NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg wrapped up a tour of Western Balkan countries this week, in a show of support for and engagement in a region with fires on multiple security fronts.
“This region is strategically important to NATO, but there are reasons for concern,” Stoltenberg said at a press conference in the North Macedonian capital of Skopje on Wednesday at the end of his trip. “We see secessionist threats in Bosnia and Herzegovina, a fragile security situation in Kosovo and stalled normalization between Belgrade and Pristina.”
Since the end of the Cold War in the 1990s, NATO has played a major security role in the region. It…