Dozens of people were killed in an Israeli airstrike on a camp for displaced Palestinians in the southern Gaza city of Rafah on May 27.
Haitham Imad / EPA
Attempts to establish justice too early may complicate efforts to achieve peace.
Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, the president of Republika Srpska, with Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, in February 2024.
EPA-EFE/Sergei Bobylev/Sputnik/Kremlin pool
Tension in the western Balkans, which has been troubled by ethnic tensions since the wars of the 1990s, is becoming an increasing concern for the EU and Nato.
Russia sees Serbia as an important ally.
Zoonar GmbH/Alamy
Europe should not ignore the importance of Serbia as a Russian ally.
Bumble Dee/Shutterstock
Kosovo is under pressure from the US and EU to give in to some of Serbia’s demands.
A woman with flowers walks past a building fortified with sandbags in the Podil neighborhood of Kyiv, Ukraine.
AP Photo/Jae C. Hong
The fragility of peace settlements in the Balkans provides a cautionary tale. US and EU policymakers may inadvertently make matters worse by acceding to the aggressor’s territorial ambitions.
EPA-EFE/Andrej Cukic
Serbia’s nationalist government seeks re-election. If it succeeds, Europe may be poised for renewed war in the Balkans.
Palestinians fleeing the northern part of the Gaza Strip on Nov. 10, 2023.
Belal Khaled/Anadolu via Getty Images
Mass forced movement of people has been used in conflicts to serve three goals: population control, territorial expansion and as a sorting mechanism. All three could be in play in Gaza.
Nato peacekeepers patrol after one police officer was killed and another wounded in an attack.
AP/Alamy
A key meeting is being held in the Balkans as the EU and US seek to resolve regional tension, partly stoked by pro-Russian forces.
Martti Ahtisaari receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 2008. Chris Jackson/Getty Images.
Ahtisaari’s role in Namibia was crucial. But he left a major legacy in pursuing peace in various places of conflict in his later life too.
A Kosovo police officer guards a road near the village of Banjska in northern Kosovo in September 2023 following an attack on police officers by Serbian militants.
(AP Photo/Bojan Slavkovic)
The U.S. and the EU have neglected the Balkans, hoping that the allure of EU integration would be enough to placate Serbia and other countries. It was not.
EPA/Julien Warnand
Commission president Ursula von der Leyen’s 2023 state of the union speech saw her press for expansion for the union’s own good.
AP Photo/Bojan Slavkovic
Once again ethnic tensions have boiled over in Kosovo.
Freedom fighter or something darker? The former president of Kosovo, Hashim Thaçi.
EPA-EFE/Koen van Weel
The trial of the former Kosovan president and several others highlights the sharp and enduring divisions and differing interpretations of history.
National fervour: ethnic Serbs protest in Northern Mitrovica in Kosovo.
EPA-EFE/Djordje Savic
Leaders on both sides are ramping up hostility for their own ends.
Kosovo Force and Kosovo Border Police conduct a joint patrol on the administrative boundary line between Kosovo and Serbia.
U.S. Army photo by Sgt. David I. Marquis, Multinational Battle Group-East/Alamy
Russia’s backing of Serbia during the Ukraine war is aggravating tensions with its neighbour Kosovo.
Vladmir Putin is very popular in Serbia.
Sasa Dzambic Photography
European leaders have failed to notice how much support Serbia is providing to Russia, an expert says.
A miner silhouetted as he works in the Stan Terg mine in northern Kosovo.
Armend Nimani/AFP via Getty Images
Our prospects of a better, fairer future are inextricably linked with the minerals and metals beneath our feet. Is it time to make peace with the industry that extracts them?
Proud: all smiles at Belgrade’s Pride march in 2021. This year’s march has been banned.
Zorana Jevtic/Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo
Despite an openly lesbian prime minister, Serbia’s deep-seated problems with homophobia remain.
Contested crossing: Kosovan Serbs protest at the ban on entry of vehicles with Serbian registration plates, September 2021.
Reuters/Laura Hasani
Unrest in the Balkans might be orchestrated by Russia, but the crisis is also an opportunity for the west.
Another big table, but this time Vladimir Putin isn’t sitting at the head.
EPA-EFE/Irinian presidential office handout
A digest of the week’s coverage of the war against Ukraine.