Afghan Asylum Seekers - Bargaining Chip in Balkan Politics

Afghanistan is the hot news on everybody's foreign policy agenda right now and the ramifications of the debacle are being felt far and wide.

Take for example the Balkans, where there are three key impacts.

The first concerns Balkan countries providing housing to Afghans who collaborated with the US.

   The second is that while some governments like Kosovo will try to use the Afghan drama to get closer to the US, others, like Serbia, will try to preserve its balance among great powers.

Third, and potentially the most dangerous ramification for the Balkans, is the possibility that Afghanistan can generate waves of migrants and refugees towards Europe.

The immediate reaction of the Balkan countries was to evacuate their citizens from Afghanistan. However, there are other issues on the agenda as well. Firstly, as the US struggles to secure safety for the Afghans who assisted the US, the Balkans are divided on whether to help the US by housing Afghans until their entry visas to the US are cleared.

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama said Albania is willing to host up to 3,000 Afghan refugees. For that purpose, the government enforced a last-minute eviction of students from their dormitories without adequate notice. However, the initial arrival of 300 refugees to the country has been delayed twice. North Macedonia agreed to house 450 Afghans, while Kosovo ambitiously flaunts the number of 10,000 people.

In contrast, while Montenegro joined the EU-US statement on the safe passage from Afghanistan, it does not feel obligated to offer refuge to Afgan citizens. Serbia also joined the statement but is unlikely to provide housing for Afghans. As Timothy Less from the Centre for Geopolitics at the University of Cambridge explained to the...