Macedonia Last piece in the Balkan tragedy

摘要

Viewed from afar, the eastward expansion of the European Union-and hence of the stability, wealth and democracy that the eu is supposed to safeguard-may look like a long, intricate story, with many detours and sub-plots, that is nonethe less predestined to have a happy outcome. Our survey in this issue suggests that view may be too complacent. But even in corners of Europe that now look wild and anarchic-such as Kosovo and the adjacent bits of Macedonia and Serbia-people talk as though the Union's civilising influence was bound, sooner or later, to embrace the entire continent. Confidence in this outcome has been stronger than ever since the removal last year of the one European leader who openly preferred the despots of Baghdad and Beijing to the bureaucrats of Brussels-Slobodan Milosevic.