Balkan Peace Park Project

BALKAN PEACE PARK PROJECT Newsletter No.3 March 2004 TREKKING FOR PEACE

Since the promotion of sustainable visitor activities is one of the stated aims of the project it is good to be able to give news of plans for 2004 and last year’s 2003 ‘inaugural trek’. This 11 day trek, in July 2003, took 36 people from 8 different countries, from Peć/Peja in Kosovo/a, through Montenegro, to Vermosh, the valley and village in the north eastern corner of Albania, and then on to the valley of Theth. There was transport for the 65km from Theth to the city of Shkodër, where 80 people attended a full day international conference on the proposed Balkans Peace Park. The purpose of the trek was to engage as many local people as possible in the enterprise, as guides, interpreters, hosts or accompanying general helpers, and to demonstrate what this kind of eco-tourism could bring to the communities en route and what facilities would be needed for such activity in the future. We had to use transport to cross frontiers this time, but in future it should be possible to walk the whole way. Vermosh and Theth: July 17th – 25th 2004 This trek is being organized from Shkodër by people from IRSH. It will journey to Vermosh by road and spend two days on walks of varying length in the valley and mountains of the area. Then the group will travel by road round to Theth for two more days of exploration in the surrounding mountains. The trek will end with dinner together at a restaurant in Shkodër. The IRSH organizers for this trip are Vildan Plepi and Blendi Dibra. Anyone interested in joining in can contact them best by e-mail: [email protected] or [email protected] This is a terrific initiative and we wish everyone a very enjoyable trip. Cycle tour: August 14 – 27th This is being planned from England by Howard Boyd in Birmingham. The general idea is to revisit places seen by last year's cross-border trek but on two wheels this time. The tour will start and finish in Podgorica and visit Murino/Plav and Cakor in Montenegro and the Rugova valley in Kosovo/a before returning to Plav. From there it will head for Theth in Albania, either by pushing bikes from Gusinje over the Qafa e Pejës (hard work!) or pushing over the border to Vermosh and then riding round to Theth. We expect a group of 10 to 20 people to do this tour and if more than that are interested there would be a second group following on. As on the 2003 trek we hope to have maximum involvement by people living in the area. Further information is available from Howard Boyd [email protected] or Richard Hargreaves on [email protected]

TALKS. . . Richard Hargreaves, who did the trek last year, prepared a talk and slide show which he has now given several times to various groups, including the Peace Studies Department at Bradford University and mountaineering clubs. He is very happy to travel anywhere, within reason, to give this talk/slide show to any group, large or small. It shows the mountain landscape and the people of the three countries and is put in the context of the concept of peace parks. He calls the talk “Mountains for Peace in the Balkans”. . . .AND EXHIBITIONS Chris Rossi, also on the trek last year, is preparing an exhibition of photographs and information about the Peace Park. Chris lives in the US where she is a museum curator in Hamilton in New York State, The exhibition will be shown at Colgate University in May and in Jackson, Mississippi in October. It is hoped that it could be transported to Europe, to England and the Balkans, perhaps.

PEOPLE. . . in the UK At the Annual General Meeting of the Balkans Peace Park Project Committee in London in September there were some VISIT TO YORKSHIRE DALES NATIONAL changes made in the membership. So this is PARK (YDNP) what it looks like now: In October 2003 a group of 8, mostly from Chairperson: Antonia Young the Albanian area of the Peace Park, Secretary: Howard Boyd enjoyed a 3 day intensive programme in the Treasurer: Nick Oliver YDNP as guests of Antonia Young in Hetton. Newsletter editor: Richard Hargreaves The visitors were: Committee members: Gjon Gjeçaj, the elected headman from Ted Brown Barry O’Connor Theth and Genci, his 15 year old nephew Kimete Bytyci Marija Anteric and interpreter, now living in Essex; Nigel Young Anya Hart-Dyke Petrit Imeraj, Mario Delia from Shkodër; The committee meets four times a year or Arben Murra, First Secretary at the Albanian more often if necessary. We alternate our Embassy in London; meetings between York, Birmingham and Annalisa and Alistair Rellie, Nick Berisha and London and visitors are very welcome. Enid Ossude. National Park day PEOPLE. . .in the Balkans The YDNP kindly arranged a whole day’s The committee in London is only a support programme at Malham, perhaps the most group. Its enthusiasm is shared with a popular tourist centre in the Dales. The growing number of active people in the group visited the information centre, the local Balkans, on whom will depend the eventual primary school, were given lunch in a pub in success of the project, the creation of a real the village and were shown a ‘bunk house’, cross-border, inter-national, environmentally very simple accommodation for groups of protected area dedicated to peace and visitors taking part in outdoor activities. Many cooperation in Kosovo/a, Montenegro and such bunk houses in Britain’s national parks Albania. Some of the leading people at the are converted barns; the Balkans group was moment in the promotion of the Peace Park especially interested in this idea. in the Balkans and with whom we have the A day’s walk in the Dales most contact are: On the 2nd day the group were taken for a Kosovo/a: day’s walk from Richard and Jane Dritan Shala – Aquila NGO Hargreaves’ house in Littondale, an example Fatos Lajci – ERA (Environmentally of a very popular walk on public footpaths Responsible Action group) between different valleys and villages. In the Montenegro: evening the visitors were amongst a full Ali Daci – Albanica Environmental Association house at Grassington Town Hall who Filip Pavlovic – Fractal enjoyed Richard’s talk/slide show on the Albania: Balkans trek. Gjon Gjecaj – Headman, Theth Further round the Dales Petrit Imeraj – Preservation of Forests and On the 3rd day they visited Kilnsey Trout the Green Environment Farm, local builder Andy Singleton showed a Blendi Dibra ) - IRSH organization, “Young fine Dales house he had renovated and Alan Vildan Plepi ) Intellectuals, Hope”, Shkodër Iles demonstrated forest stewardship at Alma Shkreli ) Scargill, which hosted them for lunch. Mario Delia - Shkodër Next visit? Following the success of this visit we hope WHY NO PICTURES ? later in the year to receive a group of people The editor apologizes for the lack of photographs from all three countries for a study visit to in this issue of the newsletter. Last time many National Parks and visitor activities in readers could not receive e-mails with pictures, so he had to send some with pictures and some England. without. This time it is to be the same for everybody. Text only! MALHAM – THETH SCHOOLS LINK (Editor: Richard Hargreaves, Strand House, After the group’s visit to his school the Hawkswick, Skipton BD23 5QA. [email protected]) headteacher at Malham was keen to form a link with the school in Theth. He arranged for the 60 children to make cards to send to Theth school and he encouraged the parents to donate money. THE BALKANS TREK 2003 AND THE FUTURE At the end of the trek Blendi Dibra and a team from IRSH organized a full day international conference on the Balkans Peace Park proposal. Among the many fine contributions to the conference was this moving and carefully constructed speech by Nick Oliver. It presents a rationale for the cross-border park and spells out what is needed to encourage visitors to go there to help create it.

There’s a tension within the concept of a National park – on the one hand, access to public; on the other hand, preservation of the environment. Goes against logic – preservation suggests keeping people out; access suggests allowing people to come in and possibly disturb the balance of the environment. The concept of an International park contains further tensions – on the one hand, relatively unrestricted access to the public; on the other hand, the demands of national security. It has always been the case that national security at borders depends on restriction of access across border; better still, restriction of access to all areas close to borders. The Albanian border, particularly, was drawn very specifically to use natural features – unscalable peaks and ridges – to separate the different nations and to make it more difficult for them to invade one another. Surely, a public right to wander freely across international borders must endanger national security?

Sketch map of the 2003 trek through the proposed Peace Park area

What I want to do here is to suggest that there is actually nothing paradoxical in the idea of an international wilderness park, to which the public have relatively unrestricted access, including across national borders; which maintains the highest standards of conservation of the natural environment; and which respects the sovereignty and security concerns of all three national entities. Depopulation Let’s look first at the environment – the natural environment, and also the social environment. The unique ecosystem in the area has already been recognised by all three sides of the borders – there are national parks in various stages of development in Kosova, in Montenegro, and in Albania. The human population – there are permanent villages, and katuns (summer pasture huts). From the permanent villages there is a drift to the cities, and the herds of cattle at the katuns are every year slightly smaller, and slightly fewer in number than the year before. There will be depopulation, or there will be change. A depopulated land is difficult to tend; it will become an almost impenetrable wilderness. This will preserve the flora and fauna, certainly, but at a cost of making them inaccessible to all but the dedicated professional. It will be difficult to mount a defence then against commercial pressure for the area to be exploited – for wood, probably, in this case. A depopulated land is also good for cross-border criminal activity – there’s less chance of being disturbed. Bring in people So there must be a permanent population, in order to stabilise an ecosystem. And that permanent population must have something to do. It’s unlikely that industry is going to want to locate itself in the farthest, most mountainous corner of any country. There are two aspects to the solution – change the status of the area from being three inaccessible corners of states, into an area in its own right – the centre of itself. And don’t bring in industry – bring in people, who will be prepared to pay for all that is best in the area already. There is already magnificent scenery, solitude, paths to walk (or to cycle). There are villages, there is superb hospitality, there are traditions. In this visitation by thirty people over two weeks, something like fifteen thousand dollars has been brought into the local economies, as payment for accommodation, food, guides, local transport. Fifteen thousand dollars is perhaps not a huge amount of money – but, then again, thirty people is not many people. And let me repeat – that money has gone straight to those who live in the area, for doing things which enhance the area. Collaboration So what should we see in this international park? First of all, I’d like to see an international accord between the three national entities to bring the park into existence. I’d like to see it there as a clear statement that security, in the middle of the Balkan region, does not consist of closed borders and continual separations of people one from another, but from collaboration on worthwhile projects whose success is in everyone’s best interest. Maps and guides More than that – I’d like to see a park that works. Clearly marked and numbered routes – for cyclists and walkers, for walkers only, for experienced mountaineers only. A good walkers’ map, at a scale of 1:50,000, and an accompanying pocket book describing the walks, the villages, the sights. It would also, of course, list the accommodation – which I would imagine as including small campsites, mountain houses (planinski domovi), dormitories, rooms with families, and maybe katun huts. The places to eat would be listed there, too – the villages that sell milk, cheese, bread, vegetables. The restaurants. They’re not here yet, of course, because there’s no-one to buy anything from them. There would be a section on guides, with contact details, for those that chose to use their services.

All this information could even be available from a website. In fact, it would be possible to use the website to decide upon and print out a route, and to book and pay for accommodation for each night of the journey. It’s actually a comparatively small exercise creating such a website. Work to do So there’s a great deal to do. There’s the political accord that creates the parks, and there’s the much more practical work of creating the facts on the ground – the waymarking of paths, the information boards, the mountain houses, the information packs. Nearly all of this work, once again, is work that could be done by people who live in the area, to help to preserve and enhance all that is best in their area.

There’s much more in terms of economic activity that would be generated from this venture – transport to the park from Tirana, Podgorica, Pristina; hire of bicycles (and walking skis in winter); shops selling mountain equipment.

And, of course, once people have got to know your country, they’ll be back again.

There are many other areas I haven’t been into here – I haven’t said anything about preservation of the flora and fauna, and I’ve said very little about the political significance of a venture like this. I’ve stated quite selfishly, really, what it would take to make me come back as a tourist, with my family, to spend my money, and to introduce two other people to one of the great regions of the world.

Nick Oliver, Shkodër, 24/7/2003