Several encouraging developments in the south Balkans allow for cautious optimism that it will be possible to contain violence there and encourage the political resolution of continuing conflicts. A ceasefire between Albanian guerrillas and the Serbian government in Belgrade, brokered by a NATO diplomat, will reduce tension in the highly sensitive Presevo Valley buffer zone. It will also relieve tension in neighbouring Macedonia, where agitation for more rights by the Albanian minority has threatened to destabilise the government.
NATO and European Union diplomats have taken an active role in heading off these prospective confrontations for fear that a wait-and-see approach could unravel the carefully-fashioned agreements put in place after the Kosovo crisis. It looks as if this approach has paid off, in that it has strengthened those who want to rely on political dialogue within the ranks of the Kosovar Albanian nationalists.
They are deeply divided on whether to seek formal independence from Yugoslavia and on whether to encourage the Albanian minority in Macedonia to secede from that state. Either of these objectives would unravel existing settlements and probably lead to a fresh round of wars in the region. That is why preventive diplomacy has been so important in recent days and weeks.
It has helped greatly that those who support independence and secession are themselves relatively small minorities within Kosovo and Macedonia. Recent Kosovo elections have been won by moderate nationalists; and in Macedonia most Albanians support the participation of a moderate nationalist party in the grand coalition, which has undertaken to speed up the improvement of minority rights.
The significance of this week's ceasefire is that it could draw the more extreme nationalists into political dialogue with Belgrade and head off the potential destabilisation of Macedonia. Another encouraging development was the decision of Mr Blagoje Simic, former mayor of Bosanski Samac in Bosnia, to surrender voluntarily to the war crimes tribunal in The Hague. He is the first Serb to do so and his decision has led to speculation that the new government led by President Vojislav Kostunica may be ready to soften its opposition to active co-operation with the court.
One way or another all concerned in the region are having to come to terms with the fact that President Kostunica's government has fundamentally changed its politics, even if too little has as yet been transformed on the ground for its peoples. A great deal is at stake for the Balkans and the wider Europe of which they are increasingly recognised to be a constituent part, as these events unfold. Nothing less than the future of a stable and peaceful Europe hangs on the outcome.