Kosovo to Kurdistan

Kosovo to Kurdistan

The roots of nationalism are very recent. Many experts of nationalism insist that the Treaty of Westphalia of 1648 ushers in the era of the nation-state system and the attendant rise of nationalist sentiments. This is not to deny that, as Anthony Smith argues, nations with a common culture, heritage, language, identity, memories, territory, and often religion, have been around for thousands of years. Yet, for many years prior to the 17th century, our identities were familial, tribal, religious, or regional rather than national.

The process of creating nation-states was sometimes a painful one, as nations had to be "imagined," to use Benedict Anderson's delightful phrase. France, for example, in creating the French state and national identity had to forcefully assimilate other cultures and languages from Occitanians and Bretons to Basques and Corsicans. In certain instances, the creation of new nation-states like Turkey, out of the remnants of the Ottoman Empire, led to tragic consequences. The first major genocide of the 20th century saw 1.5 million Armenians slaughtered by Turkish nationalists. A dark chapter in nationalism history, which led Hitler to remark "Who remembers the Armenians?" Hitler, of course, understood that genocides, then as now, count on the shocking indifference of the international community.

The flip side of nationalism is liberation from the yoke of foreign or colonial oppression. This type of nationalism is viewed as defensive, necessary, and legitimate (although the tactics of "liberation movements" were not always legitimate and kosher!) in the struggle of nations to determine their own sovereign affairs. Algeria to Zimbabwe and many other countries went through this painful process of de-colonization from old colonial masters. In Algeria, when the civil war ended in 1962, 1.5 million Algerians had paid with their lives. Families were split by support for or rejection of French colonial rule. Yet, French President De Gaulle recognized an axiom of international politics: Rule other peoples and you pay a steep price. So De Gaulle shocked his former conservative and nationalist colleagues and granted independence to Algeria in 1962. De Gaulle was nearly killed by the ultra-nationalist OAS (Secret Army Organization) for abandoning French rule in Algeria. The 1950s and 1960s marked the era of massive de-colonization, particularly in Africa. Latin American nations had achieved independence much earlier, often in the 19th century, fired by Simon Bolivar and other nationalists.

In today's blog, I want to affirm the principle of self-determination of nations that De Gaulle clearly understood was in France's national interest. Yet, I want to point out that our criteria for determining whether a nation ought to have a state is still rather hazy. In 2008, Kosovo, a province of the former Yugoslavia, unilaterally declared independence from Serbia. Serbia took the case to the International Court of Justice and declared the declaration of independence by Kosovo "illegal". Kosovo's declaration of independence has been recognized by 58 states, including the majority of EU states, Albania, Canada, the United States, Turkey, and Australia.

Russia, China, and numerous other states did not jump on the Kosovo bandwagon. They recognized that it would open up more claims for states within their own countries and around the world. The Czech President Vaclav Klaus echoed these sentiments, although the Czechs recognized Kosovo: "For me Kosovo is, above all, a precedent. We’ve opened a Pandora’s Box in Europe that could have disastrous consequences." A member of the National Assembly of the province of Quebec, Daniel Turp warned, "Recognition [of Kosovo] sets the stage for Ottawa to eventually recognize an independent Quebec." Yasser Abed Rabbo, a Palestinian negotiator, argued that if the United States and most of the European Union "have embraced the independence of Kosovo, why shouldn’t this happen with Palestine as well?" Good questions indeed! So this begs the question: Why does Kosovo declare independence and not Kurdistan?

The Kosovo precedent leads us to ask other questions: Which nations can have states and join the international community of nations represented by the United Nations? Are there double standards? Who decides? What roles can law and domestic and international politics play in these decisions?

By all objective standards, the Kurds should have had a state long before Kosovo declared its independence. Kurds are Sunni Muslims spread through four major countries: Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and Syria. There are also Kurdish communities in Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Lebanon. Yet, history has been harsh to the Kurds. Their best friend has been the mountains rather than the international community. When US President Wilson declared his principle of self-determination of nations in the aftermath of World War One, the Kurds were a good candidate for independence. They have a common language, culture, heritage, memories, and territory (albeit spread among different states, which are all threatened by Kurdish separatism). They are non-Arabs, yet share with most Arabs Sunni Islam. In recent years, they have tended to be rather secular in their political outlook, swimming against the tide of radical Islamism in the Muslim world.

From 1922-1924, a Kingdom of Kurdistan existed in Northern Iraq after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Since 1991, the Kurdish Regional Government has had a high degree of autonomy in Iraq, under US protection. In Turkey, the PKK, a Kurdish terrorist organization, has waged a war of independence against the Turkish state since 1984, with 30,000 dead and terrible repercussions for both Kurdish and Turkish civilians. The PKK's goal has been an independent Kurdish state in Turkey and they have used a spate of suicide bombings to advance their cause. In 1999, PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan was captured by the Turks in Kenya and he now calls for a negotiated settlement, autonomy, and Western-based individual rights for his people as opposed to suicide bombings, armed struggle, Marxism, and outright separation.

Part of the problem for Kurds is that they have been divided between different factions and states. Another problem is that they do not have great international support for a state. Kosovars, the Palestinians, and Tibetans have had far more success at publicizing their plights compared to the Kurds. The best success for the Kurds is in Iraq after two US invasions. Under Saddam Hussein, the Kurds faced a genocidal campaign that killed about 100,000 people. So they are happy to live without the Ba'athist dictator today. And the region is thriving compared to other parts of Iraq riddled by Sunni-Shi'íte violence.

Kosovo, in contrast, has been recognized by 58 countries. Its case is assisted by two very powerful global actors, the United States (which backed the terrorist KLA that today rules Kosovo) and the European Union. The European Union and the United States want to assuage Turkey, a key all in the war on terror and militant Islamism, and so they will not fully back Kurdish independence in Turkey. Realpolitik counts for a lot when we back some states for independence and not others.

Supporters of Kosovo independence say Serbia brought the situation upon itself by trampling constitutional guarantees for Kosovo autonomy. The NATO bombing against Yugoslavia in 1999 sealed the deal. NATO came to the aid of Kosovar Albanian Muslims, which it claimed were being systematically killed and ethnically cleansed by the Milosevic regime. The truth is that far more ethnic cleansing took place from 1992 to 1995 and the world watched as Sarajevo was shelled for more than three years by Serbian gunners. Serbs were also expelled en masse from their homes in the Krajina (Croatia), a fact we tend to ignore. It is estimated that 200,000 Bosnian Muslim died in the war that broke up Yugoslavia, a war Yugoslavia fought to maintain its territorial sovereignty. Yet, the lesson was the same, for Milosevic as De Gaulle, years earlier: You cannot keep people in your state against their will.

From the Serb side, they ask why must Kosovo be independent? Can they not remain autonomous within Serbia? They also argue that Kosovars are largely Muslim Albanians and there is already an Albanian state. Moreover, Kosovo is the "Jerusalem of the Serbs," as Tim Judah points out. It is the place of its great historical memories, the defeat against Turkish armies in the Field of Blackbirds in 1389, etched in Serb national consciousness. It is the site of their splendid religious monasteries. Besides, Serbs now face reverse discrimination and ethnic cleansing as the KLA took power in Kosovo and led the drive for unilateral independence.

From the aforementioned discussion, we can devise a few conclusions and questions related to the history of nationalism and its future:

1) Let people go rather than rule them.

2) Letting them go avoids bloodshed and war (although realists say it merely delays it and encourages more demands and violence).

3) There is no consistency in terms of why some nations get states and others do not. Great powers, unique circumstances, and profound state oppression can all push the drive to independence. Yet, suffering does not guarantee you a state, as arguably Kurd historical suffering has dwarfed its Kosovar counterpart and yet Kurds do not have a state and Kosovars do (almost) have one. In this respect, one wonders why the Kurds or Palestinians do not pull a Kosovo: A unilateral declaration of independence? Why did Palestinians from 1948-1967, before there were Israeli settlements and "occupation," not declare independence in the West Bank or Gaza (at the time under Jordanian and Egytpian control respectively)?

4) As corporations and regional bodies like the European Union increasingly gain power in an era of globalization and states lose sovereignty, will nationalism become a thing of the past?

5) Or, do we need more smaller nations so that great powers like the United States and China find it easier to navigate the minefield of global adventurism? Divide and rule and more states makes it easier for big powers to rule.

6) Do we really want independence for some nations?

7) Courts and international legal bodies can opine on the legality or illegality of self-determination for particular groups, but the reality is that we are radically inconsistent. In the US and Canada, hundreds of Native nations might authentically qualify for self-determination, but are denied this right. The Iroquois Confederacy had its own structures of self-governance long before European colonization. Yet, we disingenuously support the right of Kosovars or Palestinians to gain independence, but not necessarily the Kurds or Natives in Canada.

8)The reality is that peoples themselves decide whether they want to stay or go from an existing state based on subjective and objective criteria. When the Quebecois twice rejected independence in Canada in 1980 and 1995 (just barely in 1995, with 49 per cent for separation), the Quebecois that voted for independence were basing their decisions on the fact that Quebec has all the criteria for independence (common language, culture, territory, religion, and civil law tradition), as well as the subjective desire to be free of "les anglais" (English Canada, the British Crown, and the United States). The Parti Quebecois (PQ), which led the drive for independence for Quebec, often denied the right of Natives within Quebec to separate, or the right of English-Canadian minorities in Montreal to remain in Canada.

9) Prediction: Other Pandora's boxes will be opened in the future after Kosovo. The reason is that nobody can really tell me why some nations get states, while others still languish in perpetual statelessness.

10) States are becoming less important, but they serve important legitimization functions for people, leaders, and governments around the world from compensation for the loss of religious communities of belonging in the West to "anti-imperialist" posturing in Venezuela or Iran. States will survive the age of globalization as entities of legitimization, but the roles of states are rapidly shifting. Predicting the future is folly, as humans constantly re-create their histories, institutions, and forms of belonging.

Tamir Bar-On