Since April 3, the former president of Kosovo has been on trial in The Hague for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Like his three co-defendants, he pleaded not guilty, rejecting any command responsibility when he was at the head of the UÇK. But then, who commanded the Albanian guerrillas ?
Serbian weapons in Ukraine?
Does Serbia supply arms to Ukraine ? In any case, this is revealed by a CIA document that has leaked in recent weeks on social networks. Belgrade denies, while the country has refused to align itself with the policy of Western sanctions against Russia.
This also applies to Serbia, as to Bosnia-Herzegovina, for having been excluded from the new Balkan regional initiative called Western Balkans Quad. The objective of this umpteenth platform: to promote full respect of EU foreign and security policy “. To better convince the 27 to open their doors?
China to the rescue of Bosnian Serbs
The Serbian entity of Bosnia and Herzegovina, for its part, is turning the bar ever further to the East. Already heavily indebted, the Republika Srpska can no longer find anyone among Westerners to give it credit. Its president, Milorad Dodik, therefore ended up turning to China. At the risk of finding themselves bound hand and foot in the event of default. Decryption.
Beijing has become the privileged partner of small Balkan autocrats to compete with the European Union in the event of a dispute. It is China, for example, which is called upon to relaunch the coal sector while Brussels insists on decarbonizing local electricity production. As the energy crisis rages, difficult to praise the merits of the green transition.
In Greece, does the right want the voices of the neo-Nazis?
In Montenegro, the beginning of the post-Đukanović era began. After more than three decades of reign of the “gospodar” (lord), the small country must now break with a system whose roots draw on the crimes and looting of the 1990s. Will Jakov Milatović really be the president of a “Montenegro for all”? While waiting for the early legislative elections of 11 next June, the technical government decided to attack the citizen Đukanović. But many wonder about the timing.
Greece will vote on 21st May next to elect its new Parliament. A ballot that promises to be very complicated for the current conservative majority after the terrible train disaster at the end of February. The government, already criticized for its rightward drift, is now trying to ban a new neo-nazi party. To better recover his voices?
Easter among the Catholic Albanians of Sicily
About twenty kilometers from Athens, Eleusis is one of the three European Capitals of Culture 2023. Far from the paradisiacal landscapes of postcards, this small industrial town of 25,000 souls is filled with disused factories, its bay is strewn carcasses of abandoned boats. But Eleusis is also the homeland of the ancient playwright Aeschylus and has a rich archaeological heritage. Guided tour on site.
Last Monday, Balkan Catholics celebrated Easter. Piana degli Albanesi, in Sicily, is a high place of the Arbëresh presence, this Christian Albanian minority who arrived in the 15th century to flee the Ottoman invasion on their land. For more than five hundred years, their descendants have preserved the language, the traditions and the Eastern Catholic rite. Reporting.