Separatists and states see hope and fear in Kosovo

By Peter Apps

LONDON (Reuters) - Newly independent Kosovo might be a unique case, experts say, but it has nonetheless given fresh hope to separatist movements around the world and created a worrying precedent for nations with restive regions.

Effectively under international administration since NATO bombing forced the withdrawal of Serb forces in 1999, Kosovo follows the former Indonesian region of East Timor into independence -- and others are hoping to achieve similar status.

That worries countries from Spain to Sri Lanka, who are fighting their own insurgencies and independence movements and whose concern has led them to refuse to recognize Kosovo.

Almost all of those who have accepted Kosovo as the world's newest state have been keen to stress its uniqueness, citing its history, a near decade under international administration and its status as the final part to break away from former Yugoslavia.

The United States and others recognizing Kosovo say Serbia lost the moral authority to the region because of atrocities, massacres and ethnic cleansing, and after negotiations repeatedly failed to find another solution.

"The mere fact that everyone is going to such great lengths to say it is a unique case and doesn't set a precedent means that ultimately it does set a precedent," said international relations lecturer Spyros Economides at the London School of Economics.

"It establishes a precedent that you can overturn national sovereignty for apparent moral or humanitarian reasons -- but we only apply it selectively."

For example, Western powers were happy to recognize Kosovo, but not Chechnya or Kurdistan, he added, for fear of overly upsetting Russia or Turkey.

Essentially, NATO had intervened militarily to back a separatist rebel group and Western states had nine years later formalized that independence, he said -- a significant shift from previous ideas of state sovereignty.

That is a step beyond what happened with the birth of other new nations born in recent years such as Eritrea, which broke away from Ethiopia, or East Timor. Indonesia's 1975 invasion of East Timor was never recognized by the United Nations.

"There is a conflict between two key legal standards," said Sabine Freizer, head of European programs at the International Crisis Group. "There is the principle of territorial integrity which conflicts with the right to self-determination."

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Kosovo's independence announcement rippled through the world's separatist movements and breakaway states, which range from disputed slivers of former Soviet republics to remote rebel enclaves in Asia or Africa.

A pro-Tamil Tiger rebel Web site said the recognition "debunked" arguments that a separate ethnic Tamil state in northern and eastern Sri Lanka was unviable.

Georgia said it feared Kosovo's independence may embolden breakaway movements in the Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions.