On Kosovo, Ambassador Churkin Foreshadows a Veto
After the Soviet Union disintegrated, ethnic Russians fled the newly independent states, Ambassador Vitaly
Churkin said on Wednesday, analogizing that to what the remaining Serbs in Kosovo would do if independence were granted.
Less than five percent of the Serbs who left Kosovo have returned,
Amb. Churkin said. In a five minute response to questions from Inner
City Press, Churkin focused on what he calls the non-compliance with
the Security Council's previous resolution 1244, and the lack of a
"normal life" in Kosovo at present. Video here, from Minute 2:49 to
8:15.
This is not the time, Amb. Churkin said, for the Council
to impose a solution, i.e. independence. "The international community
should respect itself," he said, and should make sure that its previous
resolution is complied with before considering enacting a new
resolution.
News analysis: While Kosovo comparisons, when made,
are generally to Georgia's flanks Abkhazia and South Ossetia, to
Transdniester and even Nagorno-Karabakh and Western Sahara, Amb.
Churkin's call to assess and ensure compliance with previous
resolutions brought to mind to this report the Council's blithe
approach to Somalia. The Council imposed an arms embargo, then scoffed
at its own experts reports that all sides were violating the embargo.
In December 2006, when Ethiopian troops crossed the border and drove on
Mogadishu, the Council did nothing. Even now, when those troops and the
UN-supported Transitional Federal Government are shelling civilian
neighborhoods and blocking UN humanitarian shipments, the Council does
nothing.
Kosovo, however, is in Europe, if not in the EU. In
Russia, the Serbs have a veto wielding ally on the Security Council.
The U.S. deploys vetoes for Israel -- why not Russian for the Serbs?
Russia's acceptance of language in the most recent Abkhazia resolution
bowing down to the territorial integrity of Georgia was a clue: Russia
will demand no less than the support of Serbia's integrity.
Wednesday
Amb. Churkin deployed the word pogrom, as in "the anti-Serb pogroms of
2004." He spoke of Serbs' fear, and of the international presence doing
nothing as these pogroms occurred. This is strong language and would
seem to foreshadow a veto.
Another correspondent, slated to
leave the UN press corps at the end of the month, told Amb. Churkin,
"you do not like using Chapter VII," the section of the UN Charter that
lets the Council order that things be done. "Be sure you attribute that
right," Amb. Churkin joked. We are: he used the word pogrom.
Developing..
http://www.lobi.com.mk/default-EN.asp?ItemID=5C7ABD66C0F0E54E997333E00AB688F4
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