Demush Shasha from the Kosovo Institute for European Policy expresses the view that the measures imposed by the EU on Kosovo are soft and do not have irreversible consequences.
However, according to him, although the EU has the option to tighten these measures, such a decision requires the consensus of all member states, which is difficult to achieve.
So far, he says, the EU has canceled meetings of the Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA), which has a marginal effect.
Nevertheless, he points out that if consensus were reached to toughen the measures, the EU could make political and legal decisions that suspend the implementation of some parts of the SAA.
“For example, the EU could decide to suspend the entire trade section of the SAA. This would mean that Kosovo’s exporters would lose all the privileges they currently enjoy when exporting to the EU,” Shasha emphasizes.
Additionally, according to him, the EU has the option to intensify the current measure of not inviting Kosovo to high-level meetings and suspending bilateral visits.
Despite the current measure, he notes that Kosovo’s highest institutional leaders have participated in several high-level meetings so far, but this could change.
“For example, the EU could decide that starting September 1, Kosovo’s institutions be denied participation in all European forums. I am talking about escalations. This could escalate to the level of sanctions,” Shasha stresses.
He adds that until now, even the EU’s financial measures have been soft and have not produced irreversible consequences.
According to him, the EU has suspended certain funds for Kosovo but has not canceled them.
“Now the EU could escalate this and move from suspending funds to canceling them. Then the consequences would be irreversible,” Shasha emphasizes.
In this context, he says, Kosovo could face losses ranging from thousands to hundreds of millions of euros, depending on the message the EU wants to send to Kosovo’s authorities.
However, he does not believe the EU will take extreme measures but rather that they will be proportional to the behavior of Kosovo’s authorities.
“The range of possibilities for escalating these measures is infinite,” Shasha says.
Nevertheless, he notes that eventual tightening of measures is unlikely to happen in the short term and easily, as it could cause irreversible consequences in Kosovo-EU relations.
He believes that the EU will act according to the situation on the ground.
“If the EU, specifically, says ‘do not open the bridge (over the Ibar) and if Kosovo’s institutions open it, but during this process, there are no consequences on the ground – meaning no disturbances – then I do not see the EU taking measures,” Shasha stresses, adding that otherwise, the EU would respond in proportion to the created situation.
Nonetheless, Shasha expresses confidence that the EU will not take serious measures against Kosovo.
He believes that even in the past, when there were serious disturbances in the north of the country, which resulted in injured KFOR soldiers, the measures imposed by the EU on Kosovo were soft.
On May 29 of last year, protests by Serbs in northern Kosovo against the appointment of Albanian mayors in four municipalities culminated in clashes with KFOR members.
During the clashes, 93 KFOR members were injured, some of whom had serious injuries.
