Turkey forges Balkan alliances after eight months of diplomacy

Thanks to Turkey’s tireless efforts in courting the Balkan nations, particularly in the past two years, there was an about-face that led to a peaceful environment from the tinderbox in the region. Along with building good bilateral relations, Turkey’s major push was to help Balkan nations integrate into Euro-Atlantic structures. “The goal for all of us is this: to take our place within the European and Euro-Atlantic structures and strengthen the common values in the entire region. In this regard, the EU and NATO dimension is very important in the Balkans,” Turkish President Abdullah Gül told reporters during the summit this week.

On the sidelines of the summit, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu also had talks with his Bosnian, Serbian and Croatian counterparts.

“Turkey dreamed of a Balkans that achieved the highest standards in human rights, received its share of the world’s welfare, fully integrated with the European and Euro-Atlantic organizations and embraced democratic values, cultural plurality and welfare,” the Turkish president said while speaking at the summit.

The launch of trilateral meetings between Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Turkey starting on Oct. 10, 2009 in Ankara have yielded four important results that have driven the Balkans toward integrating with Europe.

Gözde Kılıç Yaşın, an expert on the region from the Turkish Center for International Relations and Strategic Analysis (TÜRKSAM), told Sunday’s Zaman that Turkey previously built its relations with neighbors and gave priority to resolving problems on the bilateral level. “Since 2008, the Balkans have suddenly and rapidly become an interest of Turkish foreign policy, and Turkey has started to pursue effective, constructive policies in the region,” Yaşın noted.

Turkey has long been seen as a staunch supporter of Bosnia and seriously irritated Serbia after Kosovo declared its independence. Turkey still works tooth and nail to spur its Middle Eastern allies to recognize Kosovo as a sovereign state. Speaking in an interview with Sunday’s Zaman, Sabine Freizer, the Europe Program Director of the International Crisis Group, said the trilateral meetings are an ingenious format and that this is a remarkable achievement for Turkey, which has managed to become a respected neutral facilitator after being perceived for a long time in the region as mainly supporting the Bosniak side. She said Turkey has had to walk a thin line, having been one of the first countries to recognize Kosovo’s independence but intent on strengthening its ties with Serbia. Yaşın also stated that Turkey believes that without Serbia, peace may not come to the region and therefore has started to pursue a strategy that has put Serbia at the center of Turkey’s Balkan policies.

Just four months later, in early February, right after the meeting between Bosnian Foreign Minister Sven Alkalaj, Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic and Davutoğlu, Bosnia and Herzegovina announced its decision to appoint an ambassador to Serbia following a three-year hiatus. The summit marked the fifth trilateral meeting.

A month later Serbia apologized for a bloody massacre of Bosnian Muslims in 1995 in the town of Srebrenica. Turkey said Turkish diplomats have worked intensively to draw global attention to the problems of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

A month later, another major Turkish goal was to secure the prospect of NATO membership for Bosnia and Herzegovina after the informal meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Tallinn. “We did it,” Turkish Foreign Minister Davutoğlu then told Sunday’s Zaman as Turkey spearheaded efforts to help launch a Membership Action Plan (MAP) for Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was rejected during NATO’s December meeting. “This was a truly impressive lobbying success,” Freizer said, “as Turkey had to convince the United States, United Kingdom and Germany, who were until a couple of weeks before the Tallinn meeting highly skeptical of the idea.”

Twenty-four days later, Serbian President Boris Tadic and Haris Silajdzic, the chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, shook hands for the first time in İstanbul. It was at the same meeting, when the Serbian president also voiced support for Bosnia’s NATO and European Union membership aspirations and its territorial integrity. Freizer said this “was a truly historical event,” particularly as Silajdzic had resisted calls to meet with the Serbian president previously.