By Audra Skuodaite
A bunch of rather sleepy morning faces of AUC students
gathered at the Newborn sign as early as 8 am on Monday, 17 June. Right after
drinking the last sips of the well-praised Kosovo’s coffee, everyone rushed to
grab their best seats in a bus, which was there to take us to
Mitrovicë/Mitrovica - the divided city of Kosovo. Peace lab has always been
unofficially advertised as the opportunity to “drive around in the UN bus”
(among other things, of course) and so this was the day that this bus arrived
to pick us up. Having enjoyed our travels to Prizren and Gračanica in spacious
buses with two seats for each, the UN bus appeared to be smaller than expected.
Nevertheless, after making sure that all of us were relatively comfortably
seated, we left to Mitrovicë/Mitrovica.
The first meeting of the day was in the south of
Mitrovicë/Mitrovica, where the OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation
in Europe) mission in Kosovo regional centre was located. Aim for neutrality
could be seen as one of the keywords describing the meeting. In fact, it was
the first time that we were not allowed to audio record the presentation and
the discussions we had - the representatives of the organization we met with
were already very careful with their language, however, having it “on record”
meant going through the hassle of requesting higher authorities in the
organisation for permission.
OSCE is an organization that holds a very
broad mandate in Kosovo, including such areas as good governance, human rights,
gender equality, law and justice, minority protection, and inter-faith
dialogue. However, as not all OSCE member states recognize Kosovo as a state,
the organization finds itself in a rather peculiar position, which can neither
support nor deny Kosovo independence. As they said, “we work in a so-called
status neutral”. The language in OSCE reports is also well thought-through,
e.g., instead of “state prosecutors” they write “Kosovo prosecutors”, or
“Kosovo audit office” instead of “national audit office.”
When one of the students
implied that one of the OSCE representatives was referring to Serbian
politicians in his talk, he was quick to correct her: “I didn’t say Serbian
politicians. I said politicians.” Another student was also corrected, when she
asked about the results of the OSCE investigation of the recent violent
outbreak in Mitrovicë/Mitrovica: “it was not an investigation, we looked into
it”. The awareness of the power of language was very present during both
the formal presentation and informal discussions with the staff of OSCE in
Kosovo.
Another takeaway message from the meeting was the belief that the real
change will not happen before the politicians solve their issues.
Reconciliation efforts are being obstructed by some people in power - for
example, a science fair, which was supposed to bring Serbian and Albanian
students together, was cancelled by certain politicians. The criticism towards
one-off reconciliation events organized by OSCE was also not overlooked - due
to the lack of funds many projects would just simply not be realized.
Regardless, OSCE staff seemed to have an impression that people from all Kosovo
communities trust them. When asked what makes him happy about the work he is
doing, one of the OSCE representatives told us a story about a person who approached
him in the street and said: “Thank you, you helped me get my passport.”
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OSCE Mission in Kosovo Regional Centre in
Mitrovicë/Mitrovica
After the meeting, we went to the
shopping mall, located within walking distance from the OSCE office. The shopping mall
was known to us as one of the not-so-many places, where the two communities (those
of Serbs and Albanians) interacted or at least were present in the same place.
Working on my project, I was filming the abundance of colorful goods in the
store, which ranged from fruits and sweets to various kinds of sausages. Soon
my creative efforts were noticed by the staff of the store. “Do you have a
permission to film?” - I was asked. I kindly apologized and was just about to
promise to delete the footage, when the man invited me and my friends to go and
see the manager. Soon we found ourselves shaking hands with a suited man in a
small office. Having convinced the manager that we were working on our university
project and that we do not work in a supermarket in Amsterdam, we got the official
permission to continue filming, and so we could continue our creative
explorations of capturing the everyday live in Kosovo.
The
next stop was the International Business College Mitrovica (IBCM), which
welcomed us with its modern campus and a number of inspirational quotes on the
walls of the academic building. IBCM set a rather positive tone with its
emphasis on integration and inclusion of different communities (up to 40% of
students in the college were non-Albanian). Nevertheless, the school is rather
small and despite the efforts of inclusion, its rigorous requirements for
admission inevitably means that only students who already have more
opportunities than others (e.g., good command of English language) are the ones
who benefit from what the college provides (must sound familiar to AUC
students). What was interesting, however, was that the college, similarly to
OSCE, was also careful with its language. In order to put less emphasis on the
divide that separates the Serbian and Albanian communities in
Mitrovicë/Mitrovica, they renamed their two campuses from the Mitrovica North and Mitrovica South to Riverview
and Riverside.
International
Business College Mitrovica
Finally,
we visited the ACDC. And no, we did not get to see the 1970s rock band. ACDC
stands for Advocacy Centre for Democratic Culture. I probably could say that
this meeting reminded me of my own positionality, formed throughout the first
days spent with the Albanian community in Kosovo. Knowing that ACDC is a
grassroots organization, working with democratization in the region, somehow I
did not expect ACDC to be that strongly focused on protecting Serbian rights in
particular. An extremely honest and genuine meeting allowed us to hear a
relatively unfiltered Serbian perspective for the first time in our trip.
The
young woman, who greeted us at ACDC, shared what issues she faces as a Serbian,
living in Mitrovicë/Mitrovica - weak rule of law, institutions that do not
accept Serbian documents, and the prevailing feeling of being unsafe. Taking action
and tackling these issues was what motivated her to work for ACDC - “our aim is
that our possibilities of Serbians would be the same as those of Albanians”.
She expressed that integration might not be possible, but the communities should
be able to live separately in peace. ACDC fosters an inter-ethnic dialogue by
organizing a number of seminars, where people from all the communities are
invited to discuss different relevant topics together. Interestingly, the
meeting resonated with the meeting with OSCE, as the importance of neutrality
came up again: “you need to be neutral in this job. But when you go home, you
know that things are not the way you want it.” The ACDC staff work hard to
provide a neutral platform (for example, hold seminars outside of
Mitrovicë/Mitrovica), but at the end of the day it is rather difficult to stay
neutral, when the matters touch personal perceptions and experiences. The
woman’s talk also brought us back to the OSCE meeting, when she expressed her
belief that the change needs to first come from above. Unless politicians
resolve the issue, the real reconciliation between the communities and peace
unlikely will be achieved.
ACDC. Written in English and Serbian language. Serbian text
written in cyrillic in order to preserve the Serbian alphabet.
The recurring theme of the day, therefore, was the
importance of the use of language. The day was also very different from all the
others previously, especially once we entered the northern part of
Mitrovicë/Mitrovica. The flags suddenly changed colors from red (Albanian flag)
or blue (Kosovo flag) to red, blue, and white (Serbian flag). Some signs in the
city changed its alphabet from Latin to Cyrillic. After the meeting with ACDC,
we all went back to our bus together with the sound of some kids cheering
“Serbia, Serbia!” right outside the ACDC office. And the complexity of
reconciling the divided communities appeared to be even more challenging than
we probably thought it was.
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