EU Leverage and Mediation Effectiveness The EU’s leverage is relatively one-sided. Based on its strong ties with Georgia in the framework of the ENP and Eastern Partnership, the EU’s degree of leverage vis-à-vis Georgia is high. Theoretically, the EU also has several possibilities to incentivise or coerce Russia to find compromise agreements with the Georgian government. In contrast, the EU’s degree of leverage vis-à-vis Abkhazia and South Ossetia is medium to low, given the limited scope of the EU’s relations with the two entities. Apart from financial assistance to confidence-building projects in Abkhazia, there are no real incentives the EU could offer to the two regions in exchange for constructive steps in the negotiation process. What do these findings add to the explanation for the EU’s low degree of effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement and the medium degree of effectiveness in terms of goal-attainment? Through the institution of the EU Special Representative and his team, the EU has opened various communication channels with the parties (Interviews EU 7, 9, 12). Due to the Special Representative’s mandate to contribute to conflict resolution in the South Caucasus, the EU has exclusive access to the separatist entities and can undertake regular field trips to Sukhumi and Tskhinvali. Additionally, the EUMM’s engagement in monitoring the ABLs and its involvement in the GID and IPRM meetings have also positively contributed to the EU’s ability to stabilise the security situation and prevent a major escalation of violence (Freire and Simão 2013). Thus, the leverage in terms of institutional capacities has been a conducive factor that enabled the EU to achieve two of its mediator goals to a certain degree. However, the EU’s limited leverage vis-à-vis Abkhazia and South Ossetia has considerably constrained its flexibility in terms of mediation strategies and tactics at its disposal. There are few possibilities to extend ZOA between the parties using positive incentives or coercive measures.

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The EU is thus not able to adopt a strategy of manipulation vis-à-vis the two separatist entities, which decreases its chances to be an effective mediator in terms of conflict settlement. Despite the limited leverage, however, this fact alone does not represent a sufficient explanation for the EU’s low effectiveness in brokering agreements between the parties. Rather, we need to turn to mediation strategy to understand how leverage influenced the EU’s mediation behavior. The EU’s Mediation Strategy: Moving Between Facilitation and Formulation The empirical findings suggest that the joint mediation style of the three co-chairs has primarily followed a strategy of facilitation. That being said, it seems that the EU’s mediation behaviour differs from that of the UN and OSCE to a certain extent, in the way that it goes beyond facilitation and reflects also some patterns of formulation. To start with, the approach of the three co-mediators clearly reflects patterns of facilitation. As the main initiator of the mediation efforts, the EU established the contacts with the parties and invited the UN and OSCE to join the process as co-chairs (Merlingen and Ostrauskaite 2009, p. 23). The co-chairs’ regular field trips to the region ahead of each GID session serve the purpose of making personal contacts with the conflict parties and gaining their trust and confidence—a key element of facilitation (Bercovitch and Lee 2003, p. 3). Apart from bilateral contacts between the co-chairs and the conflict parties, the mediators have also sought to arrange for as many interactions between the parties as possible in the framework of the GID. Informal lunches and dinners as well as expert workshops during the two-day-long rounds of the GID have served to increase the amount of communication between the parties, particularly between the Georgian government and the Abkhazian and South Ossetian authorities, who do not have any other official format that allows for bilateral exchanges (Interviews EU 10, 12).11 In joint press statements—regularly published on the website of the OSCE Chairmanship—the co-chairs have encouraged meaningful communication between the parties, calling “for the pragmatic approach of all stakeholders in addressing the concerns of the local population on the ground” (OSCE 2013, p. 1). Another facilitative tactic that mediators adopt is to clarify the views and needs of each conflict party with the aim of raising awareness on

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the other side of the negotiation table (Beardsley et al. 2006, p. 63; Bercovitch and Lee 2003, p. 3). A good example of the mediators’ use of this tactic in the GID was the invitation of OSCE-associated experts to the 36th GID round in June 2016 to give a presentation about OSCE measures for communication and transparency in conflict situations and threat perceptions in the OSCE area (OSCE 2016b). As EU Special Representative Salber explained, “[W]e then invited GID participants to describe in the round their major threats as they perceive them. We received some very precise replies with concerns that can be addressed” (Salber 2016, p. 3). Additionally, the joint reviews on the security situation in the first working group and on the humanitarian situation in the second working group reflect the co-chairs’ approach to allow for a comprehensive exchange of information between the parties (Interview EU 10). The attempt to supply the parties with missing information they could not gather themselves is a typical element of facilitation, based on the rationale that the provision of additional information may prevent and/ or overcome misunderstandings and confrontations that result from the lack of information (Beardsley et al. 2006, p. 63). Apart from these facilitative tactics, however, there are also several observations that suggest that the co-chairs have played the role of formulators in the GID—in particular, the EU Special Representative and his mediation team. First, the co-chairs have controlled the structure of the talks by designing the negotiation format, setting the dates for the negotiation rounds, and ensuring the privacy of the meetings by providing as little information as possible about the mediation to the public (Interview EU 10, EU 12). When the GID “were very much stuck in discussions between the parties about the format” (Interview EU 12) of the talks in the first few years, the co-chairs sought to keep the process focussed on substantial rather than procedural issues. Interview partners have stressed that this has become an even more important component of the co-chairs’ mediation approach since the third mediation phase (Interviews EU 12; EU_MS 18, 21, 22, 26). Besides procedural issues, the co-chairs have also actively sought to influence the substance of the discussions. As mentioned above, EU Special Representatives Morel and Lefort tried to introduce cooperation on economic issues as a third agenda item of the GID, but the idea was not taken up by the parties (Interview EU 7). Moreover, the co-chairs have actively contributed to the negotiations by making substantive

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suggestions and proposals for compromise agreements between the disputants (Interviews EU 7, 9, 12; Georgia 1, 3). As an EU official explained, “the conflict parties themselves have very rarely put proposals for compromises on the table; rather it is most often the case that the co-chairs bring some proposals into the negotiations” (Interview EU 9). The observations gathered from the interviews suggest that the EU has been the most active co-chair in terms of formulating proposals for compromises between the parties (Interviews Georgia 1, 3; EU 7). According to an EU official, the EU mediation team in the negotiation rounds between 2008 and 2014 was always able to keep the monopoly on propositions, taking ideas from the sides, but being the only one to put papers on the table. Well, the sides could reject them, or discuss them and say that it was unfair, etc., but we kept this monopoly. (Interview EU 7)

A Georgian diplomat confirmed the EU’s leading role in putting a draft version of the agreements on IPRMs of February 2009 on the table: “There were always different versions [of draft agreements] circulating. We circulated our version, the Russians circulated their version, and so on. But yes, the documents were first initiated by the EU” (Interviews Georgia 1; similarly, Georgia 3). The evidence thus suggests that the EU has sought to spur an agreement between the conflict parties through active involvement in the substance of the negotiations, particularly in the first and second mediation phases. At the same time, it has sought to strike a balance between its active involvement and keeping the ownership of the process with the conflict parties—a key feature of the EU’s approach that was particularly visible in the third phase under the leadership of EU Special Representative Salber (Interviews EU 9, 12). It is important to note that the EU has not adopted ‘manipulative’ mediation tactics. In relation to Georgia, the EU has been hesitant to link its relations with the country in the framework of the ENP and the Eastern Partnership closely with its efforts to resolve the conflict on the basis of conditionality. The Association Agreement with Georgia that entered into force in 2016 reiterates the importance of the secessionist conflicts to the bilateral EU–Georgia agenda and calls both on Georgia and the EU to stay committed to a peaceful resolution of the conflicts. However, it does not make the settlement of the conflicts a condition of Georgia’s further EU integration: The Association Agreement reflects

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the EU’s approach of encouraging Georgia to further engage with Abkhazia and South Ossetia, while being cautious not to exert too much pressure on the Georgian government (EU_MS 22, 23, 24). Concerning its relations with Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the EU has limited leverage at its disposal, but it has also appeared to be reluctant to further explore how it can use its leverage to incentivise the two entities. As a member state representative noted, We are in a kind of dilemma here. On the one side, you cannot abandon the Abkhaz population, you have to help them to facilitate travel, for example. On the other side, we have to be careful not to ruin Georgia’s strategy of engagement. (Interview EU_MS 22)

Similarly, an evaluation of the EU’s cooperation with Georgia in the period between 2007 and 2013 concluded that “the EU was politically reluctant at the higher levels to explore the full extent of what could have been usefully and appropriately funded, particularly within Abkhazia” (Particip et al. 2015, p. 45). These statements illustrate the EU’s concerns about making Georgia’s policy of engagement vis-à-vis the two entities less attractive by offering them incentives such as visa-free travel to the EU, which might be even more attractive to them than being allowed to travel freely to Georgia. This reluctance is also related to the different positions taken by the EU member states, which is further elaborated below in the context of EU policy coherence. In sum, the EU’s mediation strategy is best described as a formulation that is coupled with strong facilitative elements, with different nuances in style being set by each EU Special Representative. Mediation Strategy and EU Mediation Effectiveness How does the EU’s mediation strategy help us to explain the low degree of EU mediation effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement and the medium degree of goal-attainment? Along the lines of the theoretical expectations, one could conclude that the low degree of conflict settlement in the case of the GID is primarily conditioned by the facilitative mediation style exerted by the three co-chairs. Although the EU has used formulative tactics in the negotiations, it has not drawn upon its leverage to move the parties towards concessions. For these reasons— the argument would go—the mediation efforts have not led to any

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settlement. Based on the empirical observations, there is some support for this argument, but also some observations that suggest that the explanatory power of mediation strategy in this case is limited. On important conflict issues, the conflict parties’ positions seem to be mutually exclusive (see also below). For example, Georgia is not willing to sign an agreement on the non-use of force with South Ossetia and Abkhazia, whereas Russia refuses to sign a bilateral agreement with Georgia based on the argument that it is not a party to the conflict (Crisis Group 2013, pp. 13–15). In a situation where the parties seem to be defending mutually exclusive positions, there is no ZOA unless the mediator manages to change the calculations of the parties in such a way that they perceive a compromise as serving their underlying interests. If the mediator is neither able nor willing to use leverage to induce a change in the parties’ calculations, conflict settlement fully depends on a change in the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise. In other words, the EU—as well as the OSCE and the UN as co-chairs— fully depends on a change in the strategic cost-benefit calculations of the Russian and Georgian governments as well as the Abkhazian and South Ossetian authorities in their attempt to achieve a partial or even full settlement of the conflicts (Grono 2010, p. 28). To what extent the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise has affected the degree of EU effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement is further discussed below. Nevertheless, the findings suggest that the facilitative and formulative mediation style of the mediators has a positive effect on the EU’s effectiveness in terms of goal-attainment. As mentioned above, the EU has attained its goal of committing the parties to the GID as the primary forum for discussing their conflict. All conflict parties value the GID and have continued to participate in the talks, despite the few results the GID have brought about. To a large extent, this was made possible through the facilitative approach taken by the co-chairs. By allowing all parties to express their views and positions openly in the context of the GID—in the sessions of the working groups and during informal events such as expert workshops—the co-chairs have ensured that the conflict parties value the GID (Interviews Georgia 1; EU 9; EU_MS 18, 22, 26). It is particularly important to the Abkhazian and South Ossetian representatives that they feel that their voices are being heard in the GID and that they are able to address the issues that are of great significance to them (Apsny Press 2015a; Interviews EU_MS 22, 24).

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In a similar vein, facilitation and formulation by the mediators have a positive effect on the stabilisation of the security situation and prevent a re-escalation of the conflicts. Through the regular reviews of the security situation in the second working group, each conflict party is entitled to give their assessments of the situations at the ABLs and to address issues that are of importance to them. The most significant achievement in this regard—the creation of the IPRMs in 2009—was based on an EU proposal, which illustrates the positive effect of the EU’s role in formulation during the discussions between the disputants (Interviews Georgia 1, 3; EU 7). In a phase of the GID where the parties were very much obsessed with procedural issues rather than the substance of the conflict (Interviews EU 7, 12), it is hard to imagine that the conflict parties would have achieved this agreement without the EU’s active involvement as an agenda-setter and formulator. In sum, the findings suggest that the EU’s reluctance to use conditionality leverage vis-à-vis the conflict parties may have prevented it from achieving a higher degree of conflict settlement. At the same time, the mix of a strategy of facilitation and formulation has been conducive to the EU’s effectiveness in committing the parties to the mediation process and preventing a major re-escalation of violence. In other words, the findings demonstrate that a non-manipulative strategy may also have its merits, particularly when the mediator’s short-term objective is to stabilise the security situation. EU Policy Coherence: Unity in Support of the GID, Divisions on EU–Russia Relations Starting with the coordination between the EU’s mediation efforts and the member states’ approach to the conflict (i.e., vertical coherence), the empirical findings suggest that EU member states have lent a high degree of support to the EU mediation team, resulting in close coordination between them and the EU Special Representative. At the same time, there are dividing lines among the EU member states concerning their positions on EU–Russia relations that spill over to EU–Georgia relations, and thus indirectly affect the EU’s mediation efforts as well. To start with, EU member states have shown a strong level of support for the EU Special Representative’s efforts in conflict resolution in general, and in the GID in particular. The member states have been strong supporters of the Special Representative and his role as

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the main representative of the Union in the GID (Interviews EU 7, 9, 12; EU_MS 17, 18, 20, 22, 25). Since 2003, the member states have shown their commitment to the Special Representative by extending the mandate and increasing the budget they have at their disposal (Council of the European Union 2006, 2008a, 2011, 2015). In addition, the member states have pleaded for maintaining the position of the Special Representative for the South Caucasus against the opposing voices that have questioned its utility. Although these debates have been held behind closed doors, media sources and interviews with EU member state officials and EU representatives indicate that there were considerations undertaken by High Representative Ashton and within the EEAS, both in 2010 and 2014, to eliminate the position of the Special Representative and fully incorporate the staff working on Georgia’s conflicts into respective divisions within the EEAS (Ursu and Vashakmadze 2010, p. 1; Interviews EU 7, 12; EU_MS 18, 24). The support of the member states given to the Special Representatives reflects their belief in the utility of having an independent representative of the Union who mediates on behalf of the member states (Interviews EU_MS 17, 21, 24). The EU Special Representative and his team brief the member states regularly on the GID in sessions of the PSC and the Working Party on Eastern Europe and Central Asia (COEST). These briefings serve as an important basis for the evaluation of the Special Representative’s work in the discussions about the extension of their mandate (Interviews EU_MS 21, 22, 26). Moreover, the exchanges with the Special Representatives and the other co-chairs allow the member states to form a joint position on the conflict that can also be conveyed through bilateral communications: The member states are regularly briefed by the co-chairs on their efforts. We have the possibility of a feedback and a regular common coordination and reflection on the subject. We meet and discuss all the ideas and messages. And when a message is converging, we make sure that everyone conveys this message to support the [EU Special Representative’s] efforts, that it is really one EU, one voice. (Interview EU_MS 22)

The high degree of coordination between the Special Representative and the member states is also a function of the limited mandate of the GID, which means that “it occurs rarely that we discuss issues that are controversial among the member states” in bodies such as the PSC and COEST (Interview EU 9).

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Nevertheless, there are dividing lines among the member states concerning the EU’s relations with Russia and Georgia, which are at least indirectly related to the GID. Concerning EU–Russia relations, there are divergent positions on the question of how to deal with Russia in the context of territorial conflicts in the Eastern neighbourhood, including— but not limited to—the conflicts over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.12 On this question, EU foreign policy scholars differentiate between two groups of EU member states, a more Russia-friendly camp (composed of those, like France and Germany, which prioritize bilateral relations with Russia over a common EU approach) and a more Russia-sceptic camp (including primarily Poland, Sweden and the Baltic States, as well as at times the UK) which prefer a much tougher line. (Whitman and Wolff 2010, p. 96; see also Grono 2010, p. 26)

The dividing line between these two groups of member states has also been felt in discussions related to the EU’s co-mediation role in the GID. On the one hand, there are different views on the question of whether to push Russia towards a more constructive attitude in resolving the conflicts over Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Interviews EU 9, 11). In other words, some member states are less convinced about the utility of using leverage or coercion to move Russia towards agreement to a negotiated settlement of the conflict. In contrast, other member states such as Poland and the Baltic states have frequently demanded that a tougher approach be adopted towards Russia and that a response be given to the Georgian government’s calls for a firm rejection by the EU of Russia’s military presence in Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Interview EU 9; Georgia 1). On the other hand, the dividing line is also reflected in EU–Georgia relations in the context of the ENP and the EU’s measures to support Georgia’s conflict resolution policies (Interviews EU 8; EU_MS 18). According to a member state official, “The states that take a critical view on Russia are also very sceptic when we [the EU] try to encourage the Georgian side to strive for a stronger outreach vis-à-vis Abkhazia and South Ossetia” (Interview EU_MS 18). Instead, these states have called for a stronger affirmation of the EU’s support for Georgia’s territorial integrity and the non-recognition policy vis-à-vis the breakaway regions (Delcour 2011, pp. 59–61; Interviews EU 7; EU_MS 22; Georgia 1, 3). However, these calls contrast with the EU Special Representative’s policy of not verbalising the EU’s stance on non-recognition in the GID in order to keep the discussions as status-neutral as possible (Interview EU 9).

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In sum, the conclusion on the EU’s vertical coherence in the GID is two-fold: There is a high level of support given by the member states to the EU Special Representative’s mediation efforts in the framework of the GID. Simultaneously, there are profound dividing lines among EU member states about the EU’s broader approach towards Russia and Georgia. These divisions do not directly touch upon substantial issues related to the GID, but they are indirectly linked to them, as they concern the EU’s broader conflict resolution policies in the region. In other words, there is only a moderate degree of coordination among member states concerning the EU’s approach towards Russia and its stance towards the non-recognition of the two separatist entities. The empirical findings of this case study point to a medium degree of EU horizontal coherence as a co-mediator in the GID. In general, the position of the EU Special Representative is closely linked to all key institutions in the CFSP, namely the High Representative, the Council, the Commission, and the member states. The EU Special Representatives implement their mandate under the authority of the High Representative, but act relatively autonomously in their daily work and are only loosely tied to the EEAS’ institutional structure. Their primary contact point is the PSC (Adebahr 2012, p. 158). The EU Special Representative’s added value notwithstanding, the creation of the post of the EU Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia in 2008 certainly complicated institutional coordination within the EU (Whitman and Wolff 2010, p. 94). President Sarkozy’s insistence on appointing French diplomat Morel as an EU Special Representative for the crisis in Georgia in the first mediation phase (2008–2011), in fact, undermined the role of the EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus, Peter Semneby, and led to “an unnecessary overlap of mandates and competences” (Whitman and Juncos 2009, p. 206). In other words, the creation of the Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia meant primarily a duplication of competences due to French interests in keeping a high degree of control over the conflict settlement process (Popescu 2009, p. 470). As an interviewee put it, In strategic terms, it was maybe not so helpful to establish the position of the [EU Special Representative] for the Crisis in Georgia. The position was not really needed, as Semneby was a specialist on this region, widely accepted by all parties. (Interview EU 11)

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It was not before 2011 that this institutional overlap was removed when the EU decided to merge the two posts into the position of the EU Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia and the South Caucasus. Thereby, the EU also responded to Abkhazian and South Ossetian threats not to talk any longer to an EU representative whose official position’s wording suggested that they were a part of the territory of Georgia (Crisis Group 2011, p. 5). Concerning the coordination between the EU Special Representative and other EU institutions on the ground, that is, between the Special Representative’s team and the EU Delegation and EUMM Georgia, the findings both point to patterns of cooperation and competition—the latter to a limited degree though. In the period after the 2008 war, EU diplomats reported about turf battles between the different EU institutions based in Tbilisi (Grono 2010, p. 17; Interview EU 11). Although these coordination problems have largely been resolved with the merger of the two Special Representative positions, the coordination between actors on the ground has primarily depended on personal relationships between individuals working at different institutions (Interview EU 7; EU 12). The evaluation report on EU–Georgia relations between 2007 and 2013 commissioned by the European Commission concluded that while often excellent functional collaboration existed at the personal level (e.g. between the [EU Special Representative’s] office and the EU Delegation operations section) joint work was not necessarily encouraged, enabled, or rewarded higher up in the EU hierarchy of the individual EUMM, [EU Special Representative], EUD (DEVCO/EEAS) entities. Fixation with individual mandates at the higher levels trumped more strategic, collective and creative working together, undermining all aspects including the cooperation aspect. (Particip et al. 2015, p. 46)

The interviews with officials working in these EU institutions support the finding that there has been a solid working relationship between the different EU players on the ground (Interviews EU 10, 12). At the same time, there have also been disagreements and tensions concerning more political and strategic questions, such as on the question of how to react to Abkhazian threats in 2012 to pull out of the GID if the EUMM’s Head of Mission, General Tyszkiewicz, was not replaced (Interviews EU 7; 11, 12).

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EU Policy Coherence and Mediation Effectiveness How have vertical and horizontal coherence influenced the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator? Can we establish that EU coherence has had a positive or negative effect on mediation effectiveness? The member states’ support for the EU Special Representative has signalled the EU’s strong determination to contribute to a peaceful settlement of the conflict (Interviews Georgia 1, 2, 3). Through their continuous support for the Special Representative, the member states have also demonstrated the EU’s commitment to keep the GID as the main negotiation platform on the conflict over South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which has been a precondition for the EU to attain the goal of committing the parties to the GID as well. The member states also provide the EU Special Representative with a certain degree of leeway to adopt different mediation tactics, if necessary. The engagement of individual member states, such as in the box tree moth dossier, has positively contributed to EU Special Representative Salber’s efforts to build a basic degree of trust between the conflict parties (Interview EU 9; EU_MS 18). At the same time, the moderate degree of coordination concerning the member states’ approach vis-à-vis Georgia and Russia seems to have influenced the EU’s effectiveness in different ways. Georgian officials stated that they have perceived the EU member states as acting in concert both when it comes to their support of the Special Representative as a mediator in the GID and the non-recognition policy (Interviews Georgia 1, 3). The member states’ outspoken commitment to the non-recognition policy is perceived as a positive signal in Tbilisi. In contrast, the fact that the EU’s support for Georgia’s territorial integrity “has become a mantra we state at every meeting” (Interview EU_MS 22) has run counter to the Special Representative’s policy not to verbalise excessively on the EU’s stance on non-recognition in the GID (Interview EU 9). The limited coordination between the member states on this matter has reduced the EU’s acceptability vis-à-vis South Ossetia and Abkhazia (Grono 2010, pp. 23–26). Interviews with EU officials and civil society and academic experts support the argument that the EU’s non-recognition policy has created doubts in Sukhumi and Tskhinvali about the EU’s neutrality and credibility as a mediator. In turn, these doubts may undermine their willingness to compromise in the GID in the long run (Interviews EU 9, CS 13; Grono 2010, p. 23).

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The EU’s Coordination with the UN and OSCE Co-mediators Mediator coordination captures the quality of interaction between mediators in multi-party mediation settings. The underlying hypothesis is that mediator coordination has a positive influence on mediation effectiveness as the pooling of resources and capabilities increases the leverage the mediators have at their disposal and opens new possibilities to move the conflict parties towards agreement. The empirical results point to a high degree of coordination between the EU, the UN, and the OSCE, based on regular and intensive communication, common positions on the management of the GID, and the beneficial use of joint resources and knowledge. Regular, frequent contact and personal encounters between the individual members of the three mediation teams have been important elements of the coordination between the three organisations. The three co-chairs and their teams meet four times a year in the context of the GID meetings, conduct four to six joint travels every year to the conflict region and Moscow, and have an additional two to three meetings held exclusively for mediator coordination—one of them usually organised in New York (Interviews EU 7, EU 9). Taken together, there are at least 10 personal encounters every year between the three organisations’ representatives that allow for close coordination on their joint mediation approach. The organisations also hold regular telephone conferences to keep each other updated on the latest developments in the conflict region (Interview EU 9). The communication and coordination between the organisations in these meetings have been described as very cooperative and mutually beneficial. Close coordination has ensured that the co-chairs turn up with a joint position on how to manage the negotiations at every meeting of the GID (Interviews EU 7, 9; Salber 2016, p. 4). Apart from regular communication and exchanges of information, the three organisations have also pooled their resources and expertise in the context of their joint mediation efforts. EU officials have frequently emphasised that one key asset of the UN and the OSCE has been their long-standing experience in managing the conflicts over South Ossetia (OSCE) and Abkhazia (UN) (Morel 2009, p. 1; Salber 2016, p. 4; Interview EU 11). When the mandate of the OSCE Mission to Georgia expired on 30 June 2009, it marked the end of a 17-year-long presence of up to 183 OSCE officials who had been engaged in contributing to

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a peaceful settlement of the South Ossetian-Georgian conflict (Stöber 2011, pp. 203–205). Similarly, the UNOMIG mission had involved a maximum of 459 staff members for almost 16 years who monitored the Abkhaz-Georgian ceasefire agreement and engaged in brokering a peaceful settlement of the conflict (UNOMIG 2009). The organisations’ experience in managing the two conflicts has been helpful in various ways. For example, the establishment of the IPRMs was not an invention brought about by the GID but was based on similar mechanisms organised by the OSCE and the UN in the period before the August war of 2008. According to an EU official, the agreement on the IPRMs was initiated by an EU proposal, but the draft text built on experiences that the UN and the OSCE had had with similar mechanisms before the August 2008 war (Interview EU 11). Another example is the co-moderator role played by the UNHCR in the second working group of the GID. Having provided emergency humanitarian assistance to refugees and IDPs that have fled Abkhazia since 1993, the UNHCR has gathered tremendous expertise on refugee/IDP related matters and has served as an important provider of objective information on the situation of IDPs and refugees in Georgia (UNHCR 2009; United Nations General Assembly 2014, 2016). Moreover, interview partners reported that the three organisations have been circulating papers and drafts of potential agreements among each other in order to benefit from each other’s input before presenting the proposals to the conflict parties (Interviews EU 7, 9). As mentioned above, the mediators have also frequently drawn upon the expertise of the OSCE on conflict management-related issues such as confidence-building and arms control, inviting OSCE experts to give presentations at workshops on topics relevant in the context of the GID (Salber 2016, p. 3; Interview EU 7). The findings presented above indicate that Special Representative Salber’s praise of the cooperation between the three co-chairs reflects the empirical reality: I see only advantages in having the EU, the OSCE and UN Co-Chairing the GID together […] I am convinced that the close EU, OSCE and UN co-operation that we have established for the conduct of the GID, is something that can serve as an example in other conflict management and resolution processes. (Salber 2016, p. 4)

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In sum, the empirical results suggest a high degree of mediator coordination and well-working relationship between the EU, the UN, and the OSCE. Mediator Coordination and EU Effectiveness In light of the low degree of effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement, one is led to conclude that successful mediator coordination has had little impact. The most plausible explanation is that a high degree of mediator coordination has not changed much in terms of the conflict parties’ calculations and their willingness to compromise. The high degree of mediator coordination relates primarily to the sharing and pooling of resources in terms of expertise and institutional capacities. In other words, mediator coordination has contributed to an increase in mediator capacities, but it has not added up to the amount of resources available to incentivise the parties to overcome their incompatibilities. Nevertheless, the findings also suggest that the high degree of mediator coordination has positively influenced the mediators’ ability to jointly steer and conduct the mediation efforts in Geneva. With the three organisations taking joint positions against the walk-outs of participants from GID sessions and calling jointly for the continuation of discussions despite perceived deadlocks (OSCE 2012a, b), mediator coordination has strongly contributed to the continuation of the mediation process (Interviews EU 7, 9, 12). Additionally, from a counterfactual point of view, it is evident that a low degree of mediator coordination could have been exploited by the conflict parties and substantially increased the chances of the breakdown of negotiations. Thus, it is plausible to argue that mediator coordination has positively contributed to the EU’s ability to commit the parties to the Geneva talks. Similarly, the assessment of mediator coordination demonstrates that the contributions of the OSCE and the UN to the mediation effort have been particularly felt in the field of security management and stabilisation. Both organisations have played an important role in facilitating the IPRM meetings and have provided important input for the discussions in the first working group (Salber 2016, p. 4; Interview EU 11). Thus, the pooling of resources and sharing of information has positively contributed to the prevention of renewed escalations of violence and a stabilisation of the security situation—a key process goal of the EU.

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In sum, the findings suggest that mediator coordination has increased the EU’s mediator leverage, but it has not influenced its effectiveness in settling the conflicts in a tangible manner. At the same time, the high degree of mediator coordination has positively contributed to the EU’s effectiveness in attaining its goals related to the mediation process. Hence, one conclusion is that mediator coordination can positively influence dimensions of mediation effectiveness related to the mediation process, but it does not have a clearly traceable, direct effect on mediation outcomes and conflict settlement. The Conflict Parties’ Willingness to Compromise: Not Going Beyond the Lowest Common Denominator Having failed to achieve any substantial agreements for almost 10 years, one is inclined to ask why the conflict parties adhere to the GID and continue to meet every three months with the opposing side in Geneva. The main reason is that there is one common denominator all parties can subscribe to, that is, a shared interest in participating in the GID and continuing the mediation process (Interviews EU 7; EU_MS 23, 25; Georgia 1, 3). For all conflict parties, consenting to participate in the mediation process is less costly than not engaging in it at all, and it serves their own interests (Grono 2010, p. 23). From the Georgian perspective, the GID are important for keeping the conflicts and the search for their peaceful resolution on the radar of the international community. Even before the 2008 August war, the Georgian government had sought to internationalise the management of the two conflicts, thus seeking the support of international actors such as the United States and the EU against a perceived Russian threat (Interviews EU 11; EU_MS 22). As a Georgian official noted, “Our interest is to preserve the Geneva talks. In Georgia, no one doubts the importance of the Geneva International Discussions” (Interview Georgia 1). From the standpoint of representatives of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the GID provide an opportunity to demonstrate their international actorness and their diplomatic capacities to represent themselves in multilateral negotiations (Frear 2015, pp. 8–9). For Russia, the participation in the GID allows for a considerable degree of influence over political and security dynamics in the region, demonstrates the legitimacy of Russia’s role as an important player in the region, and acknowledges its long-standing involvement in regional conflict management mechanisms

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since the 1990s (Kuzmicheva 2011, pp. 15–17). In addition, by participating in the GID, Russia seeks to refute claims that it has not fulfilled its obligations stemming from the ‘Sarkozy-Medvedev agreement’, as Russian officials call the Six-Point Plan (Karasin 2009, pp. 2, 5). Thus, there is a shared interest by all conflict parties “to keep the topic on the agenda of the international community” (Interview EU_MS 22) by preserving the GID as the main mediation forum. Apart from this consensus on the added value of the GID, the conflict parties’ preferences concerning the management of the conflict and the main conflict issues hardly overlap, resulting in a “toxic mix of divergent interests” (Merlingen and Ostrauskaite 2009, p. 24). As the following analysis demonstrates, there is a low degree of willingness to make substantial compromises on all sides. A cornerstone of the Georgian government’s policy vis-à-vis South Ossetia and Abkhazia has been the pursuit of restoring Georgia’s territorial integrity. Despite differences in degrees, all Georgian administrations since the 1990s have emphasised that the restoration of Georgia’s territorial integrity is a core government objective (Government of Georgia 2012, pp. 3–4). Consequently, non-recognition of South Ossetia’s and Abkhazia’s de facto independence has been a firm red line of Georgian policy vis-à-vis the two entities since the 1990s (Grono 2010, p. 31). After the August 2008 war and the failed attempt to restore national sovereignty in South Ossetia by military means, the Georgian government sought a peaceful way to “reintegrate these territories and their populations into Georgia’s constitutional ambit” (Government of Georgia 2010, p. 1). The perception of the Georgian political elite—and a vast majority of the Georgian population—is that the conflicts over Abkhazia and South Ossetia primarily reflect a Georgian-Russian confrontation (Grono 2010, p. 10; Interviews EU 8, 9, Georgia 1, 2, 3). As a Georgian government official explains, this view on the conflict has become even more compelling to Georgia’s political elite since the August 2008 war: “From our perspective, 2008 really demonstrated that it is a conflict between Georgia and Russia. The key is the political conflict between Georgia and Russia. The main obstacle to solve this conflict is Russia” (Interview Georgia 1). When the Georgian Dream coalition, led by Bidzina Ivanishvili, won the October 2012 parliamentary elections and the October 2013 presidential elections, there was a shift in tone vis-à-vis Russia and the two breakaway regions towards more cooperative relationships. However,

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despite symbolic measures such as the renaming of the Ministry of Reintegration into the Ministry for Reconciliation and Civic Equality, the Georgian government has kept to its firm red lines, that is, nonrecognition of Abkhazia’s and South Ossetia’s independence and the demand for the return of ethnic Georgian IDPs to their homes in Abkhazia (Frear 2015, p. 14; Interview Georgia 2). Moreover, Tbilisi continues to refuse to sign a non-use of force agreement with South Ossetia and Abkhazia unless Moscow makes a similar pledge to the one made by President Saakashvili in 2010 (Crisis Group 2013, p. 14). In Russia, there is a completely different understanding of the conflicts when compared to the Georgian interpretation. The Russian government does not interpret the secessionist conflicts as an extension of a larger Georgian-Russian confrontation. In contrast, Russia has considered itself as a third party in the international efforts to resolve the territorial conflicts in the South Caucasus and has regularly emphasised that it is not a party to the conflicts (Crisis Group 2013, p. 2; Mikhelidze 2010, p. 4). This understanding as a third-party conflict manager in the Georgian– Abkhaz and Georgian–South Ossetian conflicts has been reinforced by Russia’s involvement in the UN- and OSCE-sponsored conflict settlement mechanisms, which existed before the August 2008 war, and its contribution to international peacekeeping efforts in the conflict zones since the 1990s. However, analysts agree that, in the pre-August 2008 war period, Russia did not demonstrate a great interest in resolving the conflicts and focussed rather on tactical steps to avoid their re-escalation (Kuzmicheva 2011, pp. 15–17). Since the Five-Day War with Georgia, Russia has shown even less interest in contributing to the resolution of the conflicts over Abkhazia and South Ossetia due to its satisfaction with the new status quo since August 2008. The Five-Day War has significantly increased Russia’s political and military control over the breakaway regions. In an interview with the Crisis Group, a Russian diplomat stated that about 5000 Russian security forces—3500 soldiers and 1500 officers of the Federal Security Service (FSB)—were stationed in Abkhazia in 2013 (Crisis Group 2013, p. 3). A report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) estimates that 7000 Russian troops were deployed in South Ossetia and Abkhazia by 2017 (Kuimova and Wezeman 2018, p. 12). Although there exists a certain degree of uncertainty about the actual size of Russian forces deployed in the region, it seems that Russia’s self-declared role as a guarantor of South Ossetia’s

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and Abkhazia’s security has provided the country with an excellent opportunity to strengthen its military build-up in a strategically important region (Grono 2010, p. 31). On the issue of the non-use of force, Russian negotiator Grigory Karasin has repeatedly refused to sign a bilateral agreement with Georgia based on the argument that Russia is not a conflict party and that such an agreement should be reached between Georgia and the two breakaway regions (Crisis Group 2013, p. 14; Interview EU 8). Instead, Russian negotiators in the GID tabled “a set of principles for the preparation of draft agreements on the non-use of force between Georgia and Abkhazia and Georgia and South Ossetia, which would be of legally binding nature” in the May 2009 negotiation round (Karasin 2009, p. 5). Moreover, Russian diplomats have unambiguously stated that they are not considering rescinding Russia’s recognition of South Ossetia’s and Abkhazia’s independence and are not willing to withdraw Russian troops from the territories, arguing that Russian military bases “were set up at the invitation and with the agreement of the authorities of the host countries” (Karasin 2009, p. 3). In contrast, Russia has sought to gradually strengthen the economic and military ties with the two entities. Clear indicators of this effort are the Russian-Abkhaz Treaty on Alliance and Strategic Partnership, signed in December 2014, and the Russian-South Ossetian Treaty on Alliance and Integration, signed in March 2015—both significantly strengthen Russia’s foothold in the politics and economics of the breakaway regions (Dolidze 2014, 2015b). In sum, as far as Russia is concerned, there is a low degree of willingness to compromise on anything that would change the favourable status quo and undermine Russia’s influence on South Ossetia and Abkhazia. As an EU member state official put it, “Russia is very comfortable with the current situation [in the conflict zones] and has close to zero incentives to change anything about it” (Interview EU_MS 18). South Ossetian and Abkhazian elites’ preferences and their willingness to compromise are influenced—and to a certain extent controlled— by Russian involvement in the GID (Crisis Group 2013, p. 13; Frear 2015, p. 89). Since the 2008 August war, a common denominator of Abkhazian and South Ossetian interests has been their fierce rejection of any form of reintegration into Georgia. However, their preferences concerning the desired status of their territories differ (Grono 2010, p. 31; Whitman and Wolff 2010, p. 100).

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The main goal of Abkhazian political elites has always been full independence from Georgia. As Abkhazian Deputy Foreign Minister Irakli Khintba stated in an article in 2010, “[I]ndependence still remains the uncontested goal for the Abkhaz people” (Khintba 2010, p. 2). In contrast, South Ossetian political elites have primarily striven for unification with the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania, and thus integration with the Russian Federation (König 2005, pp. 239–240). In a study on the public opinion in post-Soviet de facto states, O’Loughlin et al. (2015, pp. 448–449) found that these preferences are largely shared by the local populations, with more than 80% of the respondents in South Ossetia choosing integration with Russia as their preferred political option to the final status of their republic, whereas mostly 80% of the ethnic Abkhaz respondents in Abkhazia opted for independence instead of integration with Russia.13 The differences in the long-term goals of South Ossetia and Abkhazia concerning their political status also explain their varying degrees of alignment with Russia since the 2008 war. Both entities benefit politically and economically from the current status quo, which explains their fierce opposition to reintegration into Georgia. As mentioned above, Russian military presence on their territories grants the two entities a credible security guarantee. In economic terms, Russia has become an important provider of financial support to the South Ossetian and Abkhaz authorities (Crisis Group 2013, p. 6). An interview partner noted that the Georgian government estimates that in 2015 the share of Russian contributions to the budgets of South Ossetia and Abkhazia was relatively high: “For Abkhazia the estimated share is about 60%, for South Ossetia about 80%” (Interview Georgia 2). The bilateral treaties signed between Russia and South Ossetia in March 2015 and between Russia and Abkhazia in December 2014 have increased the de facto states’ dependence on Russia. Although both treaties establish coordination of the entities’ foreign policies with Russia and a common space of defence and security, the wording of the Abkhaz version of the treaty is more sensitive to Abkhazia’s aspirations of full, internationally recognised independence (Dolidze 2014). In contrast, the South Ossetian version of the treaty foresees a delegation of executive power over external policy, border control, and the military to the Russian Federation and abolishes customs check points between their borders, all of which are decisive steps that prepare South Ossetia for a full integration into the Russian Federation (Dolidze 2015b). Abkhazia’s and South Ossetia’s dependence on Russia also lowers their willingness

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to make any concessions to Georgia that might indicate a departure from their fierce opposition against reintegration into Georgia. Hence, there is no willingness at all to find compromises that would lower the degree of autonomy from Georgia that the two entities currently enjoy. On the issue of the non-use of force, representatives of Abkhazia and South Ossetia have demanded to sign bilateral non-use of force treaties with Georgia (Crisis Group 2013, p. 14). In contrast, in the second working group, Abkhaz participants have shown no real willingness to find a compromise agreement with Georgia on the return of refugees who fled the Abkhazia-Georgia war in the 1990s (Crisis Group 2013, p. 13). In sum, the analysis of the conflict parties’ positions and red lines on the conflict issues demonstrates that Georgia’s expected gains from a settlement reached through mediation in the GID are moderate, given that the political status of Abkhazia and South Ossetia is not under discussion in the GID framework. The best gains to be hoped for are security guarantees by Russia and the return of refugees to Abkhazia. At the same time, the expected gains for Russia and the two breakaway regions from an agreement with Georgia are minimal, as the status quo serves the political and economic interests of their political elites. The Conflict Parties’ Willingness to Compromise and EU Mediation Effectiveness The findings on the conflict parties’ preferences and red lines concerning the substance of the negotiations demonstrate that a ZOA is virtually non-existent. On the issue of the non-use of force, Russia strongly refuses to sign an agreement with Georgia or make a unilateral pledge on the non-use of force based on the argument that it is not a conflict party. In turn, Georgia refuses to sign bilateral agreements with Abkhazia and South Ossetia. On humanitarian issues, Abkhazian participants have blocked any serious discussions on the return of refugees because they perceive Georgia’s claims for refugee return as a threat to Abkhazia’s security (Crisis Group 2013, p. 13). The low degree of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise on humanitarian issues explains the EU’s limited effectiveness in attaining the goal of improving the living conditions of the affected populations. Without the conflict parties’ willingness to solve the issue of refugees and IDPs, there will be no visible improvements in the living conditions of a great share of the affected populations.

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Due to a low level of willingness to find common solutions on any substantial issues, a compromise agreement between the conflict parties is out of reach. In turn, this explains the EU’s low degree of effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement. As demonstrated above, the incentives for all parties to move away from their reservation points and make concessions to their opponents are either scarce or non-existent. This circumstance diminishes considerably the likelihood of rapprochement between the disputants involved in the mediation. The finding that the EU has attained its goals of committing the parties to the GID and prevented a major re-escalation of the conflict is a function of the conflict parties’ sole common denominator: the consensus that the GID are a valuable and irreplaceable negotiation platform that must be preserved (EU 7; EU_MS 22, 24; Georgia 1, 3). Through the continuation of the GID and IPRM meetings, the co-mediators have established platforms where the conflict parties can exchange information on the security situations at the ABLs, which is an important condition for preventing future escalations of violence in the conflict zones. In sum, the findings presented here support the hypothesis that assumes a positive relationship between the conflict parties’ expected gains, their willingness to compromise, and the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator. Hence, the conflict parties’ unwillingness to compromise on the most important conflict issues has resulted in a deadlock of the mediation process, which explains the EU’s relatively low degree of effectiveness as mediator. As long as some of the conflict parties perceive the status quo as being favourable and the best alternative to a compromise agreement, it is unlikely that major compromises will occur. The Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness: Difficult to Judge The internal cohesiveness of a conflict party can have a positive effect on its room for manoeuvre, and thus extend the ZOA between the opposing sides. As regards the conflict parties represented in the GID, it is difficult to make empirically substantiated claims about their internal cohesiveness except from the Georgian side. Although there are a few recent studies that take an ‘inside look’ into Abkhazia and South Ossetia by investigating public opinions and political attitudes in the de facto states (O’Loughlin et al. 2011, 2015; Toal and O’Loughlin 2013), little is known about the political elites in the two separatist regions and their internal cohesiveness. Moreover, as it was not possible for me to conduct

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interviews with policy-makers in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, substantial amounts of data on the internal politics of the two entities is scarce. What we can ascertain from studies about public opinion in Abkhazia and South Ossetia is that there exists broad public support for the overall direction of the respective authorities’ policies, including a high level of trust in the political leaders (O’Loughlin et al. 2015, pp. 439–442). In the case of Georgia, there is some evidence on different factions both in the Saakashvili-led government (2008–2012) and the Georgian Dream coalition government (2012–2016). Interview partners differentiated between ‘hardliners’ and ‘moderates’ in the Georgian government. Government officials representing the hardliner faction insist on reading the conflict as a Georgian-Russian confrontation and emphasise that the restoration of Georgia’s territorial integrity should be the government’s primary objective (Interviews EU 7, 8, 9). Allegedly, this is a position mainly held by officials working in the Ministry of the Interior and the security and intelligence authorities (Interview EU 9). The more moderate position within the government is primarily attributed to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It emphasises the need to engage with the entities and find some room for cooperation, thus pursuing a ‘soft power’ approach towards Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Interview EU 8, 9). The extent to which these divisions influence the overall mediation process, however, is difficult to ascertain. Simultaneously, the analysis above of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise demonstrates that it is, in particular, the low degree of willingness to compromise on the opposing side—Abkhazian, South Ossetian, and Russian negotiators—that has impeded the co-chairs from brokering any substantial agreement between the parties.

5.4  Explaining EU Mediation Effectiveness in the GID Since October 2008, the GID have been the main mediation platform for the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Together with the UN and the OSCE, the EU has played a leading role in mediating between the conflict parties. The empirical findings on the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator in the GID are two-fold. First, the EU has been largely ineffective in terms of conflict settlement as the GID have not led to agreements on any conflict issue. Apart from the process agreement of holding additional talks on the security situation at the ABLs in the format of the IPRMs and agreements on a few confidence-building

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measures, the mediation efforts have not produced any tangible results. Second, the EU has been relatively more effective in terms of goal-attainment, achieving its objective of committing the parties to the GID and keeping the mediation process ongoing, despite continuing tensions between the disputants and regular threats of withdrawals. Moreover, the EU has also attained—to a medium degree though—the goal of preventing a renewed outbreak of violence in the conflict zones and stabilising the security situation. However, the EU has not been effective in achieving two other main objectives, that is, brokering agreements that improve the living conditions of the affected populations and contributing to the overall settlement of the conflicts. Taking the two dimensions of effectiveness together, the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator in the GID does not exceed a low to medium degree. To explain these findings, I analysed six conditions of EU mediation effectiveness: mediator leverage, mediation strategy, policy coherence, mediator coordination, the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise and the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness. Relating the values of the independent variables to the dependent variable, EU mediation effectiveness, suggests that the empirical findings are only partly consistent with the hypotheses developed in Chapter 2. The findings on the degree of mediator leverage (medium) and mediation strategy (formulation) are largely consistent with the values we would expect if based on the finding of a low to medium degree of EU mediation effectiveness. Concerning coherence, the EU’s high degree of coherence does not seem to match the low to medium degree of EU effectiveness. Moreover, the high degree of mediator coordination is incongruent with the hypothesised positive effect on EU mediation effectiveness. The factor that matches the theoretical expectations best is the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise (low to medium) (Table 5.3). A closer look at the findings on all conditioning factors supports the conclusion that the conflict parties’ (un)willingness to compromise is the primary explanatory factor for the EU’s relative ineffectiveness as a mediator in the GID. Although Georgia has shown a moderate degree of willingness to compromise, the willingness of Russia, South Ossetia, and Abkhazia to make concessions is even lower. For Russia and the separatist entities, the expected gains from a compromise agreement with Georgia are low because the current status quo serves their political and economic interests. As the ZOA on the two most important issues discussed in the GID—the non-use of force and the return of refugees and

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IDPs—is virtually zero, the negotiations have resulted in a deadlock, which explains the low degree of conflict settlement. The EU’s relative effectiveness in achieving the process goals of committing the parties to the GID and stabilising the security situation is primarily a function of the parties’ willingness to continue the negotiations in the GID format and to seek to prevent further outbreaks of violence at the ABLs. In fact, this seems to be the only position that all conflict parties share. This very limited space for compromise agreements strongly constrains the impact that leverage, mediation strategy, coherence and mediator coordination can have with regard to EU mediation effectiveness. Among these conditions, the EU’s mediation strategy, which is based on a mix of facilitation and formulation, has still proven to be the most influential factor as it has influenced positively the conflict parties’ commitments to the mediation process and enabled a stabilisation of the security situation by the establishment of the IPRMs, thus preventing a major re-escalation of violence between the disputants. The EU’s leverage vis-à-vis Georgia and the high degree of policy coherence and mediator coordination seem to have been conducive to the mediation process, but they have not had a clearly traceable, direct effect on the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator. In sum, the findings of my analysis point to the centrality of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise to explain EU mediation effectiveness. For more than 10 years, the negotiations in the GID have made no significant progress, which is primarily due to the non-existence of a ZOA between the parties. In such a situation, the EU’s influence on the conflict parties and the chances for a settlement of the conflict are Table 5.3  Summarising the findings on conditions of EU mediation effectiveness in the GID Conditions of EU mediation effectiveness

Degrees/values of conditions

Mediator leverage Mediation strategy EU coherence Mediator coordination Conflict parties’ willingness to compromise Conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness

Medium Facilitation/formulation Medium High Low to medium mediuma

Source Own compilation a Points to the unavailability of data to fully assess the value of this variable

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limited. Nevertheless, the analysis has also pointed to the importance of the mediators’ approach to promote agreements on low-key, depoliticised issues and to foster the trust between the conflict parties—a strategy that may only pay off in the long run. The EU will have to decide whether it will continue and enhance this approach of facilitation and formulation, or adopt a power-based and more interventionist approach. The latter, however, does not seem to be a very promising avenue for future EU mediation involvement in the conflicts, given its limited leverage vis-à-vis South Ossetia and Abkhazia and some member states’ reluctance to take steps to coerce or incentivise Russia to play a more constructive role in the GID.

Notes

1. The Group was coordinated by France and included Germany, the United Kingdom, Russia and the United States. 2. For a comprehensive account of the political events leading to the 2008 August war, see Asmus (2010, ch. 2–5). 3. On 10 August 2008, Russian troops stopped 60 kilometres from Tbilisi, declaring that they did not intend to advance on the Georgian capital (Forsberg and Seppo 2010, p. 125). 4.  Throughout this chapter, the designations Geneva International Discussions (GID) and Geneva Talks are used interchangeably to refer to the mediation process ongoing since 2008 under the auspices of the EU, UN and OSCE. Similarly, the designations Georgia’s territorial conflicts and the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia are used interchangeably without prejudice to the status of the two territories. 5. From 2008 to 2011, the mandate of the EU Special representative was divided between Pierre Morel (EU Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia) and Peter Semneby (EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus). In this period, Pierre Morel was representing the EU in the GID and all matters related to the secessionist conflicts in Georgia, while Peter Semneby was covering all other aspects of EU relations with the three countries of the South Caucasus (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia). 6.  While Georgian officials use the term ‘administrative boundary line’, Abkhaz and South Ossetian officials speak of the ‘administrative border line’ in order to reinforce their claim of sovereignty and independence of Georgia.

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7. After 35 rounds of the IPRM in Gali, the Abkhaz authorities refused to participate in the meeting scheduled for 24 April 2012 based on accusations of biasedness against the EUMM Head of Mission General Andrzej Tyszkiewicz. Demanding the dismissal of General Tyszkiewicz, the Abkhaz authorities blocked any further meetings of the IPRM (Civil Georgia 2012a; Interviews EU 7, 11). However, when Tyszkiewicz’ tenure ended in summer 2013 and the Estonian Toivo Klaar took his office, the Abkhaz continued to refuse to participate in the IPRM framework. Thus, the IPRM Gali was suspended for four years until the parties reached an agreement on its resumption during the 35th round of the GID in March 2016 (OSCE 2016a). 8. The terms refugees and IDPs are used interchangeably here, both referring to the ethnic Georgians who were displaced after the Georgian-Abkhaz war in the 1990s. From the perspective of the Georgian government, these people are IDPs because Abkhazia is seen as a part of Georgia, while Abkhazian authorities refer to them as refugees. 9.  The latest UN General Assembly Resolution recognizing the right of return of refugees and IDPs in Georgia was passed on 7 June 2016; see United Nations General Assembly (2016). 10. In 1996, the EC Humanitarian Office was transformed into a full-fledge European Commission Directorate-General and is now known as the Directorate-General for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (DG ECHO). 11. In the case of Georgian-Russian relations, an additional, bilateral negotiation mechanism was created in 2012, the so-called Abashidze-Karasin talks. In these meetings, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Karasin and Georgian Prime Minister’s Special Envoy Abashidze discuss aspects of their bilateral relations, including trade, humanitarian and cultural ties and the resumption of direct flights between Georgia and Russia; see, for example, Civil Georgia (2012b, 2015). 12. The situation in Ukraine after the Russian annexation of the Crimea is another case in point. Here, the EU Member States have discussed how to react to Russia’s alleged intervention into Ukraine; see, for example, Haukkala (2015). 13.  In addition, more than 50% of the ethnic Russian respondents in Abkhazia and 48% of Georgian respondents living in Abkhazia opted for independence as their first choice. A reintegration with Georgia found the support of almost 30% of ethnic Georgian respondents, while reintegration did not find a support of more than 5% among all other ethnic groups in Abkhazia; see O’Loughlin et al. (2015, pp. 448–449).

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Karasin, G. (2009, June 4). Statement by Mr. Grigory Karasin, State Secretary and Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, at the Meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council (Press Release PC.DEL/404/09). Vienna: Delegation of the Russian Federation to the OSCE. http://www. osce.org/pc/37436?download=true. Accessed 8 November 2016. Khintba, I. (2010, September 26). The EU and the conflicts in the Eastern Neighbourhood: The case of Abkhazia. http://abkhazworld.com/aw/conflict/685-eu-and-conflicts-the-case-of-abkhazia-khintba. Accessed 2 December 2016. Khintba, I., Kvarchelia, L., & de Waal, T. (2010, April 12). The situation in Abkhazia: A civil society perspective. Washington, D.C. http://carnegieendowment.org/2010/04/11/situation-in-abkhazia-civil-society-perspective-event-2862. Accessed 18 October 2016. Kirova, I. (2012, August). Public diplomacy and conflict resolution: Russia, Georgia and the EU in Abkhazia and South Ossetia (CPD Perspectives on Public Diplomacy 7). Los Angeles, CA: USC Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School, University of Southern California. https://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/sites/uscpublicdiplomacy.org/files/useruploads/ u35361/2012%20Paper%207.pdf. Accessed 20 October 2016. König, M. (2005). The Georgian-South Ossetian conflict. In IFSH (Ed.), OSZEJahrbuch 2004: Jahrbuch zur Organisation für Sicherheit und Zusammenarbeit in Europa (OSZE) (pp. 237–49). Baden-Baden: Nomos. Kuimova, A., & Wezeman, S. T. (2018, December). Russia and Black Sea Security (SIPRI Background Paper). Stockholm: Stockholm Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2018-12/ bp_1812_black_sea_russia_0.pdf. Accessed 11 July 2019. Kuzmicheva, L. (2011, January). Unresolved conflicts in the common neighbourhood: A comparative analysis of EU and Russian policies (SPES Policy Papers). Institut für Europäische Politik (IEP). http://iep-berlin.de/wp-content/ uploads/2014/08/SPES_Policy_Paper_2011_Larisa_KUZMICHEVA.pdf. Accessed 8 November 2016. Le President de la Republique. (2008a, August 12). Protocole d’accord. Le President de la Republique. (2008b, September 8). Mise en oeuvre du Plan du 12 août 2008. Leonard, M., & Popescu, N. (2007, November). A power audit of EU-Russia relations (Policy Paper). London: European Council on Foreign Relations. http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR-02_A_POWER_AUDIT_OF_ EU-RUSSIA_RELATIONS.pdf. Accessed 14 November 2016. McKillop, A. (2014). Why the EU Has No Leverage in this Ukraine Stand-off. http://21stcenturywire.com/2014/03/06/why-the-eu-has-zero-leverageover-russia-in-this-ukraine-stand-off/. Accessed 14 November 2016.

228  J. BERGMANN Merlingen, M., & Ostrauskaite, R. (2009). EU peacebuilding in Georgia: Limits and achievements (CLEER Working Papers 2009/6). Leuven: Centre for the Law of EU External Relations. Mikhelidze, N. (2010, November). The Geneva talks over Georgia’s territorial conflicts: Achievements and challenges (Documenti IAI 10/25). Instituto Affari Internazionali. Mikhelidze, N. (2012, August). National and European cultures of governance in Georgia and Abkhaz conflict resolution (CORE Working Paper). Peace Research Institute Oslo. http://iaitestnew.asw.bz/sites/default/files/2012_ core-working-paper.pdf. Accessed 14 October 2016. Morel, P. (2009, October 15). Geneva, one year later: Which peace for Georgia? (Article published in several international newspapers). EU Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia. http://www.consilium.europa.eu/ uedocs/cmsUpload/091016_Geneva_god_spustia-FINAL-EN.pdf. Accessed 17 October 2016. O’Loughlin, J., Kolossov, V., & Toal, G. (2011). Inside Abkhazia: Survey of attitudes in a de facto state. Post-Soviet Affairs, 27(1), 1–36. O’Loughlin, J., Kolossov, V., & Toal, G. (2015). Inside the post-Soviet de facto states: A comparison of attitudes in Abkhazia, Nagorny Karabakh, South Ossetia, and Transnistria. Eurasian Geography and Economics, 55(5), 423–456. OSCE. (2012a, April 25). Statement by the co-chairs of the Geneva International Discussions. Press Release. Dublin, Brussels, Geneva. http:// www.osce.org/cio/90009. Accessed 7 November 2016. OSCE. (2012b, June 8). OSCE chairmanship emphasizes need for political will, empathy at Geneva Discussions. Press Release. Geneva. http://www.osce.org/ cio/91165. Accessed 7 November 2016. OSCE. (2013, November 6). Freedom of movement, perspectives of joint commitment on non-use of force top agenda of 25th round of Geneva International Discussions. Press Release. Geneva. http://www.osce.org/ cio/107941. Accessed 6 February 2019. OSCE. (2016a, March 23). OSCE chairmanship Special Representative Erler welcomes agreement on resumption of Gali IPRM. Press Release. Berlin. http://www.osce.org/cio/229671. Accessed 15 October 2016. OSCE. (2016b, June 15). Press Communiqué of Co-Chairs of Geneva International Discussions. Press Release. Geneva. http://www.osce.org/ cio/247006. Accessed 13 November 2016. Particip et  al. (2015). Evaluation of the European Union’s co-operation with Georgia (2007–2013), Final Report Volume I, May 2015, European Commission. https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/strategic-evaluation-eu-cooperation-georgia-2007-2013_en. Accessed 12 July 2019. Popescu, N. (2009). EU and the Eastern neighbourhood: Reluctant involvement in conflict resolution. European Foreign Affairs Review, 14(4), 457–470.

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CHAPTER 6

Conclusions

The book started from the observation that the EU has emerged as an important international provider of mediation in various conflicts around the world. In parallel, the EU has developed a systematic approach to mediation in terms of policy development and institutional capacity-building. Against this background, the book set out to achieve three research objectives: (1) to put forward an analytical framework for examining the EU’s effectiveness as an international mediator; (2) to assess the EU’s effectiveness in three cases of EU mediation; and (3) to explain the variation in degrees of EU mediation effectiveness across cases. The three case studies have provided explanations for the varying degrees of EU mediation effectiveness in the individual cases. In this concluding chapter, I summarise the main empirical findings of the case studies and compare them across cases. Subsequently, I provide an interpretation of the cross-case findings and situate them in the relevant research fields. Then, I reflect on the conceptual and methodological underpinnings of my research before identifying key policy implications of this book. Finally, I identify a number of potential avenues for future research.

6.1  Cross-Case Comparison and Causal Inferences Comparing the findings on EU mediation effectiveness across the three cases leads to two main observations (see Table 6.1). © The Author(s) 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0_6

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232  J. BERGMANN Table 6.1  Comparing EU mediation effectiveness across cases Case studies/ EU mediation effectiveness

Case Study I: EU mediation in conflict over Montenegro’s independence (2001–2006)

Case Study II: EU mediation in Belgrade– Pristina dialogue (2011–2015)

Case Study III: EU co-mediation in the Geneva International Discussions (2008–2016)

Conflict settlement Goal-attainment Combined

High High High

Medium Medium Medium

Low Medium Low to medium

Source Own compilation

First, the EU has been relatively effective in brokering agreements between conflict parties that partially or fully settle individual conflict issues. In two out of three cases, the EU has moved the parties towards agreements that address important conflict issues. In the case of EU mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the EU-mediated Belgrade Agreement led to a partial settlement of major conflict issues between Serbia/FRY and Montenegro. In the second mediation phase, the EU contributed to the achievement of the Constitutional Charter, which partially settled issues related to the political and legal framework of the State Union and achieved a full settlement of the conflict over the criteria for Montenegro’s independence referendum in 2006. In the case of EU mediation between Kosovo and Serbia, the mediation efforts have led to the full or partial settlement of several issues under discussion. Although the mediation efforts have not resulted in a full settlement of the conflict—which would necessitate a resolution of the conflict over Kosovo’s international status—the First Agreement of Principles Governing the Normalization of Relations of 19 April 2013 and subsequent agreements have partially or fully settled issues related to the governance of North Kosovo. Only in the case of EU ­co-mediation in the Geneva International Discussions (GID) on South Ossetia and Abkhazia has EU effectiveness in terms of conflict settlement been low. The GID have not led to any kind of settlement of the main conflict issues under discussion. The agreements on the establishment and resumption of the IPRMs as well as a few confidence-building measures fall into the category of process agreements and have not resulted in a spill-over towards the settlement of more politically salient issues.

6 CONCLUSIONS 

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Second, the EU has been less effective in attaining its goals as a mediator. Only in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence has the EU achieved its mediation goals to a high degree. In the other two cases, EU goal-attainment has not exceeded a medium degree. However, this finding needs further examination. In all three cases, the EU has been relatively effective in attaining its goals related to the process of mediation. In the case of EU mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the EU fully achieved its goal of preventing an early referendum in Montenegro in 2002 by committing the parties to a mediation process under the auspices of High Representative Javier Solana, thereby buying time for finding a negotiated solution to the conflict. Moreover, in the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue and the GID, the EU has also achieved the goal of committing the parties to the mediation process and preventing a breakdown of negotiations. This finding suggests that the EU is capable of conducting and stabilising a mediation process over a longer period of time, despite set-backs and temporary halts to the negotiations that occurred both in the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue and the GID. As the EU has been the initiator of all three mediation efforts, the finding may also suggest that conflict parties may find it difficult to withdraw their participation in a mediation process led by the EU.1 The variation in the degree of goal-attainment across different categories is related to the different levels of ambition of the EU’s goals. Unsurprisingly, conflict settlement has been a key EU goal in all three cases, although the EU has defined it differently in each case. In the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the EU sought to lead the mediation efforts to an outcome that would not endanger regional stability, and it attained this goal to a high degree. In the Kosovo–Serbia conflict, a main EU objective has been the normalisation of relations between Belgrade and Pristina, predominantly understood as a settlement of the conflict over the governance of North Kosovo. The EU has attained this goal only to a medium degree in the period of investigation, given that the political integration of the north into Kosovo proper remains to be finalised. As a co-mediator in the GID, the EU has sought to contribute to a peaceful settlement of the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Concerning this objective, the degree of EU goal-attainment has been evaluated as low because the mediation efforts have not resulted in a settlement of any major conflict issue. At the same time, the EU has also pursued mediation goals that go beyond conflict settlement and aim at conflict transformation, such as

234  J. BERGMANN

improvements in the living conditions of the populations affected by conflict. This has been a major goal of the EU, both in the Belgrade– Pristina dialogue and the GID, and it reflects the EU’s understanding of mediation as an instrument to address and transform “the root causes of conflict” (Council of the European Union 2009, p. 3). However, the EU’s moderate degree of effectiveness in attaining this goal in the framework of the mediation efforts demonstrates that mediation can only be one component of a comprehensive approach to conflict transformation. In sum, EU mediation effectiveness varies considerably, both across dimensions and cases. To explain this variation, we thus need to compare the findings on the conditions of EU mediation effectiveness. Conditions of EU Mediation Effectiveness and Causal Inferences The cross-case comparison of the within-case evidence suggests that mediation strategy and the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise are necessary conditions of EU mediation effectiveness (see Table 6.2). The other independent variables can only be assigned the status of contributing causes, being neither causally necessary nor sufficient (see George and Bennett 2005, p. 190). To start with, the case study results point to the centrality of the interaction between mediation strategy and the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise to understand the respective degree of EU mediation effectiveness. In the mediation process on Montenegro’s independence, the conflict parties expected large political gains from an EU-mediated agreement. Although both conflict parties’ maximalist positions—a preference for independence on the part of the Montenegrin government, and a strong interest in preserving a common federal state on the part of the Serbian/FRY government—seemed to be mutually exclusive, there was a small zone of agreement between the parties. This Zone of Agreement (ZOA) was brought about by two factors: (a) the Montenegrin government’s interest in finding a negotiated solution that would allow for broad international recognition of Montenegro’s independence, and (b) the Serbian government’s pragmatic position concerning the nature of the constitutional arrangement with Montenegro and its reluctance to take any risks that would have jeopardised Serbia’s EU membership prospects (Noutcheva 2012, p. 174). The findings suggest that it was primarily due to the EU’s mediation strategy that this space for compromise was utilised and transformed into

6 CONCLUSIONS 

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Table 6.2  Comparing the conditions of EU mediation effectiveness across cases

Mediator leverage Mediation strategy EU coherence Mediator coordination Conflict parties’ willingness to compromise Conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness EU mediation effectiveness

Case Study I: EU mediation in conflict over Montenegro’s independence (2001–2006)

Case Study II: EU mediation in BelgradePristina dialogue (2011–2015)

Case Study III: EU co-mediation in the Geneva International Discussions (2008–2016)

Medium to high Manipulation Medium to high –

High Manipulation High –

Medium Facilitation/formulation Medium High

High

Medium

Low to medium

Medium to high

Medium

Mediuma

High

Medium

Low to medium

aPoints to the unavailability of data to fully assess the value of this variable Source Own compilation

an agreement between Montenegro and Serbia. The EU successfully expanded the ZOA by adopting a strategy of manipulation, convincing the Montenegrin government to put aside its maximalist position on independence and wait another three years before holding a referendum. At the same time, the EU exploited the Serbian government’s pragmatism and secured its consent for the referendum clause in the Belgrade Agreement in exchange for the creation of a state union between Serbia and Montenegro. In other words, it was only through the EU’s active involvement in terms of manipulation that a high degree of conflict settlement and goal-attainment could be achieved. The findings on the interaction between the two variables in the second mediation phase also support this conclusion. When the EU decided to adopt the twin-track approach in its enlargement policy vis-à-vis the two countries—and thus drastically reduce the degree of conditionality applied for preserving the state union—the Montenegrin government had no further incentives to change their reluctance to implement the Belgrade Agreement and make the state union work. In turn, without the continuation of the strategy of

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manipulation, the EU was not able to move the conflict parties towards any compromises going beyond the Belgrade Agreement. In the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue, the interdependence of the EU’s mediation strategy and the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise is even more striking. The gains that the conflict parties have been expecting from an EU-mediated settlement of their conflict issues have been primarily related to their EU membership prospects. Due to the parties’ firm red lines on Kosovo’s international status and the political and legal governance of North Kosovo, there is only a small space for compromise agreements between Belgrade and Pristina. On each side, there has been very little willingness to depart from the respective maximalist positions. The Kosovo government has insisted on Serbia’s recognition of Kosovo’s independence and the full integration of North Kosovo into the country’s political and legal framework. Moreover, it has refused to accept a constitutional transfer of executive powers to institutions in the Serb-majority municipalities. The Serbian government, in turn, has been unwilling to recognise Kosovo’s independence and has thus refused to accept any agreement that would imply a de facto recognition of Kosovo’s independence. This firm position has even hardened in the period since the conclusion of the Brussels Agreement in April 2013 (see Economides and Ker-Lindsay 2015, p. 1038). Consequently, there has only been a small ZOA on issues that the settlement of which could not be interpreted as giving into the opponent’s demands. In this context, the empirical findings support the significance of the EU’s strategy of manipulation to utilise this ZOA and exploit the conflict parties’ strong preferences for future EU membership. Indeed, the EU’s strategy of using European integration as a key incentive has strongly resonated with both governments’ top domestic priorities. This interdependence between EU mediation strategy and the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise—reinforced by the EU’s decision to establish a strong link between Serbia’s accession negotiations and the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue—explains the medium degree of EU mediation effectiveness. In the case of the GID, the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise has been relatively low. From the perspective of Russia and the two breakaway regions, there are hardly any gains they can expect from a compromise agreement with Georgia due to their satisfaction with the current status quo. The ZOA on the key conflict issues—the non-use of force, the return of refugees, as well as the political status of Abkhazia and South Ossetia—is virtually zero. Consequently, the mediation

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process has been in a fundamental deadlock, resulting in a low degree of conflict settlement and a medium degree of EU effectiveness in terms of goal-attainment. In a situation where there is hardly any space for compromises, a mediation strategy of formulation that builds on the mechanism of coordination is unlikely to alter the conflict parties’ preferences and positions in the negotiations. It is difficult to ascertain if the adoption of a strategy of manipulation based on the use of leverage was possible in this mediation case. In addition, it is hard to imagine that the EU will be able to increase its leverage vis-à-vis South Ossetia and Abkhazia soon. Nevertheless, what can be ascertained is that the EU has not been able to expand the ZOA between the parties, and thus it has not been able to lead the conflict parties out of the deadlock. Again, this finding points to the interdependence of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise and mediation strategy as being the main explanation for EU mediation effectiveness in the GID. In sum, the empirical results provide confirmatory evidence for the causal significance of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise and EU mediation strategy in each case. In addition, they support the conclusion that these two variables are necessary conditions of EU mediation effectiveness. In fact, the two factors are interdependent in the way that the choice of a certain mediation strategy may alter the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise, and thus the chances of a high degree of EU mediation effectiveness. Taken together, there is substantial ground to conclude that the two independent variables are necessary conditions of EU mediation effectiveness. In contrast, the other factors analysed in this book can only be assigned the status of contributing causes, which is further explained below. Contributing Causes: Leverage, Coherence, Mediator Coordination, and the Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness If the explanatory power of an independent variable is spurious or cannot be ascertained in a definitive manner, George and Bennett (2005, p. 190) advise researchers “to claim no more than that the type of independent variable in question appears to favor – or make more likely – the occurrence of a certain type of outcome”. In other words, researchers may infer that a condition has been conducive to EU mediation effectiveness, but they may not be able to establish a causal relationship between the independent variable and EU mediation effectiveness—

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neither in terms of necessity or sufficiency nor in terms of a causal mechanism linking the two variables. In the following, I briefly discuss why the empirical findings on mediator leverage, policy coherence, mediator coordination, and the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness do not lead to the conclusion that these factors represent necessary and/or sufficient conditions of EU mediation effectiveness but rather point to their status as contributing causes. Concerning mediator leverage, the findings do not provide sufficient evidence for a direct causal relationship between the EU’s leverage and EU mediation effectiveness. Rather, it seems that mediator leverage primarily influences the EU’s mediation strategy. In line with the original hypothesis, I found that the higher the degree of EU mediator leverage, the higher the level of the EU’s flexibility in choosing different mediator tactics and the higher the chances that the EU adopts a more interventionist strategy such as manipulation. In fact, in the two cases in which the degree of EU mediator leverage was evaluated as being medium to high (Montenegro–Serbia) or even high (Belgrade–Pristina dialogue), the EU also made use of this leverage to incentivise the parties in line with a manipulative strategy. Accordingly, mediator leverage should be primarily understood as being an initial precondition of effective EU mediation that enables or constrains the EU’s ability to move parties towards agreement, but is not directly related to EU mediation effectiveness in a causal way. Similarly, the findings on EU policy coherence do not constitute sufficient confirmatory evidence for assuming that EU coherence is a necessary and/or sufficient condition of the EU’s effectiveness in mediation. Nevertheless, the empirical results are largely in line with the hypothesis that a high degree of EU coherence reassures the conflict parties that the EU is strongly committed to helping them find a settlement to their conflict. This effect has been traced particularly in relation to vertical coherence. All three case studies of EU mediation produced confirmatory evidence for the claim that the medium to high degree of EU coherence signals to the parties the EU’s commitment to the peaceful settlement of the conflicts, and it was also perceived in this way by the conflict parties (Interviews Georgia 1, 2, 3; Kosovo 1, 4; Montenegro 2; Serbia 2, 3, 4). The same conclusion applies to mediator coordination in the case of EU co-mediation in the GID. The high degree of coordination between the EU, the UN and the OSCE has increased the mediators’ leverage and their ability to organise and steer the mediation process. However, mediator coordination has not had any traceable effect on the conflict

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parties’ calculations and their willingness to compromise. In other words, the findings suggest that mediator coordination has been conducive to the EU’s ability to keep the mediation process going, together with the other two co-mediators—a core EU objective (Interviews EU 7, 9, 12). At the same time, there is no evidence of a direct causal relationship between mediator coordination and EU mediation effectiveness, thus supporting the conclusion that mediator coordination represents a contributing cause but not a necessary or sufficient condition of EU mediation effectiveness. Finally, the findings on the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness and their influence on EU mediation effectiveness are rather spurious and, at best, suggest an indirect causal relationship. Both the within-case and cross-case evidence support the conclusion that the grounds for inferring a causal relationship between this factor and EU mediation effectiveness are shaky. The findings on the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness in the Kosovo–Serbia conflict indicate that a certain degree of spoiler behaviour—exerted by the Kosovo Serbs and the nationalist opposition parties in Kosovo and Serbia—may not have a direct effect on EU mediation effectiveness as long as the two governments manage to mitigate spoiler resistance against their policies and build a sufficiently broad domestic coalition in their support. At the same time, the results of the case study on EU mediation in the conflict over Montenegro’s independence even suggest that internal divisions within a conflict party can be potentially exploited to increase their willingness to compromise. The deep divide between supporters and opponents of the independence of Montenegro prevented the Montenegrin government from defending its maximalist position in the mediation process and enabled it to consider other policy options rather than hold a referendum on independence straight away. As a mediator, the EU exploited the uncertainty about the likely outcome of a referendum on independence resulting from the political divide within Montenegro, and it convinced the Montenegrin leadership that a threeyear waiting period was in their interest. In other words, this finding demonstrates that a moderate degree of internal cohesiveness among the conflict parties can even be conducive to EU mediation effectiveness. Due to the strong interconnectedness between the conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness and its willingness to compromise, the former must be understood primarily as a contributing cause rather than a necessary or sufficient condition of EU mediation effectiveness.

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Towards a Causal Model to Explain EU Mediation Effectiveness In sum, the cross-case comparison suggests two main conclusions. First, the empirical findings on EU mediation effectiveness and its conditions demonstrate the plausibility of the analytical framework developed in Chapter 2. There is strong empirical support for the plausibility of the hypotheses that assume a positive relationship between the conditions identified and EU mediation effectiveness. Second, the conditions of EU mediation effectiveness vary in terms of their explanatory power. The conflict parties’ willingness to compromise and EU mediation strategy stand out as necessary conditions of EU mediation effectiveness and strongly interact with each other. Although a minimum degree of willingness by the conflict parties to compromise may be a precondition for EU mediation effectiveness, a strategy of manipulation based on the use of leverage may compensate, to a certain extent, for a lack of willingness by the conflict parties to compromise. Based on these conclusions, the relationships between the different conditions of EU mediation effectiveness analysed in this book are visualised in Fig. 6.1. However, the proposed model should not be understood in a deterministic way. Rather, it highlights the mutual importance of EU- and conflict-related conditions

adds up to

EU mediator leverage mediator coordination

enables/constrains

enables/constrains

EU mediation strategy EU policy coherence

conditions

co reassures/alienates conflict parties

EU mediation ectiveness

ict parties’ willingness to compromise

influences

co ict parties’ internal cohesiveness

Fig. 6.1  A causal model of EU mediation effectiveness and its conditions

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that influence the effectiveness of EU mediation and the multiplicity of factors that need to be taken into account to develop a comprehensive understanding of EU mediation effectiveness in a given case.

6.2  Interpretation of Main Findings and Implications for Research What do the findings tell us about the EU’s role as an international mediator beyond the individual cases? And how do we situate them in the broader research context? The interpretation of the main findings of this book leads to six key conclusions. First, EU mediation has a positive impact on conflict dynamics and considerably improves the chances of settling conflicts in a peaceful way. Despite the EU’s relative success in conflict settlement in the abovementioned instances, it seems that the impact of EU mediation is greatest in terms of stabilising conflicts, making renewed escalation less likely, and committing the conflict parties to a process that aims at a negotiated settlement. Although the degree of conflict settlement has varied across the cases, this stabilising effect of EU mediation is clearly traceable in all three case studies. Additionally, the findings on goal-attainment underline that stabilisation and the establishment of durable mediation mechanisms have indeed been the main short-term goals of the EU in all three cases. The overall assessment of the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator thus stands in contrast to a widespread “belief held by (many) IR scholars that the EU is particularly ineffective” (Niemann and Bretherton 2013, p. 267). The nuanced evaluation of EU effectiveness undertaken in this book suggests instead that the EU is far away from being ineffective and has an observable positive impact on the peaceful management of international conflicts. Second, although EU mediation has a stabilising effect, we should be cautious not to overestimate the influence of the EU on mediation outcomes. In fact, only one of the four mediator-related variables identified by the analytical framework of this book, that is, mediation strategy, has been identified as a necessary condition of EU mediation effectiveness. In contrast, the empirical results point to the centrality of the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise in explaining EU mediation effectiveness. The results on EU co-mediation in Georgia’s territorial conflicts support the assumption that, without a certain degree of willingness to compromise, EU mediation may not be able to make any difference in

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terms of conflict settlement. Hence, a key conclusion to be drawn from the empirical analysis of this book is that the conflict context has a significant influence on the effectiveness of the EU’s mediation involvement and should not be underestimated. This assessment thus reiterates calls in the literature for EU foreign policy analysis to focus more explicitly on the contextual factors in order to understand the EU’s effectiveness in the international realm (see Jørgensen et al. 2011, p. 614; Whitman and Wolff 2012a, pp. 212–213; b, p. 14). Third, the findings on mediation strategy and its influence on EU mediation effectiveness in the three case studies show that the EU’s mediation behaviour predominantly reflects the approach of a ‘power mediator’ rather than a ‘pure mediator’ (see Svensson 2007, pp. 229– 230). The EU has been actively engaged in all mediation efforts and, when possible, drawn upon its leverage to incentivise the parties to reach compromise agreements. In two out of three cases (Kosovo/Serbia and Montenegro), the EU has exploited its leverage to a maximum degree. More precisely, the EU has primarily adopted non-coercive measures such as rewards and guarantees offered to the conflict parties and has largely shied away from coercive measures such as threats and sanctions (see Sisk 2009, pp. 54–55).2 Although manipulation has not been a realistic option for the EU in the GID due to the lack of leverage vis-à-vis Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the EU’s mediation behaviour in the first phase reflected the logic of “power-based, deal-brokering mediation” (Grono 2010, p. 21). In other words, even in a case in which the EU has not the necessary resources to change the conflict parties’ calculations, it stuck to the logic of ‘mediation with muscles’ and adopted a strategy of formulation and active engagement rather than choosing a more facilitation-oriented approach. However, the EU has adapted its mediation strategy since the start of the second mediation phase, focussing more strongly on building confidence, and facilitating agreements on low-key issues that could spill over to the settlement of more politicised issues (Interviews EU 9; EU_MS 18). Fourth, focussing on the EU’s management of its mediation activities, the findings suggest that the delegation of competences to supranational actors in the field of mediation works relatively well. The degree of coordination between the member states and the EU actors responsible for carrying out the three mediation efforts—the High Representatives (Solana, Ashton, Mogherini), EEAS Senior Diplomat Robert Cooper, and the EU Special Representatives for the South Caucasus and the

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Crisis in Georgia—has been medium to high across the cases. To a certain extent, this is a remarkable finding in light of the literature, which has been rather critical in discussing the EU’s ability to speak with a single voice in its external policy (da Conceição-Heldt and Meunier 2014; Missiroli 2001; Thomas 2012). At the same time, this finding is—to a certain extent—a function of the fact that the EU’s engagement in conflict settlement is not a controversial issue among EU member states. Coordination becomes more controversial and difficult when the EU’s mediation efforts are linked to other EU policies, particularly EU enlargement policy and the ENP. Hence, in terms of horizontal coherence, the EU’s scorecard is mixed, suggesting room for improvement in terms of coordination among different EU institutions and between different EU policies. Fifth, the case studies point to the difficulty on the part of the conflict parties to fully implement the agreements reached in the EU-led mediation processes. Many of the agreements mediated by the EU have been ‘lost in implementation’, at least to a certain extent. In the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the partial settlement of the main conflict issues through the Belgrade Agreement did not translate into their resolution. Rather, the Montenegrin government demonstrated little willingness to fully implement the agreement to make the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro work. In fact, it was not the creation of the State Union, but the result of the referendum on independence in 2006 that finally settled and resolved the conflict between the Serbian and Montenegrin governments on the independence of Montenegro. In the case of the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue, the same dynamics seem to be at play. Although the conflict parties managed to achieve a series of agreements on a wide range of conflict issues, they have often lagged behind in terms of implementation (Bieber 2015, p. 308; BIG DEAL 2015, pp. 18–22). Moreover, continued negotiations on the specifics of several agreements at the working group level demonstrate that conflict settlement is an important—but not the final—stage of a process that may eventually lead to conflict resolution. In the case of the GID, the refusal of the Abkhazian authorities to participate in the IPRM meetings in Gali from 2012 to 2016 demonstrates that conflict parties may even find it difficult to implement procedural agreements in order to hold further talks—the lowest possible common denominator that opposing sides could agree on. This finding suggests that achieving a (full) settlement of a conflict issue does not necessarily imply that the implementation of the

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agreement is uncontested among the conflict parties and only a matter of sorting out the few remaining technical details. Sixth, the findings of this book point to the limits of socialisation and learning in mediation processes. All three case studies demonstrate that EU mediation has not led to a major transformation of the conflict parties’ relationships. Although the EU has been relatively successful in brokering agreements—particularly when referring to the Montenegro and Kosovo–Serbia case studies—the mediation efforts have not resulted in a substantial increase in the level of trust and bilateral rapprochement between the conflict parties. In other words, processes of socialisation and learning in terms of trust- and confidence-building have been largely absent in all three cases. In the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the Belgrade Agreement did not lead to the improvement of Serbian–Montenegrin bilateral relations. In particular, the European Commission’s hope that the creation of the State Union would lead to a harmonisation of the economic policies of Serbia and Montenegro proved to be wishful thinking. In contrast, the Montenegrin government tried to “sabotage” the State Union institutions and remained headed for confrontation with the Serbian government (Noutcheva 2012, pp. 102, 172). Similarly, the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue has not led to a major rapprochement between the governments of Kosovo and Serbia. In contrast, it seems that the bilateral relations are still characterised by mutual mistrust and suspicion (Bergmann and Niemann 2013; Bieber 2015). Thus, this finding points to a partial failure of the EU’s strategy of ‘creative ambiguity’. Implicitly, this strategy builds on the assumption that once parties have committed themselves to a formal agreement, they feel some sort of obligation to stick to the agreement and fill it with content at a later stage, out of a motivation not to risk undermining the mediation process as a whole. In other words, the EU’s mediation efforts have been built upon the belief that the more frequent the conflict parties interact with each other, the more likely the conflict parties will be socialised into this regular interaction and mutual compromise-making with their opponent, making set-backs in the mediation process less likely. The empirical reality, however, has demonstrated that the slow implementation of agreements is actually also a product of this strategy. The results of the case study on the GID underline this conclusion. Despite ongoing negotiations for more than 10 years, a substantial rapprochement and the existence of stable bilateral relationships built on

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mutual trust between the conflict parties seem to be a long way away (Crisis Group 2011, p. 1; Grono 2010, p. 32). In this regard, the efforts to build confidence between the parties through the promotion of agreements on low-key issues seem to be a move in the right direction. At the same time, it is too early to tell whether cooperation on ecological issues or the return of archival documents really signal social learning on the side of the conflict parties towards more cooperative negotiation behaviour.

6.3  Theoretical and Methodological Reflections This book is the first of its kind to provide a comprehensive analytical framework to evaluate and explain the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator. The conceptualisation of EU mediation effectiveness combines theoretical perspectives on effectiveness that stem both from EU foreign policy studies and international mediation research. Hence, it goes beyond one-dimensional conceptualisations of effectiveness in the respective fields by proposing to focus equally on conflict settlement and goal-attainment as indicators of EU effectiveness. In doing so, the book also addresses the shortcoming of the literature on European/EU foreign policy of applying definitions of the EU’s political influence and impact that are too narrow: “[M]any critics pay no attention to EFP’s positive influence in certain cases; they only cite situations where the EU or its member states could have ‘done more’ but failed to do so for whatever reason” (Smith 2008, p. 181). The two-dimensional conceptualisation of EU effectiveness as international mediator thus makes a contribution to the development of “more extensive measures of ‘effectiveness’” (Smith 2008, p. 181) in order to address this shortcoming. The cross-case comparison of EU mediation effectiveness demonstrated the added value of the two-dimensional conceptualisation of EU effectiveness. The findings on EU goal-attainment indicate that conflict settlement may only be one of several goals the EU pursues as a mediator. Focussing solely on conflict settlement in analysing EU effectiveness would neglect an important facet of EU mediation involvement. As regards the EU’s co-mediation in the GID, an assessment of EU goal-attainment provides a more comprehensive evaluation of EU effectiveness. In a mediation effort that is not primarily tasked with settling the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia—even though this is a longerterm EU goal—a sole focus on conflict settlement might miss out on

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smaller achievements such as confidence-building measures and the mere fact that the parties are committed to continuing their participation in the mediation process. The book has probed the plausibility of six hypotheses on the conditions of EU mediation effectiveness and evaluated their causal significance. However, there have also been limits to the depth of the empirical analysis—partly due to the constraints on available data, partly due to the choice of a comparative case design that requires the researcher to streamline and condense the within-case analyses to a certain degree. Future research could draw two conclusions from this methodological challenge. First, researchers could conduct an even more fine-grained analysis of individual variables and their influence on the dependent variable. For this purpose, a factor-centric design could be adopted, focussing on the potential causal effect of a single factor on EU mediation effectiveness. Second, one could also read the findings as an empirical confirmation of the understanding of mediation as a phenomenon that cannot be studied as a linear cause-and-effect interaction (see Bercovitch and Houston 2000, p. 171). Consequently, researchers could explore more explicitly the dynamic interaction between different variables. The findings of this book on the interaction effects between mediation strategy and the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise provide a good basis for further theorising and analysing the reciprocity of interactions between the mediator and the conflict parties and their effects. Another methodological issue worth reflecting on here is the generalisability of the empirical findings of this book. Certainly, the degree to which the findings can be generalised is limited to a certain extent. As George and Bennett (2005, p. 109) note, “[C]ase study findings can have implications both for theory development and theory testing”. The findings of the book should be primarily understood as plausibility probes that contribute to the development and refinement of theory that may be more rigorously tested in future research. Although the findings produced by the three case studies and the cross-case comparison provide firm evidence, applying the analytical framework to additional cases would certainly increase the level of confidence in the plausibility of the findings, particularly regarding the causal significance of the individual conditions of EU mediation effectiveness. Although there are not many cases in which the EU was a sole mediator, a viable strategy could be to explore further to what extent the framework is applicable to all cases of

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EU involvement in multi-party mediation, including cases of EU mediation support for other third-party mediators. Finally, mediation is a phenomenon that reflects the interactions between individuals. Hence, EU mediation effectiveness is also influenced by the personalities and competences of the individuals participating in an EU-led mediation process—on all sides of the negotiation table. Accounting for and analysing the influence of an individual’s personality and competence on mediation processes may thus be another promising avenue for future research. Although theory-guided research on the role of individuals in international mediation is nascent,3 accounting for individuals’ characteristics and behaviours in mediation processes may help to avoid biases in mediation research towards the meso- and macro levels, which neglects the importance of micro-level factors.

6.4   Policy Recommendations The EU has significantly strengthened its mediation profile in the last two decades by gaining considerable experience as a mediator in a variety of conflicts and systematically developing its capacities for mediation. Despite these achievements, there is hardly any doubt among EU policy-makers in Brussels that there is also considerable room for improvement of the EU’s mediation capabilities (Sherriff et al. 2013, p. vi). In the 2016 EU Global Strategy, mediation features relatively prominently among the EU’s instruments to prevent and manage violent conflicts. At the same time, the first two years of implementation of the EU Global Strategy have seen a strong focus on policy development in the Common Security and Defence Policy, including initiatives and institutional innovations such as Permanent Structured Cooperation (known more commonly as PESCO), the European Defence Fund, and the Civilian CSDP Compact. Almost 10 years after the adoption of the 2009 Concept on Strengthening EU Mediation and Dialogue Capacities and a phase of consolidation of the EU’s mediation capacities, a thorough reflection process on the future of EU mediation policy and practice is needed. Against this background, this book offers policy-relevant insights that provide valuable input for such a discussion. First, the EU’s own problem-solving expertise is a great source of leverage that could be more strongly exploited by EU mediators. Technical expertise is often needed in negotiations on complex issues. At the same time, it is the solution of those issues that often provides a potential steppingstone for further

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compromises on more politically salient issues. The case studies illustrate that the EU has a great amount of technical expertise at its disposal that relates to a variety of issues relevant to the settlement of territorial and political conflicts. The European Commission is a central hub of specialised knowledge and expertise within the EU. In the Belgrade– Pristina dialogue, for example, European Commission officials played a key role in the negotiations on customs stamps, border management, energy, and telecommunications, sharing their expertise on the EU’s standards and procedures with the conflict parties (see Tannam 2013, p. 963; Interviews EU 1, 4, Kosovo 8). To a similar extent, European Commission officials participated as experts in the EU-mediated Serbia– Montenegro talks and have been involved in co-chairing the second working group on humanitarian issues in the GID on the conflicts over South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Despite the European Commission’s strong involvement in the three mediation processes, the cooperation with other EU institutions managing the efforts has been rather ad hoc and dependent on personal relationships between the officials working in different EU institutions. To make full use of the European Commission’s expertise in issue areas relevant to EU mediation efforts, a roster of Commission experts could be established to quickly integrate officials in the mediation process who have the relevant expertise. Second, flexible adaptation of the mediation strategy to the conflict context is essential to fully exploit the EU’s mediation potential. The EU’s mediation behaviour in the GID between 2008 and 2011 largely reflected the logic of power mediation, although the EU’s leverage visà-vis South Ossetia and Abkhazia is limited. Since the start of the second mediation phase, the mediation strategy was adapted to a certain extent. The shift towards a stronger focus on confidence building and settling low-key conflict issues brought observable successes such as the prisoner exchange in March 2016 and the parties’ joint fight against the spread of the box tree moth. In other words, in a situation in which a more interventionist mediation behaviour does not bring the desired results, the adaptation of the EU’s mediation approach can be essential to bring about progress in the negotiations. A lesson learnt from the GID is that the EU needs to become more flexible in its approach to mediation and respond more quickly to changes in the conflict context to assure that its mediation strategy always represents the best possible way to move the parties towards agreement in a given situation.

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Third, EU member states play an important role in supporting the mediation efforts undertaken by EU institutions, but their role in the field of mediation should be clearly defined. Apart from their competences in mandating and monitoring EU mediation initiatives, member states are often indirectly involved in their operations. The case study on the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue demonstrates that individual member states can play an important role in supporting the mediation initiative. Germany and the United Kingdom, for example, put a lot of additional pressure on Serbia to implement the Brussels Agreement by making the opening of EU membership negotiations conditional on progress in its implementation. Another example is Austria’s support for the implementation of the agreement on telecommunications by applying on behalf of Kosovo and Serbia for a dialling code for Kosovo with the International Telecommunications Union. In the GID, the Czech Republic offered its assistance in implementing the agreement on cooperation in the fight against the spread of the box tree moth. Despite these examples, the involvement of EU member states has rather been ad hoc. In the interviews with member state representatives, it turned out that there is a great willingness to strengthen their support of EU mediation initiatives (Interviews EU 9; EU_MS 12, 13, 22, 24). At the same time, member state representatives emphasised that it often remains unclear how they can further contribute to the effectiveness of EU mediation, partly due to a lack of information about the current state of negotiations, and partly due to a lack of institutionalised communication with the actors mediating on behalf of the EU that goes beyond the regular briefings in the Political and Security Committee and relevant Council working groups (Interviews EU_MS 1, 4, 6, 9, 12). Although most interview partners emphasised that there is no need for an additional institutional platform to establish regular communication between member states and EU institutions about mediation activities (Interviews EU 9; EU_MS 21), there is a need for a debate on how the resources of member states could be efficiently tapped and utilised for the EU’s mediation efforts. If the EU wants to fully exploit the resources and expertise of member states, it should further specify how they can contribute to mediation initiatives undertaken by EU actors. This issue needs to be taken up by policy-makers when the 2009 Concept is replaced by an updated strategic document to guide the EU’s activities in the field of mediation.

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6.5  Studying EU Mediation: The Way Forward This book demonstrates that mediation is a vibrant field of EU foreign policy that deserves further attention, both from researchers and policymakers. The empirical analysis of three EU mediation cases illustrated that international mediation is a highly complex phenomenon that does not lend itself to a simple explanation. This book has made a first contribution to a better understanding of the EU’s effectiveness as a mediator in peace negotiations. Given the many unexplored aspects of EU mediation, this book marks the starting point rather than the end of scholarly engagement with this specific facet of EU foreign policy. Future research could investigate the EU’s contribution to multi-party mediation efforts and its activities to support other third-party mediators. Although the EU’s mediation effectiveness is more difficult to trace in multi-party mediation cases, the analysis of EU co-mediation in the GID illustrated the viability of analysing the EU’s role in multi-party mediation settings. Although the number of mediating parties was limited to three in the GID case, multi-party mediation efforts often involve a larger number of mediating actors, which may affect the EU’s political room for manoeuvre in these situations. Another issue for future research could be the role of norms in EU mediation practice, building on the emerging literature on norms in international peace mediation (Hellmüller et al. 2015; Howard and Stark 2018; Richmond 2018). Further work could explore how content-related norms (e.g. territorial integrity; democratic norms) and process-related norms (e.g. impartiality) influence EU mediation practice and how the EU deals with potential conflicts of norms in its mediation efforts. As mediation is seldom the sole instrument that the EU applies in a specific conflict context, another avenue for future research could be to explore the interactions between mediation and other EU conflict management activities such as peacekeeping operations, civilian missions, and sanctions. Recent studies have started to investigate how, and to what extent, the EU adopts ‘whole-of-government’ approaches in its conflict management and peace-building activities (van der Borgh et al. 2017). Future studies could add more fine-grained and conflict-specific analyses of how different EU conflict management interventions interact with each other in a given conflict context. Finally, we still need to know more about the EU’s added value in the field of mediation compared to states, other regional organisations, and non-state actors. Initial work that compares the EU with other mediators

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exists (Bergmann 2018; Scalera and Wiegand 2018). Putting EU mediation into comparative perspective will certainly enrich our understanding of the potentials and perils of EU mediation activity across world regions.

Notes 1. This is not to say that the finding tells us something about the likelihood of mediation onset when the EU offers to mediate, as I did not focus on non-cases of EU mediation. Rather, the argument is that once the process has been initiated, mediation undertaken by the EU may be attractive to the conflict parties in that they may find it difficult to withdraw their participation. 2. The only exception to this finding is HR Solana’s implicit threat to the Montenegrin government that an early referendum on independence in 2002 could jeopardise the country’s EU membership prospects (Solana 2001; Interview EU 13). 3. See, for example, Herrberg (2018).

References Bercovitch, J., & Houston, A. (2000). Why do they do it like this? An analysis of the factors influencing mediation behavior in international conflicts. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 44(2), 170–202. Bergmann, J. (2018). Same table, different menus? A comparison of UN and EU mediation practice in the Kosovo-Serbia conflict. International Negotiation, 23(2), 238–257. Bergmann, J., & Niemann, A. (2013). The European Union as an effective mediator in peace negotiations? Conceptual framework and plausibility probe (Mainz Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) 01/2013). Mainz: Chair of International Relations, Johannes Gutenberg University. BIG DEAL (2015, April). Lost in stagnation: Civic oversight of the Kosovo-Serbia agreement implementation (Report 2). Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, Internews Kosova and Centre for Research Transparency and Accountability. http://crta.rs/uploads/documents/2015-04-27%2010:05:10_a_44_l_en_doc. pdf. Accessed 6 June 2016. Bieber, F. (2015). The Serbia-Kosovo agreements: An EU success story? Review of Central and East European Law, 40(3–4), 285–319. Council of the European Union. (2009, November 10). Concept on strengthening EU mediation and dialogue capacities. Brussels: Council of the European Union. http://eeas.europa.eu/cfsp/conflict_prevention/docs/concept_strengthening_eu_med_en.pdf. Accessed 9 January 2019.

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6 CONCLUSIONS 

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Annex A

List of Interviews Cited as

Institutional affiliation of interviewee

Date of interview Type of interview

1.

EU 1

October 2013

Face-to-face

2.

EU_MS 1

October 2013

Face-to-face

3. 4. 5.

EU 2 EU 3 EU 4

October 2013 October 2013 October 2013

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

6.

EU_MS 2

November 2013

Face-to-face

7. 8.

EP 1 EU 5

November 2013 November 2013

Face-to-face Face-to-face

9.

CS 1

November 2013

Face-to-face

10.

Serbia 1

November 2013

Face-to-face

11. 12.

CS 2 Kosovo 1

November 2013 November 2013

Face-to-face Face-to-face

13. 14.

EP 2 CS 3

DG Enlargement, European Commission Permanent Representation of EU Member State to EU European External Action Service European External Action Service European External Action Service (retired official) Permanent Representation of EU Member State to EU Member of the European Parliament DG Enlargement, European Commission European Peacebuilding Liaison Office (EPLO) (NGO) Mission of the Republic of Serbia to the EU MediatEUr (NGO) Embassy of the Republic of Kosovo in Brussels Member of the European Parliament Civil Society Organisation, Kosovo

November 2013 November 2013

Via phone Via phone

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0

255

256  ANNEX A Cited as 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27.

28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44.

Institutional affiliation of interviewee

Kosovo 2 Government of Kosovo CS 4 Civil Society Organisation, Kosovo (2 interviewees) EU_MS 3 Embassy/Mission of EU Member State in Kosovo EU_MS 4 Embassy/Mission of EU Member State in Kosovo Kosovo 3 Kosovo Government Official CS 5 Civil Society Organisation, Kosovo Kosovo 4 Government of Kosovo Kosovo 5 Government of Kosovo EU_MS 5 Embassy/Mission of EU Member State in Kosovo EU 6 European Union Rule of Law Mission Kosovo (EULEX) EU_MS 6 Embassy/Mission of EU Member State in Kosovo OSCE OSCE Mission in Kosovo UN United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) EU_MS 7 Embassy/Mission of EU Member State in Kosovo CS 6 International Crisis Group Kosovo 6 Member of the Assembly of Kosovo Kosovo 7 Member of the Assembly of Kosovo Kosovo 8 Government of Kosovo EU_MS 8 Embassy/Mission of EU Member State in Kosovo EU_MS 9 Embassy/Mission of EU Member State in Kosovo USA Embassy of the United States in Kosovo EU_MS 10 Embassy of EU Member State in Serbia Serbia 2 Government of Serbia CS 7 Civil Society Organisation, Serbia EU_MS 11 Embassy of EU Member State in Serbia CS 8 University of Belgrade EU_MS 12 Embassy of EU Member State in Serbia EU_MS 13 Embassy of EU Member State in Serbia EU_MS 14 Embassy of EU Member State in Serbia EU_MS 15 Embassy of EU Member State in Serbia

Date of interview Type of interview May 2015 May 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face

May 2015

Face-to-face

May 2015

Face-to-face

May 2015 May 2015 May 2015 May 2015 June 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

June 2015

Face-to-face

June 2015

Face-to-face

June 2015 June 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face

June 2015

Face-to-face

June 2015 June 2015 June 2015 June 2015 June 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

June 2015

Face-to-face

June 2015

Face-to-face

September 2015

Face-to-face

September 2015 September 2015 September 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

September 2015 September 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face

September 2015

Face-to-face

September 2015

Face-to-face

September 2015

Face-to-face

Annex A

  257

Cited as

Institutional affiliation of interviewee

Date of interview Type of interview

45. 46. 47. 48. 49.

Serbia 3 CS 9 Serbia 4 Serbia 5 EU_MS 16

September 2015 September 2015 September 2015 September 2015 September 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

50.

Montenegro 1

September 2015

Face-to-face

51. 52. 53.

EU 6 Montenegro 2 Montenegro 3

September 2015 September 2015 September 2015

54.

CS 10

October 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face Written/via e-mail Via phone

55.

EU 7

July 2015

Face-to-face

56.

EP 3

December 2015

Face-to-face

57. 58. 59. 60.

CS 11 EU 8 EP 4 EU_MS 17

December 2015 December 2015 December 2015 December 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

61.

EU_MS 18

December 2015

Face-to-face

62.

EU_MS 19

December 2015

Face-to-face

63.

EU_MS 20

December 2015

Face-to-face

64. 65.

Georgia 1 EU_MS 21

December 2015 December 2015

Face-to-face Face-to-face

66. 67. 68.

EU 9 Georgia 2 EU_MS 22 (2 interviewees)

December 2015 March 2016 March 2016

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

69. 70.

Georgia 3 EU_MS 23

March 2016 March 2016

Face-to-face Face-to-face

71.

EU_MS 24

March 2016

Face-to-face

72. 73. 74.

CS 12 EU 10 EU_MS 25

March 2016 March 2016 March 2016

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face

75.

EU_MS 26

Government of Serbia (retired official) Civil Society Organisation, Serbia Government of Serbia Government of Serbia (retired official) Embassy of EU Member State in Serbia Government of Montenegro (retired official) Delegation of the EU to Montenegro Government of Montenegro Member of the Parliament of Montenegro Civil Society Organisation, Montenegro European External Action Service (retired official) Assistant to Member of the European Parliament MediatEUr (NGO) European External Action Service Secretariat of the European Parliament Permanent Representation of EU Member State to EU Permanent Representation of EU Member State to EU Permanent Representation of EU Member State to EU Permanent Representation of EU Member State to EU Embassy of Georgia in Brussels Permanent Representation of EU Member State to EU European External Action Service Government of Georgia Embassy of EU Member State in Georgia Embassy of EU Member State in Georgia Government of Georgia Embassy of EU Member State in Georgia Embassy of EU Member State in Georgia Independent Researcher, Georgia EU representation in Georgia Embassy of EU Member State in Georgia Embassy of EU Member State in Georgia

March 2016

Face-to-face

258  Annex A

76. 77. 78. 79.

Cited as

Institutional affiliation of interviewee

Date of interview Type of interview

EU 11 EU 12 CS 13 EU 13

EU representation in Georgia EU representation in Georgia Ilia University, Tbilisi General Secretariat of the Council of the EU (retired official)

March 2016 March 2016 March 2016 April 2016

Face-to-face Face-to-face Face-to-face Via phone

Annex B

Interview Questionnaire Interview Questions The questions were not relevant for all respondents. Depending on the interview partner and the specific conflict context, I changed the order of the main categories. In addition, formulations were adapted to specifically address the interview partners’ institutional affiliation or background. Responding to the interaction with the interviewees, I also raised additional issues or asked about specific details of information provided by the interview partners, thus following the basic principles of semi-structured interviews. All interview partners were assured that any information gathered from the interview would be anonymised. Initiation of the Mediation Effort • How come that the EU has initiated the mediation in the first place? • What events have led to the initiation of the mediation process?

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0

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260  Annex B

Format and Setting of the Mediation Process • To be able to better understand the mediation effort, could you briefly describe the format of the mediation process? (who participates in the mediation process? Are there plenary sessions/working groups, etc.?) • Is there a concrete agenda for the talks? If so, how has the agenda of the talks been set? • Are there any ground rules/basic principles for the negotiations? Conflict Settlement • From your point of view, what issues have been settled during the mediation process? • What issues have not been settled/not being addressed by the mediation effort? • What is the state of implementation of the agreements reached through mediation? Goal-Attainment • What is the EU’s motivation to mediate between the conflict parties? • What are the main goals of the EU acting as mediator in these negotiations? • Has the EU achieved its goals concerning the mediation effort? • From an EU perspective, what would be a preferred outcome of the mediation? Mediator Leverage • What kind of leverage does the EU have towards the parties? • What resources does the EU possess that could be used to incentivise or coerce the conflict parties towards agreement? • Has the EU been sufficiently equipped in terms of institutional capacities, funds, and personnel to manage the mediation effort?

Annex B

  261

Mediation Strategy • How would you describe the EU’s role in the mediation process? • What tactics have the EU mediators adopted during the mediation process? • Have EU mediators formulated possible solutions to the conflict issues/have EU mediators drafted agreements? • In mediation research, we distinguish three ideal types of mediation strategies (briefly describing the core features of facilitation, formulation, manipulation). From your point of view, what ideal type describes best the EU’s mediation behaviour? • Does the EU make progress in the mediation process a condition of the conflict parties’ future EU integration? EU Policy Coherence • What is the role of the Member States in the context of the mediation effort? • How does the coordination between the Member States and the High Representative/EEAS/EUSR look like? • Have individual member states played a specific role in supporting the mediation process? • Is the EU speaking with a single voice and sending coherent messages concerning the dialogue? • How is the mediation effort organised on part of EU institutions? (which institutions participate in the management of the mediation process? How does the daily coordination between the different EU institutions on the mediation dossier look like?) Mediator Coordination • Could you please describe how the coordination between the EU and the co-mediators looks like? (how often do you meet? Are there collectively defined rules and procedures for the coordination; to what extent do the co-mediators share information among each other?) • What resources do the other co-mediators bring to the negotiation table? Have these resources been utilised by the other mediators?

262  Annex B

• Have there been any tensions between the co-mediators on specific issues or procedures? • What are specific challenges when it comes to mediator coordination? Conflict Parties’ Willingness to Compromise • Why did the conflict parties agree to participate in the mediation process? • What are the conflict parties’ goals and interests in the mediation process? • What are the conflict parties’ red lines? • On what issues are the conflict parties’ willing to compromise? • What concessions have been made by the conflict parties? • How would you evaluate the conflict parties’ negotiation behaviour? Conflict Parties’ Internal Cohesiveness • How are the EU mediated talks perceived publicly in the respective conflict regions/countries? • How do domestic political parties position themselves with regard to the mediation effort? • To what extent does the government have the domestic support of the political parties/public for its negotiation behaviour? • Are there any spoilers that seek to derail the mediation effort? Concluding Questions • What potential lessons could be learnt from this case of EU mediation? • Do you have any recommendations to whom I could/should also talk?

Index

A Abkhazia Abkhaz-Georgian War, 208 Apsny Press, 184 Archives without Borders, 183 Bagapsh, S., 188 Geneva Process, 174, 187 refugees/IDPs, 18, 183, 187, 189, 208, 215, 221 Russian-Abkhaz Treatyon Alliance and Strategic Partnership, 213 Sukhumi, 175, 182–184, 194, 195, 206 Agreed conclusions in the Belgrade Pristina dialogue on acceptance of university diplomas, 117 on cadastral records, 117, 129 on civil registry books, 115–117 on customs stamps, 128, 248 on integrated border management, 116, 128, 144

Agreements Belgrade Agreement, 5, 17, 56, 58–64, 68, 74, 76–79, 82, 84, 87, 89–92, 94–99, 101, 102, 232, 235, 243, 244 Brussels Agreement, 120–123, 150, 151, 153, 155, 159, 236, 249 First Agreement Governing the Normalization of Relations, 18, 119, 120, 136, 232 B Bagapsh, S., 188 Belgrade Agreement, 5, 56, 58–64, 68, 75, 77, 79–82, 90–94, 96, 98–102, 235, 236 Belgrade-Pristina dialogue association/community of Serbmajority municipalities, 116, 124, 129, 145, 151 Asterisk Agreement, 148

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 J. Bergmann, The European Union as International Mediator, Palgrave Studies in European Union Politics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25564-0

263

264  Index Brussels Agreement, 120, 123, 150, 236, 249 cadasters, 141, 156 civil registry, 115, 117, 141 conflict parties’ internal cohesiveness, 32, 149, 157, 235 conflict parties’ willingness to compromise, 32, 129, 156, 157, 234–236 conflict settlement, 12, 112, 115, 116, 122, 156, 232, 233, 235, 237, 243 customs, 115 energy supply issues, 121 EU mediation strategy, 236 EU policy coherence, 129, 238 Freedom of movement, 115–117, 125, 129, 137 high-level political dialogue, 113, 116, 119, 126, 127, 133, 141 Integrated Border Management, 116, 118 International Court of Justice advisory opinion, 111, 138, 149 judiciary, 122, 123 liaison officers exchange, 116, 120 normalisation of relations, 126, 135, 233 police integration, 116, 123 technical dialogue phase, 113, 114 Telecoms Action Plan, 123 university diplomas, 115–117, 129, 156 Brussels Agreement, 120–123, 150, 151, 153, 155, 159, 236, 249 Butmir Process, 5, 19 C Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) CSDP mission, 7, 10, 195

Lisbon Treaty, 2 Treaty of Amsterdam, 4, 6 Conclusions of the chair of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue Arrangements regarding energy, 121 Arrangements regarding telecommunications, 121 association/community of Serb-Majority municipalities, 120, 124 On liaison agreements, 121 Conflict conflict prevention, 2, 6, 9 conflict resolution, 8, 178, 194, 195, 201, 203, 204, 243 conflict settlement, 9, 11, 16, 17, 27–29, 31, 34, 36, 40, 46, 59, 62, 64, 79, 80, 91, 92, 97, 99, 115, 119, 122, 124, 147, 156, 178, 185, 190, 191, 195, 196, 199–201, 204, 209, 210, 212, 216, 217, 219, 241–243, 245 conflict transformation, 11, 233, 234 Congruence method, 14 D Dayton Agreement, 70 Djukanovic, M., 54, 55, 71, 72, 75, 77, 85, 86, 90, 91, 93–95, 101, 102 E Effectiveness conflict settlement, 12, 17, 19, 27, 29, 31, 34, 40, 46, 64, 80, 91, 92, 112, 115, 122, 156, 178, 185, 190, 196, 200, 209, 210, 216, 217, 232, 241, 245

Index

conflict-specific perspective, 27 EU foreign policy studies, 2, 3, 11, 26, 32, 44, 245 EU-specific perspective, 27, 29 goal-attainment, 19, 26, 27, 29–31, 34, 40, 46, 79, 97, 98, 112, 127, 147, 154, 156, 178, 187, 190, 195, 199, 200, 218, 237, 241, 245 mediation research, 2, 25, 26, 32, 44, 245, 247 EU enlargement policy accession negotiations, 139 candidacy status, 136 SAA with Kosovo, 130, 137 SAA with Serbia, 130 Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA), 82, 102, 130, 136, 147 Stabilisation and Association Process (SAP), 126, 134, 136 visa liberalisation, 147 EU foreign and security policy Amsterdam Treaty, 4 Ashton, C., 111, 114 Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP), 1, 7 Council Secretariat, 57, 74, 81 Directorate-General for External Relations (DG RELEX), 81 European External Action Service (EEAS), 7, 10, 18, 114, 125, 132, 138, 140–142, 202, 242, 261 High Representative of the Union for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, 16 Lehne, S., 57, 76, 140, 143 Mogherini, F., 6, 18, 114, 122, 137 policy coherence, 3, 6, 19, 37, 38, 40, 46, 70, 84, 100, 156, 157, 199, 218, 219, 238

  265

Policy Unit of the Council Secretariat, 57 Political and Security Committee, 8, 80, 81, 111, 138, 139, 202, 204, 249 Solana, J., 4 Working Party on Eastern Europe and Central Asia (COEST), 202 Working Party on the Western Balkans Region (COWEB), 80, 81, 139 EU mediation Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, 2, 5, 6, 18, 32, 109, 112–114, 122, 127, 139, 156, 233, 236, 238, 244, 248, 249 Concept on Strengthening EU Mediation and Dialogue Capacities, 2, 6, 11, 247 European Parliament Mediation Support Service, 9 European Security Strategy (ESS), 6 four phases of EU mediation involvement, 3, 181 mediation effectiveness, 2, 3, 13, 15, 17, 19, 26, 27, 29–33, 38, 42, 44–46, 64, 70, 73, 79, 84, 96, 97, 99, 100, 124, 129, 131, 154, 156–158, 178, 185, 190, 199, 218, 219, 231, 232, 234–242, 245–247, 250 Mediation Support Team, 7, 8 Members of the European Parliament, 6 Presidency of the Council of the EU, 5, 10 Report on the Implementation of the European Security Strategy, 6 European Commission (EC) Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, 6, 134–136, 248

266  Index DG Enlargement, 114, 141, 159, 255 Directorate-General for External Relations (DG RELEX), 81 Directorate-General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations (DG NEAR), 159 economic harmonisation, 82, 84, 100 Montenegro, 16, 67, 68, 70, 71, 78, 81, 82, 84, 101, 102, 244, 248 Patten, C., 77, 82, 102 twin-track approach, 82, 84 European External Action Service (EEAS) Boura, A.M., 114 Cooper, R., 114, 132 EU Special Representatives, 7, 8 Gentilini, F., 114 Mediation Support Team, 7 Mogherini, F., 18, 113, 242 European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), 37, 192, 195, 198, 203, 243 European Neighbourhood Instrument (ENI), 191 European Security Strategy (ESS), 6 European Union Global Strategy, 9, 247 EU Special Representatives European External Action Service (EEAS), 7, 114 Klaar, T., 180, 181 Léfort, P., 180, 181, 190, 197 Morel, P., 177, 179, 180, 190, 197, 204 Political and Security Committee, 8, 139 Salber, H., 180, 181, 187, 197, 198, 206

Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia, 177, 179, 204, 205 Special Representative for the South Caucasus, 18, 178, 202, 204, 220 F Facilitation-communication, 35 Formulation, 11, 35–37, 56, 74–76, 78, 131–133, 137, 138, 158, 176, 196, 199, 201, 218–220, 235, 237, 242, 259, 261 France, 80, 139, 177, 203, 220 French Council Presidency, 175 G Geneva International Discussions (GID) box tree moth, 184, 190, 206, 248, 249 conflict settlement, 12, 16, 178, 181, 185, 190, 195, 199, 217, 219, 232–234, 237, 243, 245 EU mediation effectiveness, 2, 199, 217, 219, 236–238, 245 EU mediation goals, 233 EU mediation strategy, 199, 242, 248 EU mediator coordination, 40, 178, 207–209, 238 EU mediator leverage, 218 EU policy coherence, 40, 201 EU Special Representative for the Crisis in Georgia, 177, 204 EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus and the Crisis in Georgia, 18 Implementing Measures, 176, 177, 185–187

Index

Incident Prevention and Response Mechanisms (IPRMS), 181, 182, 184, 189, 195, 201, 208, 216, 217, 232, 243 Karasin, G., 211, 213 mediation format, 179, 188 non-use of force, 18, 178, 181, 182, 184, 187, 190, 213, 215, 218, 236 Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), 181, 208 prisoner swap, 184 refugees/IDPs, 18, 176, 178, 181, 183, 184, 187, 190, 208, 218 Sarkozy, N., 12, 176, 185 Six-Point Plan, 176, 177, 179, 185–187, 211 Georgia Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement, 192 EU Monitoring Mission, 177 European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), 192, 195, 198, 203, 243 Five-Day War, 175, 179, 212 Geneva International Discussions (GID), 6, 12, 177, 180, 182, 210, 220 Georgian-Abkhazian conflict, 174, 180, 183, 184, 188, 196 Georgian Dream, 211, 217 Georgian-Ossetian conflict, 174, 179 International Fact-Finding Mission on the Conflict in Georgia, 175 Ivanishvili, B., 211 OSCE Monitoring Mission in Georgia, 195 Saakashvili, M., 174–176, 182, 212 Shevardnadze, E., 174, 179

  267

United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG), 174, 179, 195, 208 I Incident Prevention and Response Mechanisms (IPRMS), 182, 198, 209, 219 IPRM Ergneti, 181, 182 IPRM Gali, 181, 182, 185, 189, 221, 243 International Court of Justice (ICJ), 18, 111, 113, 119, 138, 148 advisory opinion on Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence, 138 Interviews interview Questionnaire, 16, 259 semi-structured interviews, 14–16, 259 triangulation, 31 J Joint Control Commission, 174, 185 Joint Peacekeeping Force, 174 K Kosovo Ahtisaari, M., 110, 113, 146 Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, 2, 5, 18, 32, 109, 112, 113, 115, 117, 120, 123, 127, 128, 130, 135–137, 139, 145, 148–150, 156, 236, 243, 244, 249 Comprehensive Proposal for Kosovo Status settlement, 146, 147

268  Index European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX), 111, 113, 115, 118, 132, 134, 142 Kosovo Liberation Army, 110, 154 Kosovo Status Talks, 111, 113, 152, 158 North Kosovo, 112, 118–129, 138, 140, 143, 144, 148–150, 155, 156, 160, 232, 233, 236 ‘standards before status’ policy, 66, 110 unilateral declaration of independence, 18, 109, 110, 125, 143, 145, 147 L Lehne, S., 57, 76, 140, 143 Léotard, Francois, 4 M Mediation conflict settlement, 9, 11, 16, 27–29, 31, 36, 40, 46, 62, 80, 91, 92, 112, 115, 124, 156, 178, 190, 195, 199, 201, 204, 210, 216, 218, 233–235, 237, 246 definition of EU mediation, 10, 11 definition of mediation, 11, 26 mediation effectiveness, 3, 13, 26, 29, 33, 38, 40, 41, 45, 46, 79, 84, 131, 206, 207, 210 mediation research, 2, 25, 26, 32, 36, 40, 44, 245, 247, 261 mediation strategy, 3, 19, 32, 34–37, 47, 70, 73, 80, 99, 101, 129, 131, 156, 157, 178, 196, 200, 218, 219, 234, 235, 237, 241, 242, 246, 248 mediation success, 19, 26, 47, 157

mediation support, 5, 247 mediator coordination, 3, 19, 32, 39, 40, 46, 178, 207, 209, 210, 218, 219, 235, 238, 239, 262 mediator leverage, 3, 19, 32, 34, 40, 46, 47, 70, 99, 100, 129, 157, 210, 218, 219, 235, 238 Mediation research Beardsley, K., 25, 36 Bercovitch, J., 10, 26, 35, 41, 47, 48, 196, 246 conditions of mediation effectiveness, 80 Kleiboer, M., 33, 45 mediation effectiveness, 2, 25, 26, 32, 44, 245, 246 mediation success, 26 research gaps, 13 Mediation strategy coercive measures, 36, 195, 242 facilitation, 35–37, 73, 74, 131, 133, 196, 219, 235, 261 formulation, 35–37, 56, 131, 132, 196, 199, 218, 219, 237, 242 incentives, 3, 36, 73, 99, 134, 195, 199, 235, 236 leverage, 19, 32, 36, 47, 70, 73, 100, 129, 131, 134, 137, 156, 157, 178, 196, 199, 218, 219, 237, 238, 242, 247, 248 manipulation, 35–37, 56, 73, 99, 101, 112, 131, 132, 134, 137, 196, 235–238, 240, 242 Zone of agreement, 34, 234 Mediator coordination, 3, 7, 19, 32, 35, 39, 40, 46, 178, 206, 207, 209, 210, 218, 219, 235, 238, 239, 261, 262 leverage, 3, 7, 19, 32–34, 36, 40, 46, 47, 70, 99, 100, 129, 156, 157, 178, 195, 196, 200, 201,

Index

207, 210, 218–220, 235, 238, 247, 260 Medvedev, D., 176 Milosevic, S., 54, 55, 61, 71, 72, 88, 93, 110, 113 Mogherini, F. Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, 6, 18, 115, 122, 137 Geneva International Discussions (GID), 6 Iran, 6 Montenegro Belgrade Agreement, 5, 17, 56, 58–62, 64, 74, 76–78, 87, 89, 91, 93, 95–100, 232, 235, 243, 244 Constitutional Charter, 18, 56, 58, 60–64, 67, 68, 75, 77, 79, 87, 89, 93, 96, 98–100, 232 Djukanovic, 54, 55, 61, 71, 73, 75, 85, 86, 91, 93, 94 Lajcak, M., 59, 67, 69, 76, 78, 84 referendum, 17, 18, 53, 55, 56, 58–60, 63–65, 67–70, 74, 76, 78, 79, 85–87, 90–92, 94–101, 232, 233, 235, 239, 243, 251 referendum rules, 59, 63, 64, 76 Solana, J., 4, 17, 56–59, 66, 74–79, 81–83, 86, 100, 233 Movement for Self-Determination (LVV), 152–154 N Nobel Peace Prize, 1 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 4, 54, 110, 113 KFOR, 110 Kosovo bombing campaign, 54 Norwegian Nobel Committee, 1

  269

P Pardew, J., 4 Plausibility probe, 246 analytical framework, 246 Eckstein, H., 15 Process tracing Beach, D. and Pedersen, R.B., 15 hypotheses, 14, 15, 46 mechanisms, 14, 15 theory-testing process tracing, 15 triangulation, 15 R Russia Medvedev, D., 176 Russian support for Abkhazia and South Ossetia, 14, 173, 176, 179, 193–195, 203, 210–212, 215, 217, 236, 242 Russian troops deployments in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, 176, 212, 213 Russia’s stance on the non-use of force, 183, 212, 215 Russia’s willingness to compromise in the GID, 206 S Saakashvili, M., 179 Serbia Bosnian Serbs, 4 Djindjic, Zoran, 55, 57, 72, 76, 88, 89, 91, 98 EU membership prospect, 89, 234 European integration, 131 Kosovo Serbs, 144, 150, 151, 155, 160, 239 Kosovo war, 54 Kostunica, Vojislav, 55, 149 Milosevic, 54

270  Index Nikolic, T., 149 Tadic, B., 143 Vucic, A., 122 South Ossetia borderisation, 189 Five-Day War, 175, 212 Georgian-South Ossetian conflict, 174, 212 Russian-South Ossetian Treaty on Alliance and Integration, 213 Russian troops, 175, 176, 212, 213 Tskhinvali, 175, 182, 183, 194, 206 T Tadic, B., 89, 143, 149, 150 Timoshenko, Y., 9 U United Nations (UN) Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), 181, 182, 208 UN General Assembly, 111–113, 134, 183, 208, 221 UN General Assembly resolution 64/298, 113, 134 United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG), 174, 195, 208

UN Mediation Support Unit, 8 UN Special Envoy, 110, 113, 146, 181 V Vance, C., 4 Y Yanukovych, Viktor, 5 Yugoslavia, 3, 4, 75, 80, 88 Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, 17, 54, 56, 58, 59, 63–66, 70–72, 83, 85, 89, 93, 94, 97, 101, 110, 232, 234 Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, 4, 53, 70, 109 Yugoslav People’s Army, 4 Yushchenko, Viktor, 5 Z Zone of agreement (ZOA), 34–36, 42, 43, 90, 98, 148, 157, 178, 195, 200, 215, 216, 218, 219, 234–237