Headlines: in the Balkans, the economic crisis after the health crisis

Text by: Laurent Geslin Follow | Courrier des Balkans Follow

A press review presented in partnership with Le Courrier des Balkans.

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In the Balkan countries, deconfinement is accelerating , especially with a view to the start of the tourist season, which is usually a source of foreign currency, but which should this year be very calm. In Croatia, more than 43,000 new people were added to the list of job seekers between March 16 and May 15, and more than 450,000 citizens of the small country could be unemployed by the end of the year, warn economic analysts.

The situation is also very delicate in Montenegro, and the restaurateurs are asking the government to make a move, in particular by lowering the rents that establishments located on the coast must pay to the state. In Bulgaria, the Minister of Tourism, Nikolina Angelkova, called on Bulgarian holidaymakers to stay in the country this year, threatening those who would be tempted to cross the Greek or Turkish borders with a quarantine period upon their return.

However, is the epidemic over? It is with prudence that the reflections of the Bulgarian political scientist Ivan Krastev encourage . The liberal intellectual explains that it is still far too early to learn all the lessons of the crisis, but that a new world is being born and that this one signs the return of the "experts" and the nation-states .

Confinement and authoritarianism

In the Balkans, the application of strict containment measures has in any case favored the authoritarian hardening of the region's leaders, and accelerated the recomposition of political alliances. In Serbia, for example, President Aleksandar Vučić is eyeing with increasing insistence on his Hungarian neighbor Viktor Orbán . Despite the state of emergency, the two men have increased their meetings since mid-March and could join forces to resist the demands of Angela Merkel.

The end of the emergency measures also led to a start in civil society in the Balkans. In Greece, environmental organizations protest against the vote in Parliament of a new law authorizing the search for hydrocarbons in Natura 2000 classified areas. In Slovenia, the large bicycle demonstrations which denounce every Friday since 24 April the authoritarian drift of Prime Minister Janez Janša weakened the government majority. In neighboring Croatia, the government preferred to call legislative elections before the economic crisis that will generalize this summer.

In Albania, the destruction of the Tirana National Theater caused a scandal. Built in 1939 by Italian architect Giulio Berte, the building was on the list of cultural heritage in danger of the NGO Europa Nostra. It was razed by backhoes on the night of May 17 and it is now anger that erupts in the streets of the Albanian capital. For the demonstrators, this destruction is the symbol of the authoritarian and patronage drift of Prime Minister Edi Rama. On the site of the destroyed theater, a tower should be built by an oligarch close to the Prime Minister's Socialist Party (PS).

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