ce s-au deșirat din acest ghem

07:58 Oct 25, 2017 

Cap la cap is an interesting expression here, because the author obviously means that interethnic conflicts and nationalism were inseparable effects of the dissolution of former Yugoslavia, and NOT that there was a contrast between them (extreme nationalism and interethnic conflicts almost always go hand in hand). Deșira is a nice metaphor here: the countries used to form a ball, but the dissolution unravelled this ball, you could say into a thread, since the countries are still somehow connected through their shared history. Or what was a tangled ball is now a nice thread that lets you see the individual countries with their individual values.

15:39 Oct 24, 2017 

I don't think "unravelling" here has the same sense of "come apart at the seams" here.
For the record "cap la cap" I shall now be translating as "hand in hand"

13:19 Oct 24, 2017 

Inter-ethnic conflicts and nationalism came to a head in all the (new?) countries after the former Yugoslavia came apart at the seams
gets across the idea of "unraveling" and uses a common metaphor.

12:43 Oct 24, 2017 

I am aware of what it means, but to keep the metaphor, maybe I will just say "unravelled from the situation". The thing is that the metaphor in English is "something unravels..." with no metaphorical object used to complement the verb "unravels" (i.e. we usually just say "unravels from it", therefore the phrasing all sounds a bit overloaded and unnecessary for the English.
Very often keeping metaphors exactly the same does not work with the English flow, no matter how accurate the grammar is. (just for information).

12:16 Oct 24, 2017 

clashed, collided, became at odds, conflicted, etc.