Saturday, July 12, 2025

Open a space

By Maria van Wijnen


Before writing this blog post, I decided to reread all of my journal entries from Peace Lab and sit with the memories. It’s funny to read the first few journal entries, which are basically stressed scribbles where I go on and on about being worried about the test and the overwhelming amount of information. Further into the month, the writing transforms as I document our meetings and my key takeaways. There were stark differences between my emotions following each meeting. As soon as the Zoom call ended with NSI, a dense fog of despair seemed to flood the room. This was very different from the energy of the class after the meeting with Prime Minister Kurti, where we were talking over each other and brimming with excitement at having talked to such a high-ranking politician and now being able to unpack what was said. These contrasts are exactly what made the class so gripping and thought-provoking, as each class left me with so much to dissect.

One memory that sticks out to me now is hearing Elizabeth Gowing discuss how she started the Ideas Partnership. Maybe I am projecting my feelings onto my classmates, but I felt that we were hanging onto each word coming out of her mouth in a trance of awe. Any retelling of this story that I could attempt now would pale in comparison to her storytelling abilities. The organic and accidental way she became involved in the Ashkali, Roma, and Egyptian communities of Kosovo, and how she built this initiative from the ground up with such passion and care, was so inspiring to me. Other memories include talking to Kosovo 2.0, which reignited my love for Journalism. Before becoming the Social Science and international relations-focused student I am today, I was once a Humanities student at AUC, with the goal of pursuing journalism. This goal was crushed by fast-paced journalism and constant reminders that journalism is a very competitive field, which is also steadily declining in quality. I still don’t plan on pursuing journalism anymore, but the realisation that slow and good-quality journalism not only exists, but is respected and holds great impact, restored a sense of hope.

For the final project, my group and I decided to create a virtual museum designed to help people better understand Kosovo by exploring key themes like education, governance, dialogue, international engagement and peacebuilding. The museum starts in a lobby that sets the tone with maps, cultural images, a timeline of Kosovo’s history and an explanation of how and why we built this exhibit. Each room includes images and descriptions that break down complex issues, for example, a photo in the education room represents integrated schooling, a deeply debated topic in Kosovo today. 

We focused on presenting multiple perspectives without overwhelming viewers, aiming for clarity while acknowledging nuance. I could write an entire paper including everything that we cover in the museum but what we’ve built is meant to be experienced. I really hope you take the time to visit our website and explore the virtual exhibition. Reading cannot replace an immersive and interactive engagement with the images, stories and layered realities that shape Kosovo. Walking through the museum allows you to move at your own pace, to sit with the tension between different perspectives, and to feel the weight of history alongside the hope and complexity of peacebuilding.


(Our virtual exhibition from a bird's-eye view.)

Our motivation for this project came from a mix of frustration, curiosity, and a sense of responsibility. Over the course of the semester, we kept hearing the same message from civil society groups, scholars and peacebuilders: Kosovo is often misunderstood, simplified, or completely ignored by the international community. That stuck with us. We felt like, since we were learning so much that we hadn’t known before, others might be just as unaware. I even admitted to my group members that before Peace Lab Kosovo, I was not sure that I could have decisively placed Kosovo on a map, nor did I have the slightest idea of its history. 

As embarrassing as that feels to share, considering I am two years into a degree focusing on International relations, I can now feel proud of what our group has created. We didn’t want to claim authority after only a month of study; instead, we wanted to open a space where the complexity of Kosovo could speak for itself. That’s why we prioritised showing multiple viewpoints, viewpoints, even when they contradicted each other 

Ultimately, we made this museum because we felt like the people we spoke to shared their time, their history, their passion and sometimes even their pain or frustration with us. The least we could do was try to pass that forward, hopeful that all we have learned can somehow reach others who might not know much about Kosovo but who are willing to listen, to learn and to see it in all its complexity and humanity.

Friday, July 11, 2025

Dream of bridges

 By Ema Torcato

Peace Lab is officially over! Now that the course has come to an end, I’ve been thinking a lot about everything I learned both in class and through the process of creating our final group project. This blogpost is a way for me to reflect on those experiences, and to make sense of what this course has meant to me. 

When we learned about the main bridge of Mitrovica during one of our first classes I was struck by the irony of it. A structure designed to unite had come to symbolise distance, tension and unresolved conflict. Having thought about this paradox for a while with my group, we decided to make it the core of our group’s project: a zine that showcases a visual and narrative exploration of how this bridge functions as both a physical and symbolic boundary between North and South Mitrovica. Through poems, quotes, images and historical context, we wanted to show how places can carry trauma, but also how they can hold potential for connection and healing. The online version of the zine is available to anyone through this link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cWWDi79LMDBX6gBdOFt8edXD5UJXH8qF/view?usp=sharing



Initially, we thought we’d focus on myths and stories surrounding the river, or even produce a short film, but after some more research and with Anne’s insights, we realised a different format would be more realistic and impactful. We discovered that myths about the Ibar were quite sparse, and a short film, while exciting, would have been too ambitious given our limited time. Because of this, we pivoted to a zine, which in hindsight was the best decision we could’ve made. The zine gave us room to be creative while staying grounded in serious content, covering the bridge’s past, present and future. 

Creating the zine was a true team effort. While Johanna led the design due to her experience, everyone contributed: researching and cross-checking information, writing each section, sourcing images, formatting quotes, organising layouts and giving feedback. One of my favourite parts was how much care we all put into not just the content, but the feeling of the zine. We wanted it to be accessible. We did not want it to feel like an academic paper, but something people could actually read and engage with. Working closely with my teammates made the process feel meaningful and fun, even when we were under time pressure. I genuinely felt like I formed lasting bonds with people I hadn’t worked with before. In a way, I felt that the way we laughed, debated and helped each other edit and revise became a kind of peacebuilding in itself. It reminded me how important collaboration is in doing work that aims to understand and heal conflict.

On a personal level, this entire course, and especially the project, forced me to reflect deeply on my future. I found myself journaling a lot, trying to figure out if I could see myself in a peacebuilding, human rights, grassroots career. Many of the meetings we had were raw and honest. We heard from people who dedicate their lives to building safer communities and creating social change, often while facing limited resources, public scepticism, or even political backlash. It was inspiring, but at times it made me feel almost hopeless. I realised how emotionally demanding this field is, and how much resilience it requires. I started asking myself hard questions: Would I be able to handle that kind of pressure? Do I have the emotional capacity for this kind of work long-term? The answer, I think, is still unclear. But I’m grateful that this class gave me a safe space to think about it seriously and honestly.

Another realisation I had was about the power of creative expression in understanding conflict. Our project didn’t just summarise facts, it used visual language, poetry and emotion to capture what’s at stake in Mitrovica. Through this, I was able to see how creativity isn’t a distraction from serious issues but rather one of the most powerful tools we have to make people care, to build empathy and to imagine new futures. Our zine wasn’t a solution to the division in Kosovo, but it was a small contribution to reframing the story. It was also, for me, a personal way of exploring how stories, images and collective memory shape the world we live in.


Peace Lab didn’t just teach me about Kosovo’s history. It challenged my ideas about connection, justice and possibility. It reminded me that even in spaces filled with tension, people still dream of bridges (literal and metaphorical ones) that might one day bring them closer. And maybe, in some small way, this project helped me start to build one too.

Thursday, July 10, 2025

Stories for curiosity, for courage and for change

By Veronica Hibbert

You can find our website here

It’s the end of June, and Peace Lab is over. The last four weeks have been very thought-provoking. As I have written in my previous blogpost, something shifted in me during our meeting with Besa Luci from Kosovo 2.0. She spoke about slow journalism: the idea that stories don’t need to be rushed, that it’s okay to take time, to dig deeper, to ask why something matters rather than just what happened. That idea stuck with me.

I’ve always loved stories and the art of storytelling. I remember reading Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls as a child, and letting those short, powerful stories shape my dreams. This has been an inspiration for our final project. 

Together with my group, we created a digital storytelling platform that celebrates Kovosar women, past and present, women who’ve made meaningful contributions to society. Each story highlights the lives, struggles and accomplishments of Kosovar women from various ethnic and professional backgrounds. We wrote these stories in the style of fairytales, aimed at young girls--which sounds pretty straightforward, but writing children’s books is not as easy as we anticipated. We struggled with using the right tone and describing someone’s life in a couple of hundred words. 

But it worked, and we’re proud of the platform we created. This project reminded me that storytelling can be more than creative expression; it can be activism. It can reclaim forgotten histories, amplify overlooked voices and offer alternatives to the narratives that dominate. Like Kosovo 2.0, our goal wasn’t to just inform, but to listen and care.

I walk away from Peace Lab not just with new knowledge, but with a renewed sense of purpose. I’ve been reminded that stories, when told with care, can build bridges. They can heal. And they can plant seeds, for curiosity, for courage and for change.

Wednesday, July 9, 2025

On doing domething, even when it feels small

By Ana Vladescu


Screenshot of the website we created for our project. We hope it inspires more Kosovar women and girls to share their experiences and lessons.


Throughout my time at AUC, I’ve often felt stuck between theory and action. I’m grateful for the education I’m receiving, one that challenges me intellectually, but I sometimes wonder what to do with all this knowledge. That question became especially relevant last year during the on-campus protests against the genocide in Gaza. I participated from a distance, but part of me questioned whether the protests were helping. Some students were annoyed or dismissive, and I worried that the actions, while well-intentioned, might only push people away from the cause. I’ve always believed that guilt makes a poor foundation for activism because it can lead to burnout, to bitterness, or to performative gestures that mean little in the end. And yet, when I heard students complain about the protests, I always defended them: at least they were trying. At least they were keeping the conversation alive. 


Even now, a year later, I have more questions than answers. What can I do in the face of injustice? How can I act meaningfully without jeopardising the life I’ve worked hard to build? And how do I do that while recognising the privilege I hold—the privilege to choose when and how to engage? It’s easy to be critical from the sidelines, but far more difficult to take action that feels both responsible and impactful. I often find myself caught in that tension: wanting to do something but feeling paralysed by doubt, uncertainty, or fear of doing it wrong.


These same questions resurfaced throughout this project. As we learned more about Kosovo, met with NGOs on the ground like New Social Initiative and UNMIK, and heard firsthand about the challenges they face, I felt that same familiar guilt. I wanted to help. I wanted to do something. But what? How? My group’s project—to create a website of children’s stories about strong women in Kosovo—sometimes felt a little silly. Was this really going to help anyone? Would it matter? Or would it fade into obscurity, like so many well-meaning school projects before it? 


But as we reached the final week, something shifted in me. My biggest takeaway is this: Do something. Even if it feels small. Even if it annoys people. Even if it seems naive or idealistic or a product of your youthful inexperience. If it’s thoughtful, meaningful, and done with care, then it’s not nothing. It matters. Because something is always better than nothing. If everyone waits for the perfect moment or the perfect plan, or assumes their contribution is too small to count, nothing will change. I think I finally understand how peace is built piece by piece. After all, that’s how Peace Lab Rwanda began: with Dieudonné’s initiative to invite the former Rwandan Ambassador to visit AUC in 2019. I wonder if he knew how his small effort would grow into something so much bigger, encompassing generations of AUC students. Maybe it’s cliché to say every action has consequences, even if we don’t see them until years later. But this project reminded me that clichés still hold truth. So I’m trying to hold onto this one: If you believe something matters, do something about it. Even if it’s just telling a story.

Tuesday, July 8, 2025

Giving change a human face

By Szymon Bajerski

At first, I thought I would write my final blog post about political change. When I entered my first Peace Lab class at the beginning of June I expected to be flooded with information about institutions: UNMIK, EULEX, the government. As a law student I always tend to focus my attention on the official communication, binding instruments and large-scale governance. If the government fails — I was thinking — maybe NGOs could provide answers to the questions regarding Kosovo’s status. Organise everything in Excel, exercise political pressure and then you can succeed.
 
What has come afterwards can only be described as a series of disappointments. Firstly, the interview with New Social Initiative, who expressed their concerns with a stagnant, or at times even worsening political landscape. It was difficult to gather my thoughts. “Describing Kosovo as a pre-conflict society — peculiar.” Then came the inability to contact EULEX, reluctance of UNMIK officials to answer questions, a recurring theme of exclusion, even around issues disconnected from ethnical tensions. I felt frustrated, tired, even disillusioned. Until I realised I was looking in the wrong direction.
 
In my own considerations of change I failed to give it a human face. Rather than look at statistics on the conflict, one can try to feel what it is like to live through it. Numbers don’t speak; People do. Together with my friends Ella and Elena we wanted to understand what it is like to visit Kosovo, to be Kosovar. Therefore, for our final project we decided to explore how people connect and the spaces they require to do so. Interviewing former Peace Lab Kosovo students, as well as Kosovar locals, we created a guide to where, how and with whom individuals interact.
 
One might think that such a project is predestined to fail. Perhaps it would run a risk of becoming a “he said, she said” publication, struggle to achieve academic depth or even collapse, with few or no interviewees. At first, we did indeed struggle, especially because we were not in Kosovo in person. We even considered withdrawing. Then, we finally secured our first interviewee and started listening.
 
Our guests told us simple stories: of their everyday lives, trips, meals. As I listened, my eyes would open wider and wider. Suddenly I could smell the hot air in Pristina, feel the burning sun on my skin. I could hear the crowds making their way through Mother Theresa Boulevard, taste the wine. I was no longer in Amsterdam, but rather caught in what I can only describe as the magic of listening. For once I could feel that Kosovo comes to me, as a place where people fall in love and get heartbroken, are born and pass away; they laugh and cry. Kosovars are not political actors, they are humans. Many of our interviewees shared that, politics aside, everyday conversations shape how communities interact. Those everyday dialogues are really when change occurs, not in Brussels, or in shiny parliamentary halls.
 
It is difficult to recognise the importance of conversations. Sometimes you really need to “shut up and listen”. Only if you recognise a human in the other, can you find out what stories they carry. Those stories hold the power to change you. With this shift, peacebuilding can start.

Monday, July 7, 2025

The Importance of individual agency

By Isaac Otter

The homepage of our website--you can find it here

This course has taught me many things, but what I think I will take away from it more than anything, is the agency we have to build peace. Before this course, my viewpoint of peacebuilding was centred around international aid, and although this does play a major role, I feel like there is a serious neglect – especially in IR theory – of the importance of individual agency in peacebuilding. On the local level, it is arguably much more important for the realisation of individual agency, rather than top down, bloated institutions, many of which seem to perpetuate the neo-colonial dynamics they were implemented to stop. Hearing talks from people like Dieudonné, someone so passionate about local peace building, it caused a genuine shift in my perception of what is possible.
 
This gradual shift in perspective over the course of Peace Lab culminated in the final project and our excitement for it. In the beginning we were going to write stories for a book, but instead we decided to make a website (you can find it here). This website has the aim of being a space for people to share inspirational stories of people in Kosovo, to promote transformative dialogue. One key feature of the website is the ease to switch between: English, Albanian, and Serbian – aligning with our goal of accessibility. This project showed me the individual agency I had to create something. In a world of increasing commercialism, there is little room or value given to acts of kindness without reciprocation. This sad truth is partially the reason for my blindness against my own agency, as without monetary value it is often deemed unimportant.
 
So how will I take this into my future? Remembering my own agency is what I aim to do with the teachings I have received in this course. Although its perceived value may be undermined by the capitalist systems at play, I think its relative local importance can be incomparable to that of larger institutional work – for example, projects enacted by the UN. The empowerment of people to act on their own terms, for their own problems, seems to be either an overlooked, or under-published version of peacebuilding – which I plan to pursue further.  
 
Overall, this course has not only taught me about the history of the Balkans, but also about the realities of peacebuilding. Although sad we were not able to visit Kosovo due to different financial priorities at our school, I think that the course (and its very intensive nature), broadened my insight into the value of individual agency. 

Sunday, July 6, 2025

The Spark of Youth

 By Ana Vladescu

Albin Kurti circa 1997

A few weeks ago, I went home for the first time in two years and found myself flipping through old primary school yearbooks. The little kids I grew up with are completely different now, as expected. But as I looked through those old photos I noticed that we all had something in common. There’s this glint in our eyes that you don’t usually find in our eyes as the years pass. It’s what united us then, and maybe still does. As people age, we learn to suppress our expressions, speak more cautiously, carry ourselves like we’ve seen too much. But why is it that the older we get, the more we mock or dismiss the idealism of the young? I’ve heard it all my life: “You’ll understand when you’re older,” “the world doesn’t work that way,” or my personal favorite, “you only believe that because you’re still young.” I used to believe I’d be the exception—that I could get older without getting duller. But lately I wonder: is losing the spark inevitable?

Our meeting with UNMIK was very emotional for me; it made me feel small. When I was 16, I told everyone I would become president someday. It was overambitious and naïve, but I felt it deeply. I just wanted to make things better, to prove that politics didn’t have to be dirty. My family laughed, and I understood why, but this feeling of “smallness” lingered. Over time, I’ve been told again and again that my belief in people and peace is just a side effect of being young. And maybe they’re right. Sitting in that meeting, listening to career officials who couldn’t (or wouldn’t) answer basic questions about what motivates them now, I felt something close to heartbreak. They used to be passionate “when they were young,” one of them said, like youth was a condition they’d outgrown. It hit me hard: is this what adulthood looks like? Still working, still important on paper, but no longer moved by the purpose that brought you there?

When we met the prime minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti for our online meeting, something shifted. I’d done my research. I knew he had once been a student protester, politically outspoken and driven by ideals. And I was skeptical—wondering if power had turned him into just another polished politician who forgot where he started. My question to him was: “As an opposition figure, your voice was powerful because it stood against the system. Now that you are part of the system, how do you hold yourself accountable?” His answer surprised me. He spoke not just with care, but with conviction. He acknowledged the difficulty of accountability in a government without a functioning parliament, but said he holds himself accountable by staying adaptable—by not changing his social class. That struck me. Most politicians avoid this topic entirely, especially in my home countries (the U.S. and Romania), where power often comes with distance. Kurti’s answer wasn’t perfect, but it felt honest. He remembered. And that memory, I realized, might be the key. The spark doesn’t have to die—it just needs to be protected.

I’ve often felt trapped in this strange in-between: legally an adult, socially still a child. “Proper adults” (as I refer to them) talk down to me, assume I don’t understand how the world works. But what if I do—and I’m just not jaded yet? Our virtual journey through Kosovo has been full of emotional whiplash: UNMIK’s disillusionment, the dry hopelessness in the room during our NSI conversation, the passion in the voices at the Peace by Peace workshop, and the thoughtful optimism of Besa Luci from Kosovo 2.0. There, I saw humanities taken seriously, media used as a tool for empathy and dialogue. In their work—and in Kurti’s voice—I saw proof that some people carry their spark with them, even as they grow. Maybe being young isn’t about age at all, but about refusing to forget why you started. Maybe it’s not naïve to believe in change, just deeply, stubbornly human. And maybe, just maybe, the real work of growing up is learning how to keep your spark alive in a world that keeps trying to smother it.

Saturday, July 5, 2025

On the horrors and beauty of being human, or Our Den Haag trip

Bu Julia Kowalczyk

The past two days (19 and 20 June) are a story my future children will hear about, whether they want it or not. I see it as a slide progression of contrasting pictures. The Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, sat between two Kosovar flags in a Zoom window, and the serious yet fascinated faces of my classmates surrounding him on the screen. Postcard-like Den Haag glowing with the light of Dutch June’s most favourable weather. The cold and sterile court room of the Kosovo Specialist Chambers (KSC). The hot sand of the beach and fresh strawberries immediately after. 

I thought nothing could possibly beat the experience of hearing perhaps the most important person in Kosovo flawlessly and with hypnotising conviction reference Albert Camus and Pierre Bourdieu in response to our questions about creating a peaceful society of equals. But it was still visiting the KSC that brought me the closest to Kosovo that I have ever been, even though different financial priorities at Amsterdam University College regrettably stopped this semester’s Peace Lab from seeing the country in person.

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers, Den Haag

We had the privilege of being invited to an extensive meeting with a public relations person in a setting similar to that of a real press briefing. There we learned about the KSC’s mandate and its inner workings straight from the source. The Kosovo Specialist Chambers is a court established to investigate and prosecute war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the Kosovo War, between 1998 and 2000. The most notable and contentious case up to date is that of Hashim Thaçi, the former president of Kosovo. While the court operates under Kosovo law, it is staffed by international judges. The reasoning behind that hiring policy centres around mitigating political influences and ensuring impartiality.

My classmates and I demonstrated the interviewing skills we have developed over the few weeks of Peace Lab by asking a number of critical, nuanced questions, amongst others about the inclusion of Kosovar Albanians and Serbs directly in the restorative justice process, the neocolonial perspective on international organisations, and the community outreach efforts in Pristina. That riveting experience further fuelled my passion for qualitative research and journalism. It also made me reflect on how much more personal it feels to talk to officials in person as opposed to via a video conference. Additionally, I believe hearing the public relations person’s insightful advice regarding building a career in the field of social justice was very inspiring for all the driven young people present.  

What possibly made the biggest impression on me was sitting in the same exact place where the families of the people indicted for war crimes do during trials, from above watching their detained loved ones stand in front of the judges and defend themselves against organ harvesting and torture allegations. I wish I will one day have the opportunity to visit this room again during an active hearing. 

Even after leaving the official part of the excursion, many of us stayed together as we simply could not stop discussing our impressions all the way until the late evening. Some even described the KSC visit as a “before and after” moment in their lives. I could not shake off the feeling that while we came close to themes which make one question how depraved human nature can appear at times, we also, against all odds, saw something very uplifting. While the overall effectiveness of institutions such as the KSC or the International Court of Justice (ICJ) can be constructively questioned, they do exist and keep standing as a tangible representation of society’s ultimate quest for justice, materialising our unwavering commitment to collectively bringing about a better future.

Friday, July 4, 2025

Optimism in a world of division


By Dave van Twuijver

On Tuesday 17 June we had our meeting with Community Building Mitrovica (CBM), a peacebuilding organisation located in the tense northern part of Kosovo. CBM is mainly involved in facilitating contact and dialogue between the citizens of the whole of the Mitrovica municipality. The NGO was established by Valdete Idrizi, who was forced out of her home in North Mitrovica during the Serb invasion of 1999. Its staff is made up of both Albanians and Serbs, which enables the NGO to be attractive to both ethnicities.

I was excited for the meeting, but also didn’t quite know what to expect. We had one other meeting with a different NGO from Mitrovica, which wasn’t as positive as many of us had expected. It seemed like they nearly had lost hope in their cause and were questioning if what they did even mattered anymore. This was an eye opener for us, as it showed us that peacebuilding is not always successful and can be very difficult. Because of this, I was excited about our meeting. On the one hand I was nervous as I feared that the meeting would have a similar tone. However, when our meeting had started, I quickly realised that this would not be the case.

The meeting we had was very inspirational. CBM was very excited to talk about what they have achieved over the years and were eager to explain and answer all of our questions. They explained to us how they measure success through different methods. However, what stuck with me the most is what they described as success. We were told that as an NGO, or any other individual or company, you have to appreciate the little successes. CBM would already deem their whole NGO a success if they influenced one single mind into being more open and accepting towards the other.

I think that the main lesson that I learned from this meeting is that people with a similar goal and in a very similar environment can have very different stances on their success. Whereas New Social Initiative was very pessimistic about a lot of things, CBM was very positive and happy with the progress that they were making. Like CBM, I think that it's not all about the big victories won in front of a large crowd. These big victories are all built upon smaller ones won throughout time, which we must celebrate as well.

Thursday, July 3, 2025

Reform of the Kosovo Specialist Chamber: The only way to achieve true justice

An image from a trial involving former Prime Minister and President of Kosovo Hashim Thaci (pictured top left) on 03/04/23.

By Ben Sweeney

On Friday 20 June, I (as part of the Peace Lab course) travelled to The Hague to visit the Kosovo Specialist Chambers (KSC) to learn more about the body. The KSC was created in 2017 to judge perpetrators of the Kosovo Liberation Army’s violence from 1998 to 2000. At the KSC we met with a public relations person who gave a presentation about the history of the KSC, how the Chambers works and ongoing trials. Additionally, she answered questions from us students about the KSC.

Coming away from the meeting, I was struck by her view of the goal of the KSC. During the Q&A session, I asked about how the court manages to reconcile its desire to bring justice to victims in Kosovo while directly contributing to political instability in the country through the summoning, arrest and jailing of leaders. Another colleague questioned the lack of Kosovar involvement in the body aside from the Defence's counsel. Both answers shocked me. She made it clear to me that the KSC’s job is not the reconciliation of communities within Kosovo, but rather bringing people to justice. Additionally, her defence of the KSC not employing any Kosovar (or Serbian) national on the staff left myself and others with a sour taste in our mouths – as if the KSC had decided that those communities could not be trusted in bringing alleged war criminals and those accused of heinous crimes to account.  

Over the last three weeks, our studies have focused on how to bring groups together and create a shared identity with the aim of building a sustainable and inclusive peace for Kosovars. We have heard from civil society groups who organise safe spaces for citizens to share their feelings to move towards a less divisive society, alongside political figures such as the Prime Minister who spoke of his goal of establishing an integrated education system within Kosovo to bring majority and non-majority groups together. Their focus has been on making Kosovo better for the next generation and ending the decades of tensions between rival ethnic groups. This is not the feeling I got from the KSC. Their goal of trying alleged criminals is unpopular within both ethnic Serb and ethnic Albanian communities with disagreement over to what extent the KSC should try to attain justice for victims of horrifying acts. However, the KSC does not change its tactics despite its stated commitment to community outreach – continuing its institutionalised actions. This (while having the ironic effect of creating a shared identity of opposition) is not beneficial to Kosovo’s future.
While I see the benefits of putting criminals in jail, I feel there needs to be a significant re-thinking of KSC operations. The body has to emphasise the inclusion of Kosovar communities in the decision making – top-down strategies won’t work in the long-term to create spaces for Kosovars to live in. Instead, I see further engagement with both groups as key – taking on board their views and wishes is the only way to achieve true justice for the communities and end the needless violence which dominated the 20th century in the Balkans.

Wednesday, July 2, 2025

Where hope meets mandate: The limits of international peacebuilding

By Ella Haeusgen

As of 20 June, we had been learning about Kosovo for roughly three weeks: its politics, its history, its people and cultures. When studying Kosovo, it is impossible to avoid the recurring theme of the important ongoing role of international actors. UNMIK (the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo) is a particularly important yet controversial actor in Kosovo. While UNMIK representatives label UNMIK's influence as having 'birthed' Kosovo, it is often criticised by Kosovo's population and faces unfriendly opposition. 

Throughout our Peace Lab course, we have learned about UNMIK's achievements in the immediate post-war period. However, we have also gained an understanding of UNMIK's shortcomings. The general perception of UNMIK is one of dislike, frustration and anger, as it has failed to achieve certain aims. With its top-down approach and its way of 'forcing democracy', as PM Kurti would later label it, UNMIK faces allegations of imposing certain conditions on the Kosovar population in a – perhaps – post-colonial manner. 


At the same time, Kosovo might be much worse off without
 UNMIK's assistance. Its presence contributed to the stabilisation of the region and the restoration of order and the rule of law in Kosovo since 1999. However, it is now 2025 and UNMIK is still in Kosovo, mainly in a monitoring and reporting role, with no exit strategy. An end to UNMIK is impossible until there is a change in the mandate, which is highly unlikely. There is no real solution to the status question in sight, no clear pathway for UNMIK's work and increasing, inter-ethnic tensions. This all tends to create a sense of hopelessness among the people. 

Thus, when the day finally came to meet UNMIK, we had many questions. It was an exciting day for us, with both the (online) meeting with UNMIK and the meeting with Kosovo’s Prime Minister, Albin Kurti, scheduled back-to-back. This meant preparing for two meetings that required careful consideration and an open mind. We couldn’t let our existing perceptions guide us in these meetings; rather, we had to create space for other, new perspectives.

The UNMIK meeting itself was very interesting in parts; for example, we learned that there is a plan to build two more bridges in Mitrovica, a rather surprising plan that could have a significant impact on the city (although one might wonder why two more should be built if the current one is not working to bridge the communities). Moreover, we learnt about one of UNMIK’s achievements, namely the creation of the first dictionary since 1993. As we have learned, learning one’s language is crucial in the peacebuilding process and thus this is an important step. 

However, overall, the class felt underwhelmed after the meeting. While we now had a better understanding of UNMIK’s work and its ongoing community building efforts, we were disappointed not to receive clear answers to our questions. When we tried to find out what motivates the peacekeepers, we received uninspiring answers, often delivered with a tone along the lines of, 'as long as there is a mandate and a budget, the mission will continue and we'll be here'. Nevertheless, it is understandable that UN personnel face many challenges and may eventually lose the enthusiasm and drive of students who are only at the beginning of this long journey to work towards a better world.
 
One day later, we met a woman who prefers to stay anonymous – an inspiring woman – who had worked for the UN in Kosovo for six years after the end of the war. She gave us another picture of the interaction between UN staff and the local population. It is a picture characterised by cultural diversity, openness on all sides, perhaps shyness, but also curiosity about the person on the other side and a strongly interwoven, local cooperation. 

Things change over time and perhaps the truth lies in the middle of things. As Anne said after the meeting with UNMIK, there is a lot we don't know and we will probably never see the whole picture - if that is even possible. It's a frustrating and intractable situation: we don't really like the status quo, but it may be the best we have. It resembles the inherent compromise we find ourselves in when attempting to mitigate the complexity of human nature, be it in a democratic or humanitarian context.

UN Resolution 1244 is passed by the UNSC on the 10th of July, 1999


Tuesday, July 1, 2025

Unlearning

By Szymon Bajerski
 
“[…] what matters even more than what we learn, is the unlearning.”
                                                                                    Besa Luci, Co-founder of Kosovo 2.0
 
Over the last three weeks we have heard (and shared) strikingly different stories. From hope to despair, from ambitious plans to chaos, our Kosovar speakers gifted us 45-minute-long insights into their daily struggles. It is impossible not to notice contradictions appearing between those testimonies. I sometimes found it difficult to make sense of such incoherent tales. A difference in perspectives — between individuals, groups, nations — leads to construction of parallel narratives, already predestined to never meet in the aphoristic middle. Generations share stories of hatred, mistreatment, offence. Misunderstandings only deepen with time as truth is lost somewhere in the story. We learn what (or whom) to perceive, but also how to perceive it.
 
To become an actor of change is to learn how to speak. It is to learn how to listen. But it is also to unlearn. Old habits die hard: leaving narratives, especially those shared throughout centuries, behind is not easy. Sometimes the discriminatory meaning is incorporated in the everyday language so deeply, that we don’t even realise what hurtful words we may use. Reconciliation is however not possible, unless the conflicted groups allow themselves to think of each other as equals. They must be given a voice, to create a new, shared story to tell.  

Kosovo’s Prime Minister Albin Kurti shared with us his idea to create common schools for kids of Albanian, Serb and other origins. Although I often don’t agree with Mr. Kurti, this time I was truly fascinated. Such schools attempt to reshape the narrative through collective experiences: of growing up together, forming friendships, falling in love, intermarrying.  “Forgetting” the never-ending tension. Unlearning the way they’re spoken about.
 
Personally, Peace Lab Kosovo has proven to be an unlearning process. Every time I started to form a somewhat coherent opinion on the conflict, the next interviewee would successfully shutter it into pieces. At first it resulted in frustration. With time, I could see the impact the process had for me. To leave one’s damaging presuppositions behind is to free self from the negative emotions one carries. Prejudices have the power to ruin the conversation, but they do so from the inside. They shape minds, close ears, open the door to violence. Only a real striving for forgiveness can make one truly understand the other.
 
So I urge you to think: What do you have yet to unlearn?