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Q&A: “In Most Conflicts We Know What Needs to Be Done”

Interview with Martti Ahtisaari, Chairman of the Crisis Management Initiative

VENICE, Dec 10 2007 (IPS) - There is hardly a trouble-shooter in the world today more trusted than Martti Ahtisaari, Chairman of the Crisis Management Initiative. Kosovo, the disputed southern province of Serbia, is the latest challenge he has taken on.

He has done this as head of the Crisis Management Initiative (CMI), an independent, non-profit organisation that works for “sustainable security” and “combines analysis, action and advocacy.” The Helsinki-based organisation was founded in 2000.

Ahtisaari was in Venice to attend a meeting on the role of communication in the alliance of civilisations, organised jointly by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), the Province of Venice and IPS. Ahtisaari spoke at the meeting with Sanjay Suri from IPS.

IPS: How far has the EU-U.S.-Russia Troika progressed on Kosovo? Martti Ahtisaari: It doesn’t look like they have been able to make any headway. Of course the secretary-general has to report this to the Security Council, and then the Council has to start debating. What they have on the table is the report that I and my colleagues presented in March. We will see if there is a different reception to that report now.

I think everyone has known what outcome is going to come; I think this 120-day exercise was important because it should now hopefully unite the European Union in dealing with this.

IPS: Is the Kosovo issue a microcosm of attempts to bridge political differences within a nation? MA: No, I think it’s much more important what kind of leadership countries have. If you look around at the world, and you look at the past history of the world, and the greatest disasters, it always is around certain individuals, and others have very much followed.

Unfortunately Mr Milosevic behaved in a manner that can’t be ignored. I don’t think anyone, even in Serbia — there may be a few — but the majority of Serbs recognise that things went badly wrong. And I think that has to be the beginning, when you start looking for solutions. Because if you think you can start negotiating the status of Kosovo without any history at allà

There are democratic forces in power who beat Milosevic in elections, and sometimes they behave like there shouldn’t be any history, and we should start from a time before Mr Milosevic. But it doesn’t work that way, and I don’t think you can force the situation, otherwise over 90 percent of the population in Kosovo yearns for independence, after only what happened in the 1990s; you don’t need to go further than that.

IPS: But are there not irreconcilable differences now between peoples? MA: I think there has been a lot of work done on both sides. The political leadership in Kosovo at the moment, the Albanians, have actually been in touch, the Prime Minister has visited, the President has visited the Serb communities. The Serbian Orthodox Church has had a dialogue with Kosovo Albanians, and that has led to a different attitude in many places. I have some of the monasteries, for instance, and witnessed that personally.

But one of the problems is that when the status is not clear whether a country becomes independent or not, it actually prevents normal dialogue between people. And furthermore, when Kosovo Serbs have not participated in elections like the recent one because they have been ordered by Belgrade not to, and they have decided themselves that that’s the line they want to follow, it’s very difficult then if you want to exclude yourself in the political process, it’s very difficult to come to a normal situation, or at least somewhat normal situation where the dialogue could be pursued.

But there’s an enormous amount of work that lies ahead whatever status comes, because I think reconciliation is a long-term exercise.

IPS: What are the principles in conflict resolution that you have seen work? MA: Throughout my career I have dealt with groups that have been at one time or other been branded terrorists. Sometimes for political convenience more than anything else. And it’s interesting to see that the same groups, when they come to power in certain countries, or they share power in some others, they have become responsible actors in their societies. I don’t think you learn to become responsible if you don’t hold power.

And therefore to imagine if there has been a political process, a democratic political process through elections that are generally regarded as free and fair, to say that certain groups are excluded because their statements have been such that others and neighbours might find objectionable, I have experienced from many of these conflicts that people know, organisations know what is expected of them if they are part of a political process.

But it is I think unreasonable to believe that any of these groups would start a political process by declaring that yes, we accept this, this and that. It will come, but it’s part of a political process, and I think we are wasting our time if we believe that one can artificially push this sort of groups aside.

IPS: IPS set up a dialogue on alliance among civilisations. Can this help? MA: I think IPS is an important organisation in many ways because first of all its information concentrates on processes, not on personalities and events as media tends to. It analyses the situation, and therefore it is of vital importance. It also brings people together. This is one event, but we can draw conclusions out of this discussion as well.

IPS: We see conflicts in Turkey, elsewhere. Are there fundamental solutions? MA: Every conflict can be solved if we put our political will behind it, and we get all the necessary actors to support us, problems can be solved. In most conflicts we know very well what needs to be done. We are simply hesitating in not moving forward. And there, as we see different religions coming together, as we heard the reports here, is of vital importance. It’s the best preventive medicine I can think of.

IPS: Can war ever help? MA: We have seen that World War II ended the Nazism that was destroying Europe. Sometimes you need military intervention to stop genocide. I think more has been done wrong in the world by not interfering in time. We could have saved many lives. We know that in Africa at a number of locations the international community should actually have acted, but didn’t. But it is also very important that if we have to use military force to stop a conflict, that then reconciliation work starts.