The Western Balkans Looking Forward to the Future
The Western Balkans Looking Forward to the Future

Summary/Abstract: The Western Balkans conflict dragged on for ten years and involved Albanians, Bosnians, Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes. The United States, NATO, and the EU helped the Western Balkans move from war to peace, from disintegration to sustainable development, and to a Euro- Atlantic future. The Balkan events saw the region racked by ethnic rivalry, hyper-nationalism, and bloody wars. Thousands of people in the region lost their lives by terror and genocide. Their homes were destroyed. Women and children were killed, violated and displaced. It was not easy amidst this suspicion, hatred, discontent and extremism to iron things out, and some questions emerge. Why did all that happen? What went wrong? These conflicts demonstrate the risks of politics in the region. The fundamental problem that lay behind this history was the difference between geopolitical and ethnic boundaries and the absence of adequate political mechanisms to deal with this difference. A brief review of the history might help us better understand the Euro-Atlantic policy and look forward to the future.

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