And Britain and Ireland have won a legally watertight guarantee that they can indefinitely retain control of their own borders.

ECONOMIST: Mountains still to climb | The

Mr Salmond attributes the development substantially to policies pursued by the Scottish government: notably accelerated capital investment, access to finance and the stability involved in a guarantee of no compulsory redundancies in those areas of the public sector over which he has direct control.

BBC: Alex Salmond's Plan Macb

None of this is a guarantee that the Belgrade regime is about to fall, but it does suggest that it could lose control if Serbia's infrastructure starts to break down.

ECONOMIST: NATO piles it on