I’m pro-secession when the secessionist group is distinctly different, has a just cause, would clearly be better off as a separate country, and when integration is clearly not a plausible alternative.

Kosovo satisfies three and a half out of four of those. Macedonian Albanians, maybe two out of four. Montenegro, none out of four.

I’m just not seeing it.

Doug M.

The very reason why the international community has studiously avoided recognising seccessionist movements for the last fifty years is that once you start to ackowledge an unfettered right to self-determination you open up the way to state fragmentation on a massive scale. Why should the Albanians in Macedonia have the right to their own state or to unite with Kosovo and not the Hungarians in Vojvodina or Romania. And what about the Bosnian Serbs uniting with Serbia? How about the Muslims of Western Thrace joining Turkey? What about Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Trans-Dniestra, Northern Cyprus, the Tamils of Sri Lanka. The list goes on.

The alternative route since the end of the Second World War has therefore been to promote political equality and full respect for minority rights. This is the model that we have sought to implement in any number of other cases, even in cases where the minority feels fundamentally different. Abandoning this model - even in the case of Kosovo - has the potential to increase international conflict and not limit it. Already Russia has said that Kosovo should be a precedent for South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Are we really ready to turn our backs on established practice and tacitly encourage separatism over reconcilliation and democratisation within existing borders?

ps. The real reason why Montenegro shouldn’t become independend: Another Balkan country that will vote on other Balkan countries in the Eurovision Song Contest. How can any other win?

(Wikipedia has the detail for those of you unfamiliar with Eurovision’s previous significant intrusion into European politics:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnation_revolution )

It does sound a bit ‘uncool’, doesn’t it?
Disclaimer: not that there’s anything wrong with the Song Festival