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Analysis of current events: “towards the rule of law in Kosovo: EULEX should go”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Andrew Radin
Andrew Radin*
Affiliation:
International Security Program, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
*
*Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

Following Kosovo's declaration of independence in February 2008, the European Union deployed a rule of law mission in Kosovo (EULEX). While EULEX and its supporters have argued that the mission has the potential to succeed, critics claim that the mission has failed to significantly improve Kosovo's rule of law institutions, to address the rule of law vacuum in the north of Kosovo, and to prosecute high-level organized crime and corruption. I argue that the critics are correct, and explain that the mission is fundamentally flawed due to its neutrality about Kosovo's independence, its rejection of conditionality and capacity building, and its difficulty investigating politicized crimes. Consequently, the mission cannot overcome the inherent challenges of building the rule of law in Kosovo, namely the desire of the Kosovo Albanian majority for independence and the connection between politics and criminality. The paper concludes that EULEX should not be renewed, since the mission's main functions could be better fulfilled by other international organizations, namely the NATO-led Kosovo Force and the European Union Office.

Keywords

EULEXKosovorule of law
Type
Analysis of Current Events
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 42 , Issue 2 , March 2014 , pp. 181 - 194
Copyright
Copyright © 2014 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

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