Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1473976
13 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 20 JULY 2022 OPINION Andi Hoxhaj Andi Hoxhaj is Fellow in European Union Law, University of Warwick theconversation.com THE EU continues to keep Albania, Bos- nia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Koso- vo, North Macedonia and Serbia on the waiting list to join, despite the possibility that the region could shift closer to Russia. Russia has long been an influential force in the western Balkans from helping to create pro-Russian associations, to build- ing significant stakes in oil and gas pro- jects. Moves to stoke up ethnic tensions be- tween Bosnians and Serbs also appear to have Russian approval. Meanwhile, Mi- lorad Dodik, the current Serb member of the presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovi- na, has supported the creation of the two self-declared republics in Ukraine, lining up behind Russia's president Vladimir Pu- tin. Bosnia and Herzegovina has a three-member presidency made up of one member from each of the country's three major ethnic groups: Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats (in order of size). The state com- prises two autonomous entities: the Fed- eration of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska, and a third unit, the Brčko District. Dodik is also behind plans to establish a new Serb army, and aligns to a separa- tist movement that could split Bosnia and Herzegovina in half. Germany has just an- nounced it will freeze €120 million (£101 million) worth of infrastructure projects in Bosnia's Serb region because of con- cerns over secessionist policies. And the UK government announced sanctions in April 2022 against Dodik, including a travel ban, for undermining the region's stability. Analysts are worried that Dodik's move- ment could threaten the uneasy peace cre- ated after the Balkan war, which ended in 1999. But despite this, EU officials did not even participate in the press conference scheduled with the leaders of the western Balkans after the recent two-day summit between the two groups. The most ob- vious explanation for the impasse is that another priority always takes precedence – currently Ukraine. But this approach has been taken as a snub, especially in Bosnia and Herzego- vina, Kosovo and North Macedonia. The EU is creating further resentment by tak- ing a different approach with Ukraine to the one that has been set out for the west- ern Balkans. Russia's plans for the Balkans The EU's attitude will not go unnoticed by Russia as it continues its plans to fur- ther undermine the political and public support for the EU and convert the na- tions into its supporters. It already has had some success in Serbia, where only under half of the population now support joining the EU. Meanwhile, the western Balkan states are experiencing a massive brain drain be- cause of abysmal economic growth and a lack of political stability. Young people are moving to EU countries in search of jobs. The region is projected to lose more than half of its citizens in the next two decades. And with the slow pace of the en- largement policy and there could be little left to integrate into the EU. The western Balkans first started dis- cussing EU membership in the mid-2000s, but there's still no consensus from EU members on their future entry. The time the process is taking is fuelling anti-EU at- titudes and leaving more space for Russia and China to increase their influence. But the EU needs these allies to combat major security challenges. Otherwise, it leaves behind an increasingly fractured region, where Russia has cultivated na- tionalist groups and uses misinformation to undermine pro-democracy narratives. How does Ukraine compare? Ukraine is unlikely to start accession ne- gotiations with the EU until it has control over its borders and meets a series of cri- teria identified by the European Commis- sion. These include vetting of Ukraine's judg- es and prosecutors, and showing a track record (prosecutions and convictions) in the fight against corruption and high-level organised crime, as well as the implemen- tation of an "anti-oligarch law" to limit the undue influence of corrupt individuals in economic, political and public life. Certain conditions must usually be met before a country can be granted candidate status, as was the case with Albania. But the EU recommends granting candidate status to Ukraine on the "understanding" that it will take tangible steps towards meeting the conditions. However, talks with not be opened until it clearly shows it is upholding the rule of law and the fight against corruption. Albania, a Nato member, recently said the lack of EU accession commitments to the western Balkans was a regional security issue and requested Nato set up peacekeeping operations to counter Rus- sian influence. It also announced that it will establish a Nato naval base along its Adriatic coast. The UK also called for reinforcements to the Nato mission in the western Balkans, especially in Bosnia and Herzegovina to promote stability and security, and coun- ter Russia's regional disinformation. However, by keeping the western Bal- kans waiting since 2003, the EU has seri- ously diminished its influence. Both Alba- nia and North Macedonia met the criteria to open accession talks in 2018. The lack of a timeline for these candidate countries to join means there are fewer in- centives to reform. There are also some in the region who point to current member states like Hungary whose democratic standards seem similar, if not the same, as theirs. The EU is currently debating switching to a qualified-majority voting procedure on foreign and security policy. This comes after Hungary blocked the EU imposing sanctions against Russia over Ukraine, un- less it obtained more money from the EU COVID-19 recovery fund. Moving to qualified majority voting requires amendments to the EU treaty. However, if the EU agrees to extend quali- fied majority voting into new policy areas, it might also extend it to its enlargement policy, so that candidate states are not blocked or used as bargaining chips by populist governments supported by Rus- sia, as Bulgaria is doing to North Mace- donia, or Hungary might do in Ukraine in the future. If the EU does not take Russia's rising influence in the western Balkans as seri- ously as it should, it risks making enemies on its borders, and right now, with the Ukraine-Russian war blazing, that would be very negligent indeed. tion…. etc., etc), and; c) The result of an energy-generating strategy that still ultimately involves 'burn- ing fossil fuels' – in the form of LNG - and therefore, contributing (however slightly) to the very issue that is causing Climate Change in the first place. Having said this: no amount of 'harvested rainwater' will ever be sufficient to actual- ly replace RO, as our country's main wa- ter-producing technology. Nor is it even realistically possible to capture, and con- serve, all but a tiny fraction of Malta's (al- ready limited) annual rainfall. But I have to say it, all the same. Person- ally, I find it hard to accept that a country that is always so very eager to 'excavate tunnels' (even when there is no actual need for them), and 'build underground carparks', and so on… just cannot ever get round to excavating even a single, solitary 'underground reservoir'… of the kind that hydrologists such as Marco Cremona (and reports such as that TPPI study I men- tioned earlier) have been insisting on, for decades. And that, I fear, is just the start. For there is also the small matter that our island's natural aquifers are not only being slowly desiccated, through lack of annual rainfall; they are also being over-exploited through (often unregulated) bore-hole extraction… which has the 'double-whammy' effect, of both further depleting the water table; whilst also increasing the salinity of the lit- tle ground-water that remains. That's not to mention the fact that the Planning Authority has green-lighted doz- ens of mega-construction projects, in re- cent years: without ever insisting on (still less, enforcing) an existing policy to ensure that all new developments feature their own, in-built cisterns and reservoirs. So instead of 'doing their bit', by trying to be as hydrologically 'self-sufficient' as pos- sible… these new developments only place further strain on the water-table (among other things, by pumping up yet more groundwater from our already-depleted aquifers… to fill up their private swim- ming-pools.) And I think I'll stop there, for now, be- cause… I mean, come on. You'd have to be 'as blind as a bat'… no, wait, that's not blind enough. You'd have to be 'as blind as our government, to the implications of the global Climate Change crisis', not to im- mediately realise that our entire approach to Malta's water issues is hopelessly – but HOPELESSLY – unsustainable. The only question that still remains is… well, the one in the headline, I suppose. Russia's influence in the Balkans is growing The Serb leader in Bosnia & Herzogovina, Milorad Dodik, has been an outspoken supporter of Russia's president Vladimir Putin