In the framework of a dialogue on Kosovo and Serbia, I was asked to give an introductory keynote speech. The dialogue, which was organized by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), took place in Vienna at the Bruno Kreisky Forum on the very day that Russia invaded Ukraine. Russia is led by a president who is eager to weaken the West – and especially the EU -- wherever it can, including in the Western Balkans. This creates an additional argument for why the EU should strengthen its engagement in the region and insist on dialogue and cooperation between all groups and countries of Southeast Europe. The basis for such a dialogue must be respect for one other and for the different stories and narratives told by each group. The starting point of my contribution was a speech held by the famous Nigerian-American author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

The breakup of the Yugoslav Federation was an historic event with many, often horrific, consequences. Some European politicians wanted to stop the dissolution of the state in the Southeast of Europe. Some, on the other hand, supported it, especially those who were eager to see the Serb influence reduced. I saw it pragmatically. The diverging forces inside the country were obviously too strong and the forces to keep the country together too authoritarian and undemocratic to enable a continuation of Yugoslavia. The wars following the dissolution demonstrated this clearly. Thirty years on, people who have been involved in those events, along with younger generations, should use the opportunity to discuss in a more detached way what happened during and after the dissolution. To foster this conversation, the IIP has launched a series of interviews and discussions that explore possibilities and conditions for reconciliation in the region. In this context, reconciliation is understood not so much as a formal procedure but as a „way of life“, as was put by Vesna Pusic – a Croatian political leader and one of respondents in our interview series.

With all the crises in the Middle East, the Eastern Mediterranean and the South Caucasus, one could forget to deal with the problems of the EU’s immediate neighbors in the Western Balkans. The slow progress and the permanence of unsolved issues of course help to forget and overlook this area. But of course not for the IIP, which pays special attention to the youth of that region. And also for the Vienna Institut for International Economics - WIIW, which deals strongly with the economic development of that area, there is no forgetting. And recently, the European Commission published its progress report on enlargement and a proposal for an investment package for the Western Balkans. Reason enough to look closely to the Western Balkans issues and challenges.

The EU will move forward with the opening of accession talks with Albania and North Macedonia. Both countries — like the other candidate countries Serbia and Montenegro — lost much time due to a lack of reforms and internal political disputes. But let us not speak about the past but instead look toward the future. And both governments present in power in Albania and North Macedonia have made decisive progress on many reforms necessary for future EU membership.

What is the relation between history, the teaching of history, reconciliation, and peace? Even if people and politicians would agree on historic facts, the evaluation of these facts and the roots and causes leading to these facts vary extensively. In a Europe that was for centuries characterized by wars, the interpretation of history is particularly sensitive. The different, often antagonistic evaluation of past wars lead to new wars. The experiment to build a common Europe, beyond national, ethnic, and cultural cleavages, would necessarily only come about with difficulties. And the same was and is true for a region like the Western Balkans.

Last week, in the framework of the “Vision 2030” project created by the “Young Generations for the New Balkans” with the support of the IIP and others, I once again returned to Tirana, the capital of Albania. I first visited the city at the beginning of the nineties, when Albania had just started to transform itself from a backward Communist dictatorship into a capitalist democracy. As with all countries that seek to undergo a fundamental transformation, expectations were too high - especially concerning the timeframe and speed of the transition. Old habits and new reactionary forces oftentimes hinder rapid and thorough transformations.