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Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans, Volume 5, Number 1, 2003

Approaches to political violence and terrorism in former Yugoslavia1


FLORIAN BIEBER
No other part of Europe has seen a greater degree of violence in the past decade than former Yugoslavia. The wars and violence leading to the death of more than 200,000 people were primarily motivated by ethnic nationalism. This ethnic violence was simultaneously deeply political in the sense that it was committed with political goals in mindsuch as the creation of homogeneous nation-states or maintaining political powerand organized by political forcesparties and governments.2 As most conicts in the former Yugoslavia have been described as wars the usefulness of the term political violence is not apparent at rst sight. At closer examination, however, one can note that before, during and after the wars, political violence took place in most regions of former Yugoslavia. How to distinguish war from political violence? Wars are marked by high intensity, both in terms of the number of participants, as well as in terms of the number of victims. Some scholars have used the somewhat arbitrary, yet necessary, threshold of 1000 victims to consider a violent conict a war.3 Political violence on the other hand can describe a much broader range of violence, claiming far fewer lives and coexisting with an overall state of peace.4 In fact, most civil wars, including the ones in former Yugoslavia, have been preceded by low-intensity political violence. In many cases, the wars are inconceivable without a considerable degree of political violence rst. Developing a better understanding of political violence thus appears imperative in explaining the escalation of ethnic violence into wars. This will be discussed below. In the rst instance, we need to distinguish between different categories of political violence, particularly between terrorism and political violence perpetrated by guerilla groups and paramilitary formations. The term terrorism has become a much-used label since 11 September 2001. In former Yugoslavia, terrorism had been already heavily
1 This article is based on a study written in the framework of a project of the Forum for Ethnic Relations, Belgrade with the funding of the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation, New York on Terrorism and Ethnic Conicts: Experience of the Western Balkans. 2 M. J. Esman, Ethnic Politics, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY and London, 1994, pp. 2648. 3 M. E. Brown, Ethnic and internal conicts. Causes and implications, in C. A. Crocker et al. (eds), Turbulent Peace. The Challenges of Managing International Conict, United States Institute of Peace Press, Washington, 2001, p. 212. 4 Mary Kaldor actually largely describes political violence when distinguishing new from old wars. See M. Kaldor, New & Old Wars. Organized Violence in a Global Era, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1999.

ISSN 1461-3190 print/ISSN 1469-963X online/03/01003913 2003 Taylor & Francis Ltd DOI: 10.1080/1461319032000062642

40 Florian Bieber used throughout the 1990s by political elites to either describe the opponents on the other side of the ethnic divideoften employed to describe a whole nationor to portray threats in general against the respective nation. As a term with strong normative connotations and a history of misuse, terrorism has to be rmly placed into relationship with other forms of political violence. Terrorism will thus be examined as one form of political violence and distinguished from other, often more common, types of political violence. This paper seeks to develop a framework for understanding political violence in former Yugoslavia. In particular, it will examine the role of terrorism during the past decade as a form of political violence and argues that contrary to frequent pronouncements by political actors in the region, terrorism has only been a marginal phenomenon, constituting merely a small segment of political violence, in former Yugoslavia during the 1990s. Instead, other forms of political violence have been substantially more prevalent and are more likely to pose a threat to the stability of the region than terrorism. Distinguishing political violence and terrorism in former Yugoslavia While the overall number of instances of terrorism have been low in former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, especially if compared with other types of political violence, it is worth attempting to develop a conceptual matrix in which terrorism and other forms of politically motivated violence in Southeastern Europe can be understood. When examining terrorism and political violence in Southeastern Europe, we can exclude some categories, which might be applicable elsewhere, but are uncommon in the Balkans.5 Firstly, most political violence and terrorism have been motivated by ethnicity and/or national identity. Related one can nd elements of religious fundamentalism and racism, but both are mostly connected to nationally motivated political violence. Other motivators, such as leftwing ideology, have been marginal or non-existent in political violence of recent years. We need to distinguish furthermore internal from transnational political violence. Although nationalist movements are often active across state borders, they are not international, as their activities are conned to their area of residence (or claim).6 The only signicant type of internationally active terrorism has been by Islamic fundamentalist groups, possibly linked to AlQaida. These groups have carried out or planned only a few terrorist acts in the region itself.7 Their targets have mostly not been connected to the countries themselves, but rather representations of the USA. As such, they constitute a largely foreign group targeting other non-domestic actors. Countries where this
For a broader typology of terrorism, see P. Wilkinson, The strategic implications of terrorism, in M. L. Sondhi (ed.), Terrorism & Political Violence. A Sourcebook, Har-Anand, New Delhi, 2000. 6 This stands in contrast to some Ustas e e migre terrorist groups, which were active in the 1970s in attacking Yugoslav representations in North America and Western Europe. See M. Glamoc ak, Koncepcije velike Hrvatske i velike Srbije u politic koj emigraciji, Rujno, Uz ice, 1997, pp. 111123. Although occasionally commentators feared the re-emergence of this type of political violence, it did not materialize. See D. Hedl, Croatian extremist threat, IWPR Balkan Crisis Report, 8 September 2000. 7 Including a car bomb in front of the police station in Rijeka, Croatia planted by Al-gama al-islamiya over the alleged arrest of one of the groups leaders; the planned attacks against US interests in Bosnia in the aftermath of 11 September 2001. Data from Forum for Ethnic Relations, Terrorism and ethnic conicts: experience of the western Balkans, Belgrade, 2002.
5

Political violence and terrorism 41 threat exists, especially Bosnia, are thus only involved as a consequence of the war and weakness of state authority. Primarily, we have to take into account three types of criteria in the categorization. Firstly, the relationship to the government, secondly the readiness to use violence (and degree) and the nature of the violence employed. The taxonomy given in Table 1 is not a rigid framework in which to conceptualize political violence, but should rather serve as a compass to understand different types of political violence. If we rst examine the readiness to use violence, we have to distinguish the rhetoric of violence from the actual use of violence and dene an intermediary step of rhetoric of violence combined with sporadic violence. The rhetoric of violence, although not constituting an act of violence, merits inclusion here, as the incitement to violence has been a key component of the conicts in former Yugoslavia, as has been the case with most other conicts which include aspects of ethnicity.8 The group advocating violence might not itself engage in it, but will usually not try to distance itself from acts committed under its ideology. In the case of Southeastern Europe, extreme nationalist political parties and groups qualify for this category. In Serbia the Serbian Radical Party (SRS) and the Party of Serbian Unity (SSJ), both with links to paramilitary formations during the Bosnia and Kosovo war, openly advocated the use of force against other nations in Yugoslavia and in neighboring states.9 In Croatia the Croatian Party of Right (HPS) falls into the same group. Also in cases such as Macedonia, where a full-scale war in 2001 was narrowly averted, some parties, including the governing party at the time, the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary OrganizationDemocratic Party of Macedonian National Unity (VMRO-DPMNE),10 condoned the use of force. In addition to parties, nationalist movements belong to this category, such as the ultra-nationalist movement Obraz in Serbia, whose following has grown since the fall of the Milos evic regime.11 While some groups and parties maintained their own paramilitaries, others merely advocated the use of force. In times when the use of force was legitimate within the political framework these parties and groups operated, few of those who condoned the use of force refrained from some degree of direct or indirect involvement. As a result most parties and groups at time of war might fall into the third category of organizations using violence against objects or groups. In the next category, we nd groups, which engage in both sporadic acts of violence and which at the same time publicly advocate violence. Often such groups would substantially use the threat of violence, rather than violence itself. Stopping short of being outright terrorist groups or paramilitaries, these
See for example M. Lenkova (ed.), Hate Speech in the Balkans, ETEPE, Athens, 1998. The Party of Serbian Unity was in fact set up by the paramilitary leader and convicted criminal eljko Arkan Raz Z natovic . 10 The name of the party is borrowed from a pre-World War II group which employed guerilla strategies at the turn of the century and terrorist tactics in inter-war Yugoslavia. On this issue see S. Troebst, IMRO 100 FYROM? The politics of Macedonian historiography, in J. Pettifer (ed.), The New Macedonian Question, Palgrave, Basingstoke, 2001, pp. 6078. 11 Although Obraz has also been implicated in a few violent incidents, the primary function of the group is advocating the use of force and extreme nationalist ideas. Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia, Human Rights and Transition. Serbia 2001, Belgrade, 2002, pp. 236239.
9 8

42 Florian Bieber

Table 1. Taxonomy of political violence

Readiness to use violence Governmental indifference GovernmentGovernmentsponsored tolerated Extremist political parties and movements Parties, movements, paramilitary groups

Relationship to the government Anti-government

Rhetoric of violence

Governmental groups Governments

Rhetoric of violence with sporadic incidents of violence (low degree of organization) Paramilitary groups

Extremist groups and movements

Organized violence against material objects Paramilitary groups Paramilitary groups

Secret services

Terrorist groups (guerilla groups) Terrorist groups (guerilla groups) Guerilla groups (terrorist groups)

Organized violence against individuals

Secret services

Organized violence against groups

Special police and army units

Political violence and terrorism 43 groups are usually characterized by a lower organizational degree and might have other constraints such as the danger of a ban if engaging to openly in violence. Such groups would typically include Skinheads and other neo-Fascist groups and movements, as well as some extremist parties. A third group can be dened as openly engaging in acts of violence, with varying degrees of public acknowledgment thereof. Such groups include paramilitaries, parts of the army and police in some countries, guerilla groups and terrorist organizations. To further dene this category, it is worth differentiating the nature of the violence perpetrated, although one is likely to often nd these groups perpetrating violence in all three categories. The rst category limits violence to material damage inicted, for example, through bombs. Such attacks usually seek to instill fear in the population or a particular group. This tactic has been commonly used either as a tool to engage in ethnic cleansing or to prevent the return of refugees after the end of the wars. Thus, it can be found mostly in areas directly affected by war, such as Croatia, Bosnia and Macedonia. However, such attacks also occurred against minorities in Serbia during the early phases of the war in 19911992. As the aim is immediate (expelling/preventing return of communities) and the political intention obvious, most attacks have not been claimed by the perpetrators.12 This type of political violence, beyond the wars themselves, has probably been the most common and had lasting effects on inter-ethnic relations and the demography of former Yugoslavia. In Croatia, for example, in areas which were occupied by the Serbian Republic of Krajina between 1991 and 1995 some 22,000 Serb-owned homes were destroyed after the end of the armed conict in August 1995.13 In addition to the destruction of houses, attacks against symbols of other nations have been common, such as the destruction of most mosques in the Serb Republic during and after the Bosnian war and bombing of Serbian Orthodox churches and monuments in Kosovo after the end of the war in 1999. In the subsequent category, violence is targeted against individuals. This type of violence expresses itself in assassinations, car bombs and other types of targeted attacks. Although nationalism and inter-ethnic tension have played their part, this type of political violence has rarely been directed against political gures of other nations. Altogether these types of attack have been sporadic and are often indistinguishable from organized crime. There have been generally four types of assassinations: the rst targeted politicians, such as the car bomb against the Macedonian president Kiro Gligorov in 1995 or the spree of assassinations of Serbian regime politicians in 2000.14 A second group affected individuals who have been uncovering war crimes, such as the assassination of Milan Levar, a key witness in a Croatian war crimes case at The Hague war crimes tribunal in 2001 and the car bomb against the editor of eljko Kopanja, in the Bosnian Serb independent newspaper Nezavisne Novine, Z 1999, for investigating war crimes by local Serbs. Third, some attacks were

12 In a number of cases the respective governments and some of its agencies (police, army) have been directly or indirectly involved. 13 Croatia war veterans protest against UN grave dig, Reuters, 24 April 2001. 14 The assassination included the Federal Minister of Defence, Pavle Bulatovic .

44 Florian Bieber directed against ofcials for investigating organized crime, such as the assassination of the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the Bosnian Federation, Joz o Leutar, in 2000. Finally, opposition politicians and personalities have been targeted, presumably by the authoritarian regimes of the 1990s. This has been uruvija was shot particularly the case in Serbia, where the journalist Slavko C during the Kosovo war in 1999, as well as at least one attempt on the life of Vuk Dras kovic , president of the opposition Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO), was made in 19992000. While most assassinations have largely remained unresolved, most can be characterized by the (presumed) perpetrators: Nationalists and groups with links to war criminals for the second group, organized crime with the third and individuals and organizations associated with the authorities with the last group. Finally, organized groups might target particular groups dened by ethnicity, political conviction, sexual preferences and religion. These acts of political violence can include most crimes committed during ethnically motivated wars, such as the ethnic cleansing and mass murder by armed forces during the wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo. Additionally, paramilitary groups and government-controlled forces have been targeting groups outside of war zones. Such instances include the expelling of Croats from the Vojvodina village of Hrtkovci in 1992, organized by the paramilitary organization of the SRS,15 attacks by Croatian government forces, as well as Serbian paramilitaries in 1990 in ethnically mixed areas in Croatia. While paramilitaries and terrorist groups will be identiable in all three categories of violence committed, terrorist groups would most fall into the rst and second group of the types of violence employed (objects and individuals), while paramilitaries would mostly be active in violence of the third category (groups). In addition to the categorization according to the types of force employed, a distinction is required as to the role of governmental involvement. Here the role of the government surveyed is less the question of the general support a movement might receive from any government outside the area of conict, as often the case with terrorist groups, but rather the relationship on the ground. Here government does not need to refer to the legitimate or internationally recognized government, but rather the authority, which controls a particular territory and exercises authority over it. Thus the army of the Republika Srpska during the Bosnian war would not qualify as a terrorist group, but as an army or as a paramilitary group. Generally speaking, we can distinguish ve types of relationships to governments. Some groups might be direct institutions of the government, such as army and police units. They might sometimes be acknowledged by the authorities, while at times these links might be denied. Most importantly, they are part of the integral structure of the state and the authorities exercise direct control over these units. In addition, it is important that the state (or parts/actors) control these groups. Due to cronyism and personalization of state institutions, it would be awed to include civilian or democratic control in this category. In the case of former Yugoslavia most

15 See Humanitarian Law Centre, Human Rights 19911995. Spotlight Series, Belgrade, 2002, pp. 83108.

Political violence and terrorism 45 secret services, special army and police units have acted as belonging to this category,16 as have some groups resemble paramilitary formations, but were in fact integrated into and controlled by state structures, such as the Lions paramilitaries in Macedonia, which have been implicated in some of the acts of violence against Albanians and opposition during the conict in 2001.17 The second category includes groups which are intrinsically linked to the state either through personnel or funding, but which maintain a certain degree of independence. Within the category of engaging in rhetoric of violence, they might be coalition partners in government, orwith higher propensity to violencethey might be paramilitary groups working with the state. A number of Serbian paramilitary groups, such as Arkans Tigers, would fall in this category.18 Closely linked are groups, which are tolerated by the government, but not explicitly endorsed or supported by governmental authorities. The difference to the second group might be caused by the collusion of goals, but not of means. Other factors, such as international pressure or competition for power, might explain the difference to the second category. Such groups include some of the Serb paramilitary groups active in Bosnia after 1993, when the Serbian government sought to end the war and put pressure on the Bosnian Serb authorities to accept international peace plans. In Croatia and Bosnia the paramilitary Croatian Defense Forces (HOS) maintained separate units from the government forces active in Croatia in 19911992 and in Bosnia in 1992. The government eventually took control of HOS and integrated it into the regular forces in Croatia and into the Bosnian Croat army (HVO).19 Some groups with a rhetoric of violence and the sporadic use of violence might be met with government indifference, especially if the targets of these groups are on the social margins of the society where governments might have little motivation to pursue these groups. It is at the same time inconceivable for groups to be using violence as a main means of advancing their agenda, without either tacit government support or opposition. Per denition, governments hold the monopoly over the use of force. Any erosion of this monopoly is usually met with resistance by the government, unless these groups serve some political purpose for the government. There might be instances when non-political violence, especially in connection with organized crime, might meet government indifference, but the inherent political nature of the violence described here prohibits such indifference. The nal category includes groups, which oppose the government, either through a rhetoric of violence, such as extremist anti-system parties and movements, or through acts of violence. It is here where we would locate classic terrorist groups, as well as guerilla movements. A distinction between

16 For this in Bosnia see M. A. Hoare, Civilianmilitary relations in Bosnia-Herzegovina anic 19921995, in B. Magas and I. Z (eds), The War in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina 19911995, Frank Cass, London, 2001, pp. 178199. For Kosovo see Fond za humanitarno pravo, Kosovo. Kako viz tseno, tako rec eno, Belgrade, 2001, pp. 2125. 17 P. Sherwell, Ministers arm paramilitaries in Macedonia, Sunday Telegraph, 1 July 2001. 18 Milosevic and the chain of command in Kosovo, Human Rights Watch Backgrounder, New York, 2 July 2001. 19 US Department of State, Croatia Human Rights Practices 1993, Washington, 1994.

46 Florian Bieber the two types of groups will be elaborated later. Most acts of political violence, which would be categorized as classical terrorism in former Yugoslavia, have had few claims of responsibility. Guerilla groups have been more prominent. The armies of the Serbian Krajina in Croatia and the Serbian Republic would not fall into this category, however, as they were structurally part of the Yugoslav army and soon controlled a territory which resembled a parastate. Cases of guerilla groups in the former Yugoslavia have been the Kosovo Liberation Army (UC K) between 1996 and 1999, the Liberation Army of Pres evo, Medvedja and Bujanovac (UC PMB) in 2000 and 2001, as well as the National Liberation Army (UC K) in Macedonia in 2001.20 What emerges from this taxonomy is that terrorism constitutes merely a small segment of organized political violence. While groups of nearly all sub-categories have been described as terrorists, it is more useful to focus on the distinctions between the groups. As all groups share at least the rhetorical support for the use of violence to achieve political goals, boundaries might be uid and cooperation between groups belonging to different categories is frequent. As development is a key factor in all movements, one will often observe groups moving from one sub-category to another in the course of time. Due to the over-usage of the term terrorism in the context of the former Yugoslavia and globally, a closer examination of terrorism is in order. Understanding terrorism The previously mentioned rhetoric of terrorist threats points us to a key problem associated with the study of terrorism: denitions. It is no surprise that terrorism has been more prolic in the rhetoric of politicians than of scholars. Terrorism, as some scholars point out, is a convenient label to attach to someone you dislike: If you get others to accept that label, you have won a substantial victory in the struggle by getting others to adopt your value system.21 The use of the label terrorism has and is frequently used to describe the use of violence opposed by the person or government using the label. As such, it can be seen more as a discursive practice than as valid categorization of violence. In order to grasp terrorism as a concept, one has to place it in a relational context with other forms of violence, thus limiting it. While the border to other forms of violence might remain uid, using a restrictive denition is the only way to use the term terrorism in an academically useful way.22 Terrorism can be dened as a type of political violence, which uses the threat or act of violence to create an atmosphere of fear for the advancement
On the three see T. Judah, Kosovo. War and Revenge, Yale University Press, New Haven, CT and London, 2000; S. Lipsius, Vorbild Uc K: Albaner in Serbien gru nden Uc PM, Su dosteuropa, 49(34), 2000, pp. 133143; S. Lipsius, Die neue Uc K in Makedonien und die politische Entwicklung in Kosovo, Su dosteuropa, 50(13), 2001, pp. 116. 21 D. W. Ziegler, War, Peace, and International Politics, 8th edn, Longman, New York, 2000, p. 147. 22 This is also pointed out by Walter Laqueur in the introduction to his updated work on terrorism from 1987 where he addressed critiques, which noted that he did not categorize guerilla warfare or state terrorism as terrorism, see W. Laqueur, The Age of Terrorism, Little, Brown, Boston and Toronto, 1987.
20

Political violence and terrorism 47 of a political agenda.23 As such, as Paul Wilkinson points out, terrorism is a weapon or method which has been used throughout history by both states and sub-state organizations for a whole variety of political causes or purposes.24 Political violence implies that the act of terrorism is carried out with a particular agenda. Assassinations for example without a political motive would not be considered terrorism (e.g. the assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan in 1981). When the motivation is criminal, one also cannot speak of terrorism (such as assassinations among members of the Belgrade underground). These acts of violence are usually considered criminal by both domestic laws under which they are carried out (arson, murder, blackmail, etc.) as well as by international law (targeting of civilians). To distinguish terrorist movements from guerilla movements and parties in an ethnic conict, it is necessary to include a dimension of territory to the denition. Guerilla movements conne their activities to the area of dispute and are mostly conned to rural settings. Urban guerilla movements have been generally limited and occurred primarily in collapsed states, such as Beirut in the 1970s and 1980s.25 Similarly acts of violence committed during an ethnic conict by either militias or paramilitary groups are similar to terrorism in the sense that they are criminal in nature and seek to instill fear, especially when taking the example of ethnic cleansing committed during the Bosnian war, it is worth distinguishing it from terrorism. Finally, it is important to differentiate goals and effects of terrorist movements from those of parties to an ethnic conict. While it is again difcult to draw a rm distinction, most terrorist movements seek to trigger a larger conict, rather than overthrow the existing order (in the broad sense of both political system and social order) single-handedly. As such, they rely on either a reaction by the government targeted which will trigger solidarity of the victims of the government reaction with the terrorist movement or a withdrawal of the government (if possible) in the face of losses inicted by the terrorist acts. Fighting by paramilitary and other groups is often aimed at changing the ethnic composition itself and does not perceive itself primarily as a trigger. The difculty of this distinction is highlighted by the activities of the UC K which acted both as a guerilla movement and as a terrorist group: it attacked Albanians loyal to the Yugoslav authorities, sought to trigger Western intervention and built mass support by seeking reprisals against civilians by Serbian and Yugoslav (para-)military and police forces. While structurally resembling guerilla groups, the tactics of the UC K of securing external support through its acts rather than accomplishing its goals, i.e. independence of Kosovo, are more reminiscent of terrorist groups.26 As mentioned above, it is hard to avoid the normative dimension when dening terrorism. Few, if any, movements would agree with being described
23 berscha P. Waldmann, Terrorismus-Unterscha tzte oder U tzte Bedrohung?, in C. Leggewie (ed.), Politik im 21. Jahrhundert, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt, 2001, pp. 392394. 24 P. Wilkinson, op. cit. 25 W. Laqueur, op. cit., p. 300. 26 T. Loza, A need for atrocities, Transitions, 6(3), March 1999, pp. 1617. More generally on the use of international attention as a tool to advance domestic goals in the Balkans see S. Troebst, Balkanisches Politikmuster? Nationalrevolutiona re Bewegungen in Su dosteuropa und die Ressource Welto ffentlichkeit , Osteuropa, 50(11), 2000, pp. 12541266.

48 Florian Bieber a terrorist organization, as it implies activities, which are per denition immoral and target innocent people.27 As a result, the analysis of terrorism will inevitably condemn the acts of terrorism. At the same time, it is to separate the acts of violence from the goals. Just as the aims do not justify the means, the means should not automatically discredit the goals. All to often the goals themselves are incompatible with liberal democracies and human rights and, even if they are, the means employed cast doubt on the sincerity of its proponents. Nevertheless, it would be shortsighted to dismiss the goals outright, especially in cases where the terrorist movement appears to have a broad base and when operating in or against an oppressive system. In addition to the denition, one can arrive at a number of features of most terrorist movements. Firstly, a group that engages in acts of terrorism can have other functions and the use of terrorism might not be the only way it acts. The group might also operate as a guerilla movement or as a political party at the same time.28 Obviously terrorist groups can transform themselves over time into parties or organizations that pursue their aims only peacefully. Alternatively, many terrorist groups just disappear because of arrest, the fulllment of their goals or the decline of the movements ideological underpinnings. Most terrorist organizations are characterized by their small size, most often numbering only a few dozen or a few hundred members. This is to their military advantage and political disadvantage, as Laqueur has emphasized: [w]hile it is difcult to detect small groups and while they can inict considerable damage, their political effect is bound to be limited.29 Beyond former Yugoslavia, terrorist groups can derive their motivation and claim to legitimacy from a number of different sources. The basis could be ideological, anti-colonial, nationalistseparatist or religious. These categories are not to be conceived as being rigid dividers. Many movements have combined characteristics from several categories. The Palestinian movement Hamas is both a religious movement and an anti-colonial movement. The strength of the different categories of terrorist movements has changed throughout time. While in the 1970s ideological movements were identied as the main threat to peace, religion-based movements replaced them by the 1980s and 1990s. Although the reach of activities of organizations might be global and directed not only at the particular regimes they seek to change, but also their international supporters mostly keep a local political agenda. A few movements, however, have extended their activities and goals primarily beyond the national framework and sought a global goal, most notably and recently Al-Qaida. By denition, neither nationalistseparatist nor anti-colonial movements have developed such a global agenda, despite the existence of some types of coalitions between different movements. At the same time the use of violence might evolve to a degree that the actual agenda becomes submerged so that the main raison de tre of movements is violence, as has been the case with later generations of Western European
27 On the nature of terrorism from a moral perspective, see P. Gilbert, Terrorism, Security, and Nationality: An Introductory Study in Applied Political Philosophy, Routledge, London, 1994, pp. 442. Gilbert seeks to differentiate terrorism from freedom ghting or tyrannicide by focusing on the system against which the movement operates. 28 Similarly parties can be closely coupled to terrorist organizations, such as the IRA and Sinn Fe in. 29 W. Laqueur, op. cit., p. 301.

Political violence and terrorism 49 radical left-wing terrorist organizations in the 1970s and 1980s.30 In addition to violence being the motivator of such movements, non-political criminal activities can become prominent stimuli for terrorist movements. While these organizations would merely become criminal organizations if they ceased entirely to pursue a political agenda, criminal and political goals are often closely wed. One reason lies in the per denition criminal nature of terrorism. Another key factor can be attributed to the need to use illegal sources to raise funds for criminal activities. Drug smuggling (e.g. Shining Path/Peru, UC K/Kosovo) and kidnapping (Abu Sayef Group/Philippines) are among the activities often pursued by terrorist movements with the result that at times the moneygaining components of the movements activities gains the upper hand over the political goals, as evidenced with a number of loyalist groups in Northern Ireland. Terrorism and Southeastern Europe Terrorism has not been alien to Southeastern Europe. Throughout the 20th century, a signicant number of terrorist movements have been active in the region, including the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914 by Mlada Bosna and the assassination of the Yugoslav King Aleksandar in Marseille in 1934 by the Macedonia nationalist VMRO together with the Croatian fascist Ustas e movement. In more recent decades, some radical Croat e migre organizations conducted terrorist acts against Yugoslav institutions and representatives abroad in the 1970s. As outlined above, the violence in former Yugoslavia throughout the 1990s and early in the new millennium is more difcult to dene. Contrary to many expectations, especially in the West during the NATO bombing and exemplied in Western popular culture (e.g. the movie The Peacemaker), only little terrorism took place. In most cases, the violence cannot be qualied as terrorism. For this phenomenon, we can identify three tentative reasons: Most violence was state organized and/or sanctioned. As such, there was little need for small terrorist groups to further their political agenda independently from state-sanctioned violence. Despite the high degree of inter-ethnic tensions, the politicalcriminal elites pursuing the wars and violence engaged with each other to an unprecedented degree. The degree of explicit and implicit cooperation between these elites throughout most of the conict reduced the interest of states in sponsoring terrorism in former Yugoslavia. The goals of the war were largely conned to the conquest and/or control of territory while expelling or controlling populations of other ethnicity. Consequently, the overthrow of the other states/authorities was not the primary interest of the nationalist movements. Although terrorism has been largely absent from the spectrum of violence employed in former Yugoslavia in the past decade, it would be false to completely deny the effects the wars had on terrorism. More important than the emergence of local terrorist movements have been the international implications for terrorist movements.
30

Ibid.

50 Florian Bieber Firstly, the wars in former Yugoslavia, especially in Bosnia, and the passivity of Western countries were instrumentalized by many radical Islamic organizations in the Muslim world as evidence for the anti-Muslim policies of the West. Secondly, the wars and the weak position of the Bosnian government during the war led to the arrival of both radical Islamic ghters and organizations that have remained active in Bosnia after the end of the war. Finally, one consequence of the wars has been the emergence of weak political units where public authority does not control the entirety of the territory effectively. Weak states, both in terms of the lack of control of territory, fragility of institutions, and the absence of the rule of law, can easily host global terrorist groups.31 With these effects in mind, it is important to remain cautious and not overestimate their impact. The rhetoric of large and well-organized terrorist groups in Southeastern Europe has not been backed by substantial evidence and mostly been a tool to advance a particular political often a nationalistagenda.32 Dening the threat of political violence The main threat of political violence in the past decade emanated from governments and organizations sponsored by recognized or unrecognized authorities. With different governments at conict with each other and supporting groups using violence as a means to achieve political objectives, little room for terrorist groups in the narrow sense existed. We can note attacks against buildings and members of ethnic, religious and social minorities through the past decade. Some of these attacks were specic to the conict such as the bombing of houses and religious monumentswhile others were mirrored throughout Europe, i.e. Skinhead attacks against Roma. In most cases, however, these incidents were either perpetrated by paramilitary groups with government support or consent, or were rather sporadic with either nobody claiming responsibility or shady groups with little structure or consistency. With the end of the authoritarian regimes in Serbia and Croatia and the substantial international military presence in the region the risk of outright state-sponsorship of political violence has declined. Despite the change of regimes, political and ethnic violence continued to be a signicant problem in Macedonia, Kosovo and Southern Serbia. In these areas there is a continued danger of violence perpetrated by paramilitary and terrorist groups. In the larger region the main danger for political violence lies elsewhere. Here two types of political violence can be identied as possible dangers. Firstly, violence against social and ethnic minorities might increase. A number of attacks against Roma in Serbia and elsewhere in recent years committed by Skinheads and other extremist groups point to this trend. Such movements thrive on the dissatisfaction of especially the youth with the transformation process.33 The high degree of nationalism, result of the nationalist mobilization of the 1990s, might feed into this phenomenon. This type of violence can,
See M. Glenny, Heading off terrorism in the Balkans, New York Times, 16 October 2001. A. Ciric, FRY in war against terrorism, AIM Belgrade, 8 October 2001; W. v. Meurs, Der Balkan im Schatten des 11. September 2001, Su dosteuropa Mitteilungen, 42(4), 2002, pp. 1013. 33 For Serbia see Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia, op. cit., pp. 235239.
32 31

Political violence and terrorism 51 however, be equally observed in other transition countries, as well as in Western Europe. The second type of violence might arise in former conict areas through terrorist groups or radical movements who might seek to reverse the tentative re-integration in parts of the former conict zones. Lacking state-sponsorship, they might be explicitly directed against the governments and be ready to use violence to pursue their aims. Until today such groups have only appeared in the form of declarations, rather than through acts of violence.34 Beyond the future threat of political violence, the record of the 1990s highlights another source of concern: the erosion of the state monopoly of the use of force.35 Although most use of force, as has been demonstrated, has been instigated by governments, rather than by sub-national actors, a considerable degree of political violence has been committed by groups only loosely or indirectly controlled by governments. A high degree of private ownership of weapons, the participation of signicant parts of the population in former Yugoslavia in armed formations during the past decade and continuing weaknesses of some states in the region pose a threat arising from non-governmental political violence. Florian Bieber is senior non-resident research associate at the European Centre for Minority Issues based in Belgrade and International Policy Fellow at the Open Society Institute, Budapest. He has published articles on nationalism and politics in Southeastern Europe in Nationalities Papers, Third World Quarterly, Current History and other journals. He authored Bosnien-Herzegowina und Libanon im Vergleich. Die historische Entwicklung und das politische System vor Ausbruch des Bu rgerkrieges [Comparing Bosnia-Herzegovina and Lebanon. Historical Development and the Political System Prior to the Civil War] (Pro Universitate Verlag, Sinzheim, 1999) and edited together with Dz emal Sokolovic Reconstructing Multiethnic Societies: The Case of Bosnia-Herzegovina (Ashgate, Alder idas Daskalovski Understanding the War in Kosovo (Frank shot, 2001) and with Z Cass, London, 2003). He is co-editor of the journal Southeast European Politics and founder and editor of Balkan Academic News. Address for correspondence: Majke Jevrosime 6/14, Serbia and Montenegro 11000 Beograd. E-mail: bieberf@gmx.net

34 In 2001, for example, leaets were distributed in the Serb entity of Bosnia threatening Bosniak returnees. The materials were signed by largely unknown organizations called Serbia to Tokio and Greater Serbia, see Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in the Republika Srpska, Human Rights in Republika Srpska AprilJune 2001, Bijelina, 2001. 35 In addition, the use of force by governments has been frequently illegitimate in its targeting of groups and individuals for political and ethnic reasons. On general consideration on this issue see A. Leander, Globalisation and the eroding state monopoly of legitimate violence, COPRI Working Paper, No. 24, 2002.

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