Security Sector Reform and Donor Assistance in Serbia - Defence ...

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main imperative that leads international representatives involved in SSR to coordinate theirwork is the necessity of the exchange of the information.Various attempts at coordination have been made, some within regional cooperationinitiatives, such as the Stability Pact Working Table III. The examples examined n moredetail below have been relatively successful:The Serbia-NATO DRG began working in February 2006 with the intention of acceleratingand directing the process of reform of the defence system, and thus enabling Serbia’s fasteraccession to Euro-Atlantic integrations. The Group was formed at the instigation of Norwayand comprises 15 working groups, made up of Serbian MoD officials, NATO officials, andrepresentatives of other Serbian government bodies, international organisations, and onoccasion experts from the NGO community. This useful cooperation process was dropped bySerbia in early 2008, as noted in section two above.However, experiences from this process were very positive. The DRG not only addressedthe concerns of all parties involved, including the international stakeholders funding engagedwith significant funds, it also provided much better local ownership to the processes, as itenabled in-depth engagement by relevant parties as well as direct horizontal and verticalcommunication. The latter is of particular importance and is often lacking when it comes tomanagement of processes and teamwork, leading to delays and failure to maximise outputs.As such, this cooperation process, while it lasted, was one of the more positive experiencesin Serbia’s SSR effort.The South East Europe Clearinghouse is a regional security initiative launched in 2004 bythe United States European Command (US EUCOM) and the Slovenian Ministry of Defence.The goal of this initiative is to accelerate the process of accession to Euro-Atlanticintegrations by helping SEEC countries, (Albania, Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegroand BIH) as candidates for NATO membership.This initiative is developing well, with increased local ownership in terms of regionalapproaches to defence issues, for example, planning common approaches to issues such asspecialist training. Such cost-effective approaches will increase trust and experiences amongthose participating, thus contributing directly to regional stabilisation and possibly the EUsecurity agenda. Moreover, although it is primarily a project level event, this initiative has hada positive strategic effect over the past year, when Serbia decided to limit its cooperation withmany key donor countries, as well as neighbours.The Nordic Initiative aims to provide a coordinated and combined approach to the defencecooperation activities of the five Nordic countries of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway andSweden to the Western Balkan countries of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia,Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia in order to more effectively contribute to theconsolidation of peace and stability in the region. Two key stated objectives are to develop aframework through which to deliver coordinated bilateral or multilateral defence cooperationactivities within the region, and to identify and develop joint activities to assist the Partnercountries in their respective defence and SSR programmes. In this sense, the most importantaspect of the Nordic Initiative Steering Group is the ability to discuss national priorities andpoints of view in an open and transparent way. In other words, focus is on informationexchange and harmonisation with other interested parties, where possible.The EU possesses huge potential to act as an SSR actor, but until recently it has notinvested in a comprehensive approach in this area. Although the EU does hold occasionalmeetings with partner states and other international actors on various subjects of commoninterest it must be noted that there is no holistic approach to SSR in Serbia for both theCommission’s large office and the EU member-states represented in Serbia. The problem isthat the EU is not primarily concerned with SSR in Serbia, focusing instead on the EU’s22
internal security concept, the “area of freedom, security and justice” (AFSJ) the primaryobjective of which is to provide European citizens with an enhanced level of security withinthe EU. 53That is not to say the EU does not recognise the relationship between its own securityconcerns and SSR processes in potential new member states 54 . Indeed, it is recognised that‘[t]he development of an area of freedom, security and justice can only be successful if it isunderpinned by a partnership with third countries’. 55 The December 2005 EU CouncilExternal Justice & Home Affairs Strategy contains a forceful statement about the importanceof enlargement within the context of EU interests:“The prospect of enlargement is an effective way to align with EU standards inJHA in candidate countries and those with a European perspective, both throughthe adoption and implementation of the acquis and through improvements inoperational contacts and cooperation. 56More recently, the Lisbon Treaty has provided a new, more coordinated approach to securityand defence issues, including SSR at first generation level, falling under the umbrella ofForeign Security and Defence Policy. However, this will take time to develop further,especially when it comes to more advanced second generation support to SSR, which isdiscussed in this paper. .The OSCE has for the past eight years sought to aid cooperation of key stakeholders inpolice reform, as a strategic partner to the Serbian MoI. The process was initiated with thePolice Reform Donor’s Conference held in June 2002 and lasted until June 2006, when theMoI lost interest in the process. The organisation launched a more informal informationexchangeprocess among key donors which lasted from late 2007 until early 2009. Althoughthis process had a much lower level of expectation, it too was discontinued due to lack ofinterest at a strategic level from a sufficient number of stakeholders.There have been informal attempts by a small group of interested defence attachés to meetup occasionally and discuss relevant issues of common interest. 57 This simplified and adhocsetting has been very beneficial according to those interviewed, as it relates to shorttermand practical issues of common concern to those taking part. In terms of change, it canbe argued that this small gathering represents an important change agent effect, asbrainstorming, information exchange and possibly coordination does not go much beyondthis level.However, in the sense of this paper, such small informal settings have limited application asdonor cooperation should be more holistic in terms of applicability and formal in terms ofsetting to have maximum desirable output. In other words, it should involve a larger numberof stakeholders, as programmes do not have just funding issues at stake, but also significantreform aspects and policy implications.Moreover, considering SSR is a holistic concept often requiring major policy decisions, it canbe observed that coordination among just two or three countries (even if these are majordonors) is not sufficient to advance reform. In other words, SSR programmes need to takea multi-layered or multi-stakeholder approach if they are to be successful, especially53 Jörg Monar, ‘Justice and Home Affairs’ in The EU and Security Sector Reform, DCAF 2007, p. 13054 Effective multilateral engagement in the area of SSR was first referred to as a strategic objective ofthe EU in the European Security Strategy (ESS) published in 2003.55 http://ec.europa.eu/justice_home/fsj/external/wai/fsj_external_intro_en.htm56 EU Council document no 15446/05 of 6.12.2005, para 10.57 An example is the so-called Programme for Resettlement in Serbia and Montenegro Army –PRISMA. Witek Nowosielski, ‘The Retraining and Resettlement’, Chevening Magazine 18-19, 2004,p.4323
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