Balkanalysis.com

Archive for June, 2004

Alarm as Macedonia Driven Towards Internet Extinction

Starting about a month ago, Balkanalysis.com has learned, residents of Macedonia have been unable to access an ever-increasing number of American websites. Certain commercially compiled reports commonly purchased by American ISPs and hosting companies are warning that the country is a hotbed of internet fraud- and so, these companies are starting [...]

The NATO Summit: Where Boris Trajkovski Lives On

Perhaps the planners of the Istanbul NATO Summit were just too busy setting out the cocktail napkins, or dealing with George W. Bush’s 600-strong entourage to take notice, but according to the alliance’s website, the late Boris Trajkovski is still the President of Macedonia, and Branko Crvenkovski remains Prime Minister. One [...]

Tadic Wins, the West Continues to Feel Good About Itself

Well, Europe can breathe easier tonight, knowing that a “pro-Western reformer” has won the presidency of Serbia, as opposed to a “hard-line nationalist.” So get out the party hats and wheel in the cake!Almost as farcical as the notion that the West actually cares about anything more than maintaining its own self-image of [...]

Pointless Elections and Possible Solutions for Serbia

Nebojsa Malic takes a hard look at the options on the eve of Serbia’s presidential election.
After the first round of the pointless poll that was the Serbian presidential election, two candidates emerged to contest the dubious honor or presiding over Empire’s favorite European pariah. On one side is [...]

Decentralization Continues to Bedevil Macedonia

The most crucial, and therefore most unpleasant issue with which Macedonia has to grapple in 2004 is decentralization- the devolution of power from the central government to “local self-government” administrations throughout the countries. This issue has continued to be the point of greatest friction between the once-solid government coalition. But not [...]

NATO to Macedonia: Donít Get Your Hopes Up

Macedonia, along with Albania and Croatia, have been told that they shouldn’t accept much from the alliance at its annual summit in Istanbul, to be held on June 28-29. While not entirely unexpected, the news is a bit dismaying for a government that has been optimistically selling its citizens on a [...]

The Secrets of Occupation: Scott Taylor on Iraq

Update on Serbiaís Presidential Race

Fretting over Serbia’s political future has been an obligatory part of the Western discourse as shaped by the media, government officials, NGOs and policy centers, ever since Slobodan Milosevic was deposed in October of 2000. Almost four years later, many of the same characters who supplanted him remain in the [...]

Globalizing, Terrorist-Linked Mafia Thrives in the Balkans

As if organized crime wasn’t already pervasive enough in the Balkans, we now have the news that Colombian drug lords have established a beachhead in the region for their exports to Eastern European mafias.
Channel News Asia today quoted executive director of UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Antonio Maria [...]

Bulgaria All Set to Join the EU, Probably

Bulgaria’s completion of membership negotiations with the European Union on Tuesday has paved the way for its entrance into the EU on January 1, 2007. Having jumped this hurdle, there remains only the EU Accession Treaty (to be signed next spring) as the last major bureaucratic formality for Sofia’s joining up [...]

Ideas, Enthusiasm Fuel Bulgariaís Tourism Growth

Recently welcomed into NATO, and preparing for EU membership in the next few years, Bulgaria continues to take major steps forward in its remarkably quick transition from Sovietization to Western capitalism. Although a large part of its success has to do with good geographical fortune (i.e., not suffering from growth-retarding war, [...]

A Witness to the Kosovo War: Scott Taylor’s Inat

Inat: Images of Serbia and the Kosovo Conflict, Esprit de Corps Books, 2000
By Scott Taylor
Reviewed by Nebojsa Malic
Inat is the story of a seasoned correspondent’s experiences “…on the other side of the battle line,” as Scott Taylor sums up his work in his brief introduction. The book lives up well to this [...]

In Skopje, a Cosmic Encounter with Venus

Although at first it seemed Skopje’s cloudy skies would ruin everything, yesterday morning Macedonian astronomy buffs in the capital got what they came for: a good glimpse of Venus, strung like a black pearl across the edge of the sun, transiting it for the first time in 122 years.
One of the heavens’ rarest events, the [...]

Kosovo: The Deadly Game Continues

On Saturday, another Serbian teen was gunned down in Kosovo by Albanian driver-by shooters eager to spark a reprisal, and thus a justification for the “final solution,” i.e., the complete ethnic cleansing of all Serbs from the province.According to Reuters, “…U.N. police spokesman Malcolm Ashby said 16-year-old Dimitrije Popovic was killed [...]

Balkan Auction Goods Back, Apologies for the Delay

Many readers have enjoyed purchasing distinctive, unusual items from the Balkan past through one of our sponsors, eBay. A technical glitch led to the service being temporarily off-line. Now however, it is back up and running- as you will see by clicking on “read more” below.

Saakashvili Tested: Is Georgiaís ‘Uniter’ Up To The Task?

For all his embracing of modern Western-style human rights and democracy, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili aspires to be more like a medieval king. He wants, perhaps, to be another King David the Builder, the 12th century ruler who liberated the towns and countryside from the Seljuk Turks and consolidated Georgian power at [...]

Oil Discovered in Bosnia: Find Hushed Up for Years, Official Says

Four years ago, the Bulletin of Atomic Sciences described Azerbaijan as “…the focal point of the next round in the Great Game of Nations, a dangerous, hot-headed place with a Klondike of wealth beneath it. It is Bosnia with oil.”
What then, we might ask, would actually constitute a “Bosnia with oil?” [...]