Rambouillet Peace Conference - Hawaii Pacific University

Section C; Declaration of Independence
Boshkovich 100
Just a couple of months after the end of talks regarding the final solution for
Kosovo, on February 17 th 2008, the Albanians unilaterally declared independence.
Interestingly, to avoid Russian intervention in the UN, separatists have chosen Sunday to
declare independence. This declaration was immediately recognized by the USA,
Germany, UK, France, Italy, and other countries that bombed Serbia 9 years before.
Additionally, countries that are probably not sure where Kosovo is recognized this
independence most likely due to a foreign pressure; examples are Costa Rica,
Afghanistan, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Burkina Faso, Colombia, Belize, Samoa,
Comoros, Montenegro, FYR Macedonia, etc. Besides those countries, as expected, many
countries with Muslim majority have also recognized Kosovo as an independent country.
On the other side, Serbia decided to protect her territory and citizens not with the
weapons but by usage of diplomacy (for the first time since 1990‘s). The author of this
paper thinks that it was a very wise decision, regardless of the fact that some people in
Serbia thought that the invasion of Kosovo was a better alternative due to NATO‘s
commitments in Afghanistan and Iraq. The most important allies for the Serbs regarding
this matter are Russia and China. Besides them, there are some other countries that are
also in favor of Serbia mainly because of their own issues with separatism, or just
because of their strong belief that independence of Kosovo is violation of international
law. Examples are: Spain, Slovakia, Romania, Greece, Cyprus, Brazil, India, Argentina,
South Africa, Venezuela, Bosnia and Herzegovina (because of Serbs in that country who
have some kind of veto in federal institutions), etc.