Is Montenegro entering the order of those who destabilize the Balkans?

Montenegro still lacks the capacity to create a serious regional problem, but the government of Dritan Abazovic, which seems to be in a tighter embrace of Serbian and Russian influence, will create a problem for its own country, analysts believe after the latest diplomatic scandal with neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The attendance of Montenegrin government ministers at a meeting in Banja Luka, where Republika Srpska authorities commemorated 9 January, a date from 1992 which for some Bosnian Serbs is a symbol of the creation of this entity, and for Bosniaks and Croats the beginning of the suffering, was branded scandalous by Abazovic only after pressure from domestic and international public opinion. The US embassy in Podgorica, for example, described the move by Abazovic’s ministers as “very disappointing”.

Before changing his position on Thursday, Abazovic said that he would not dismiss the Ministers of Justice and Finance, Marko Kovac and Aleksandar Damjanovic, for their participation in the controversial celebration, which was also declared unconstitutional by the BiH Constitutional Court. The Montenegrin government, Abazovic said, had no role to play in the participation of its ministers in the celebration of the entity’s holiday.

This example also points to the continuation of highly problematic foreign policy actions and attitudes of the Dritan Abazovic government, which are moving us away from the Western course, but also collapsing the position we had in the regional context – Daliborka Uljarevic, a political scientist at the Centre for Civic Education, told Al Jazeera.

It should be stressed that there is no “private” and “personal” when a country’s minister goes abroad for a political meeting, although some have tried to portray it as such, and Abazovic himself initially categorised it as a “right to his views”, which he said he “respects and values”.

He also subsequently called such an action a scandal, but that sounds more like a forced than a convincing reaction – she said.

From leading to losing country

Since he supported Zdravko Krivokapić’s government in 2020 and became its Prime Minister last April, Abazović has often been criticised in Montenegro for his condescending attitudes towards the Serbian Orthodox Church and Serbian politics from Belgrade.

Abazovic’s government has been in a technical mandate since August last year, after losing support in Parliament.

A member of NATO, a leading region in European integration, Montenegro is increasingly in conflict with the West. The head of Slovenian diplomacy, Tanja Fajon, said at the end of last month that the EU could halt accession negotiations with Montenegro because of the severe political crisis in the country.

Uljarevic says that some of Abazovic’s moves show that the prime minister [in his technical mandate] is firmly embracing the policy of “expanding Serbian and Russian influence in the region”. Montenegro, she says, does not have the capacity to create wider problems for the region, and is certainly doing so to its own detriment. Like other countries in the Western Balkans, the European Union is Montenegro’s main economic partner.

Alignment with Vučić and Putin

Montenegro does not yet have the capacity to produce a serious regional problem, but coordination with the policies that they have – I am thinking of the policies of Serbian President [Aleksandar] Vucic, but also of [Vladimir] Putin – undoubtedly puts it in the order of those who are losing credibility among Western partners and cannot be allies in the Europeanisation of the region. In all this, Montenegro may again find itself as the biggest loser, because the benefits it gains from this kind of alignment with retrograde actors are only for the benefit of certain political leaders who, unfortunately, at the moment, have a significant influence on decision-making processes, while the damage to the public and state interest of Montenegro is undoubted and great – says Uljarević.

The Montenegrin government has not officially distanced itself from the messages of the leader of the Bosnian Serbs, Milorad Dodik, who, at a meeting in Banja Luka attended by Abazovic’s ministers, said that it was time for “all Serbs to live in one country”, which, as Uljarevic concludes, is a practical call for new conflicts, “because such announcements in Bosnia and Herzegovina led, among other things to the genocide in Srebrenica in 1995”.

These messages and the policies that flow from them call into question the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as Montenegro, Kosovo, Croatia, etc. and are contrary to Montenegro’s long-standing and sound foreign policy objectives, which focus on sustainable regional cooperation – concluded Uljarević./Pobjeda/