Defarges : Flanders can look at the Kosovo example
Kosovo was not a unique case because the question of territorial integrity is being asked all around in the world, including in the heart of the European Union – in Belgium – where Flemish secessionists can look at the Kosovo example to achieve their own objectives, French analyst Philippe Moreau Defarges told the Belgian media.
(KosovoCompromise Staff) Friday, September 26, 2008
Defarges stirred attention in Belgium with his text in the 2009 yearbook of the French Institute for International Relations (IFRI) in which he compares Kosovo to Belgium.
These two cases show that a state can be dismantled "if the right to self-determination is put ahead of the integrity of states", said the analyst, who is also external adviser to the French foreign ministry.
« With the idea that the peoples have the right to decide by themselves, the Flemish people can say to themselves : why can't we ? », Defarges argues.
"To put Kosovo and Belgium at the same level might be shocking. But it is the same problem: how can we reconcile in the modern world the stability of states, which are representing a key element of international order, with the right of the peoples to decides by themselves", he said.
« If the right of the peoples for self-determination obtains priority, then the Flemish people, the Macedonian Albanians and the Kurds will become independent and we would enter a neverending logic », he points out.
Defarges believes that the question of self-determination and territorial integrity is one of the most difficult ones in Europe, and that, apart from Flanders, right to self-determination can also be claimed by Catalonia, the Basque Country, Corsica and Scotland.
"Kosovo was not a unique case, because the question of territorial integrity is being asked everywhere", he says.
