The status of Kosovo

 

 

The status of Kosovo International Herald Tribune SUNDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2005 Hashim Thaci argues that Albanians in Kosovo are entitled to independence from Serbia ("My people deserve their independence," Views, Nov. 26).   Thaci's main argument for independence is that his Albanian people have suffered so much. But while Slobodan Milosevic's policies were indeed ruthless and indefensible, Thaci's historical account lacks vital elements of Albanian nationalism and separatism, including the fact that Serbs and other minorities in Kosovo have suffered over the last six years.   Thaci claims that minorities will be protected in an independent Kosovo. But the percentage of Serbs left in Kosovo has dropped dramatically in recent decades - including the nearly 200,000 Serbs who left the province in the wake of the 1999 war. Thaci was a leading politician at the time. In contrast, Serbia has remained multi-ethnic. The "old nationalism" that Thaci blames on the Belgrade of today is not exactly eradicated in today's Kosovo.   The world has about 200 countries and thousands upon thousands of ethnic groups. Should we have thousands of new countries, one for each ethnic group? Thaci mentions Serbian war criminals, but there are indicted Kosovo-Albanian war criminals too.   Thaci would like Kosovo to join the European Union with protection from NATO as part of a demilitarized area. The idea of demilitarization is news to us.   Jan Oberg, Lund, Sweden Aleksandar Mitic, Brussels     Hashim Thaci had the nom de guerre Snake. That, in itself, is very telling.   Thaci, a former leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army, which was once branded a terrorist group by the U.S. government, has now apparently morphed into a sage purveyor of advice via your prestigious newspaper. So, what is behind this sudden transformation?   It is more than obvious that the ongoing terror tactics against the Serbs and other minorities in Kosovo, perpetrated first by the KLA and then by its successor criminal offshoots, continues to be ignored and disguised by the West's mainstream media and politicians. Why? Because, they have no other way to justify NATO's aggression on Yugoslavia in 1999.   If Thaci's people have "earned" sovereignty, then the criteria for independence are murder, mayhem and barbarism. Is Europe ready and willing to embrace an intolerant and terrorist-supported Islamic state in its underbelly?   L.M. Milanovich Edmonton, Canada   Copyright © 2005 The International Herald Tribune | www.iht.com

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/12/04/news/edletmon.php

Hashim Thaci argues that Albanians in Kosovo are entitled to independence from Serbia (RMy people deserve their independence,R Views, Nov. 26).

Related...

BALKANS: STAR TREATMENT FOR ACQUITTED KOSOVARS

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.php?cat=Politics&loid=8.0.235868612&par=0


ADN Kronos International (Italy)
December 2, 2005


BALKANS: STAR TREATMENT FOR ACQUITTED KOSOVARS


-The verdict will only strengthen “anti-Hague sentiments in Serbia”, argued [Belgrade University professor of international law Vojin] Dimitrijevic, adding that court has demonstrated “partiality in favor of Kosovo Albanians, who turned out to be privileged participants in all these wars”.


Pristina - The Kosovo Albanian language media on Friday gave star treatment to Fatmir Limaj and Isak Musliu, two Kosovo Albanians acquitted by UN war crimes tribunal in the Hague.

The two man were indicted by the International Tribunal for War Crimes in Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on charges of killing civilians in a Kosovo prison camp during ethnic Albanian rebellion against Serbian rule in 1998.

A third man facing the same charges was convicted. The acquittals have been harshly criticised by Belgrade and Serbian leaders in Kosovo who argues that it proves that the tribunal is anti-Serb.

Limaj and Musliu, who operated a prison camp in the village of Lapusnik in which 23 Serb and Albanian civilians, suspected of collaborating with Serbian forces, were killed, arrived in Pristina on Thursday night, greeted by a crowd of their supporters.

They were acquitted by the Tribunal on Wednesday, while a third indictee, Haradin Bala was sentenced to
13 years for killing nine civilians.

Kosovo newspapers celebrated their return in celebratory front page articles and the daily “Koha ditore”, quoted Limaj as saying their release was a “victory for Kosovo, which will surely become independent”.

The two were commanders of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which started a rebellion against the Serbian authorities [which]led to a NATO bombing campaign and forced Serbian troops from the province, which has been under United Nations control since 1999.

“There was no need to go to the Hague to prove the holiness of the war conducted by the KLA,” said Limaj.
He predicted Bala would soon also be freed on appeal.

Meanwhile, Vojin Dimitrijevic, a professor of international law at Belgrade University, until now a staunch supporter of the Tribunal, said that the Hague prosecutors haven’t shown “the usual diligence” in proving Limaj and Musliu guilt.

Furthermore, the “chain of command responsibility” was completely neglected in this case, since Limaj and Musliu, as commanders, were freed while Bala, who was a guard in the prison camp, was convicted.

The verdict will only strengthen “anti-Hague sentiments in Serbia”, argued Dimitrijevic, adding that court has demonstrated “partiality in favor of Kosovo Albanians, who turned out to be privileged participants in all these wars”.

George Bush & Tony Blair Forced Clinton to Bomb Serbia!

 

News Flash: George Bush & Tony Blair Forced Clinton to Bomb Serbia!

November 30, 2005

The Opinion Journal , caught this mind-bender this past weekend:

Simon Jenkins, a columnist for London's Sunday Times, ( http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2088-1892515,00.html  ) comments on reports that President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair toyed with the idea of bombing al-Jazeera, the Qatar-based

 

TV network: That Blair and Bush should have discussed bombing the Al-Jazeera building in Qatar is hardly surprising. They agreed to bomb the headquarters of Serbian television during the Kosovo war.

Well, color us impressed. Who knew President Bush was already conducting foreign policy back in 1999, when he was still governor of Texas?

 

 

http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110007608#simon

War Crimes: Albanians Jubilant, Serbs Alarmed

 

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.php?cat=Security&loid=8.0.235428272&par=0


ADN Kronos International (Italy)
December 1, 2005


WAR CRIMES: ALBANIANS JUBILANT, SERBS ALARMED AT
KOSOVO VERDICT


-The ruling regarding the camp, operated by the Kosovo
Liberation Army (KLA) appears to contradict previous sentences from the same
court which accepted the
principle of responsibility for alleged crimes up the
chain-of-command.
-"[F]reeing Limaj and Musliu "had cost Kosovo
Albanians and their lobbyists 50 million euro".
-"How is it possible that no one in Kosovo is
responsible for the things which are evident?" he [a
Serbian official] added, also referring to events
since the province was put under UN administration,
including an estimated 200,000 Serbs and other
non-Albanians who have fled from Kosovo, three
thousand who have been either killed or are listed as
missing, and the scores of Serbian churches and
medieval monasteries have been destroyed.
-Last month the ICTY acquitted a commander of the
Bosnian Muslim army, Sefer Halilovic, strengthening a
wide spread feeling in Serbia that the Tribunal is
actually politicised and anti-Serb.



Pristina/Belgrade - Kosovo Albanians celebrated with
gunshots and fireworks the acquittal of their
co-nationals, Fatmir Limaj and Isak Musliu, by the UN
war crimes tribunal in the Hague, while Serbs
expressed "shock and consternation".

Limaj, Musliu and a third man - Haradin Bala - were
the first Albanians indicted for crimes during the
1998 Kosovo Albanian rebellion against Serbian rule.
They were accused of operating a prison camp in
Lapushnik, where 23 Serb and Albanian civilians,
suspected of collaborating with Serb forces, were
killed from May to July 1998. The court acquitted
Limaj and Musliu, but convicted Bala, a prison guard,
to 13 years jail.

The International Tribunal for Crimes in former
Yugoslavia (ITCY) panel, headed by Australian judge
Kevin Parker, ruled that "it has not been proven
beyond reasonable doubt" that Limaj and Musliu were
responsible for the killings. The ruling regarding the
camp, operated by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)
appears to contradict previous sentences from the same
court which accepted the principle of responsibility
for alleged crimes up the chain-of-command.

The ICTY ruling was greeted with celebrations,
fireworks and shooting in the air throughout Kosovo,
and president Ibrahim Rugova deemed it a victory for
justice. "Today's trial justifies the liberation
struggle of Kosovo Albanians against Serbian
occupation, the righteousness of the struggle for
freedom and independence of our country and confirms
the faith in international justice and the Hague
Tribunal," Rugova said.

He expressed the hope that "not all legal
possibilities have been exhausted" for freeing Bala as
well. Other Kosovo Albanian leaders echoed, more or
less, Rugova's words, praising Limaj, a former
political leader, and Musliu as national heroes.

But the reaction from Kosovo Serbs and the government
in Belgrade was predictably different.

Slavisa Petkovic, the only Serb who accepted a
ministerial post in Kosovo prime minister Bajram
Kosumi's government, said that ICTY decision was, "to
put it mildly, scandalous".

Petkovic, who is considered a traitor by many Serbs,
alleged that he had heard in Pristina that freeing
Limaj and Musliu "had cost Kosovo Albanians and their
lobbyists 50 million euro". It was unclear whether his
allegations that the court ruling was not impartial
were a reference to direct lobbying from the Kosovo
Albanians or from other outside sources.

Kosovo Albanians, who form a 1.7 million majority
against some 100.000 remaining Serbs, are demanding
independence in upcoming talks on the final status of
the technically Serbian province, under UN control
since 1999. Petkovic argued the ICTY verdict will only
encourage Kosovo Albanians to use violence to achieve
the goal of independence.

Jovan Simic, an aide to Serbian president Boris Tadic,
said that the verdict "presented a bad picture of the
Tribunal" , recalling that "not one Serb has been
freed" so far.

"How is it possible that no one in Kosovo is
responsible for the things which are evident" he
added, also referring to events since the province was
put under UN administration, including an estimated 200,000 Serbs and other
non-Albanians who have fled
from Kosovo three thousand who have been either killed
or are listed as missing, and the scores of Serbian
churches and medieval monasteries have been destroyed.


Even Belgrade lawyer, Vasilije Tapuskovic, who had
served as a "friend of the court" of the Hague
Tribunal, said expressed consternation over the
acquittal of Limaj and Musliu.

Last month the ICTY acquitted a commander of the
Bosnian Muslim army, Sefer Halilovic, strengthening a
wide spread feeling in Serbia that the Tribunal is
actually politicised and anti-Serb.

Close to fifty Serbs and several Croats have been
sentenced so far for crimes committed in the Balkan
wars of the 1990s.

If you can't shoot the messenger, lock him up

 

The Hindu Date:01/12/2005 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2005/12/01/stories/2005120106381100.htm Opinion- News Analysis If you can't shoot the messenger, lock him up Siddharth Varadarajan President Bush's alleged threat to bombAl Jazeerashouldn't surprise us. Ever since the NATO attack on Yugoslavia, the U.S. has looked at the media it can't control as the "enemy."     IF THERE were any doubts about the authenticity of the Daily Mirror story on President George W. Bush wanting to bomb the head offices of Al Jazeera, the British government would appear to have cleared them up by threatening editors with prison if they publish the text of the confidential memo from which the London tabloid sourced its account. After all, if the White House's line about the story being "outlandish" were really true, why on earth would Tony Blair  whose conversation with the American President last April is the subject of the memo  invoke the Official Secrets Act to prevent its publication? I can think of only two reasons, neither of which does Mr. Blair or Mr. Bush any credit. Either the American President did threaten to blow up the Qatar-based Arabic news channel because he was upset at its coverage of U.S. counter-insurgency operations in Fallujah. Or he did not, in which case the British Prime Minister wants to suppress the memo because it records Mr. Bush admitting  or threatening  something even more terrible. Tempting though it is to dismiss the alleged threat against the Arabic broadcaster as a "conspiracy theory" (as Mr. Blair is suggesting) or a "joke" on the part of the U.S. President, there is the unsettling coincidence of Al Jazeera having been hit by American bombs twice before. In November 2001, the channel's Kabul office was hit by a U.S. missile and in April 2003, a `smart' bomb terminated its Baghdad operation with extreme prejudice, killing a journalist, Tareq Ayoub. Even without reading the April 2004 memo, we know from an earlier outburst by Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that the Bush administration just doesn't like the upstart broadcaster. They move about on their own in Iraq and refuse to be tied down as `embeds'. They speak the local language. And the footage they show has rather more shock and awe than what the Pentagon is comfortable putting on air. Does this mean the U.S. would deliberately bomb journalists in contravention of the laws of war  and the "freedoms" in whose name Iraq was invaded? Perhaps not, but what NATO did to the Radio Television Serbia (RTS) studios in Belgrade in 1999 suggests this military and moral Rubicon is more easily crossed than one would like to imagine. During the U.S.-led bombing of Yugoslavia, NATO aircraft deliberately bombed the RTS station in Belgrade. Sixteen civilians were killed in the attack that NATO and Pentagon spokesmen defended as an act of military necessity against "enemy propaganda." RTS broadcasts may have been propaganda and Yugoslavia, technically, was NATO's enemy. But RTS was media and the people who worked  and died  for it were entitled to the Geneva Convention's protections from armed attack both as civilians and journalists. The bottom line, however, was that they broadcast things which the U.S. military couldn't control and didn't like. Images of civilians killed or injured by NATO bombings. The same sort of images Al Jazeera was showing out of Fallujah. The only difference is that in those days, the Clinton administration didn't have a Secretary of Defence who went around saying, "We don't do Geneva Conventions here." Contagious intolerance   Unfortunately for press freedom, intolerance towards the media is a malignant and contagious disease. One hostile act against journalists quickly begets another. Mr Bush's threat against Al Jazeera quickly led to Mr. Blair's ultimatum to the British media. Slobodan Milosevic did not go after CNN or the BBC, whose NATO correspondent during the war went on to become NATO spokesman after it ended. But had the Yugoslav leader done so and cited a dislike for their "enemy propaganda" as justification, how different would he have been from NATO? Similarly, threatening Al Jazeera makes the terrain in Iraq and elsewhere more dangerous for all journalists because it tells Al Qaeda and their allies that journalists are fair game, that it is okay to kidnap or kill foreign reporters. The slippery slope doesn't end there. President Bush's dislike of Al Jazeera is only an extreme manifestation of the antipathy governments around the world feel towards media coverage that they cannot suppress, spin or control. In the aftermath of 9/11  and the extraordinary perversion of democratic norms this has led to in almost all established democracies  this intolerance is being kitted out with legal and even military teeth. Britain's new anti-terror proposals and Australia's draft anti-terrorism legislation and proposed extensions to the sedition law, for example, both aim to regulate what journalists can and cannot report on pain of imprisonment. Under India's Prevention of Terrorism Act  repealed under public pressure last year  the definition of "providing support" to a designated terrorist organisation was left so vague as to encompass even news reports or opinion pieces. Moreover, as the recent British gag order shows, governments are quite capable of dredging up old, anachronistic laws like the OSA to control the dissemination of information when they find their backs truly up against the wall and when anti-terrorism laws are of no help. Section 5 of the OSA  making it illegal for an unauthorised individual to be in possession of official documents  has rarely been used in Britain and never against journalists. Sometimes, governments don't even need a `compelling' reason to act against the media other than the very existence of laws that can be invoked. In India, the OSA was used by the erstwhile Vajpayee government in 2002 to imprison a senior Kashmiri journalist, Iftikhar Gilani, on the flimsiest of grounds in pursuit of a political vendetta against his father-in-law, the separatist politician Syed Ali Shah Geelani. Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, Jose Padilla, the White House torture memos and other dystopic products of the post 9/11 world testify to just how corrosive the war on terror has been for civil liberties and democratic values. We are some way away from the point of no return but if the media were also to fall victim, the prospects for collective recovery would be dim indeed.

Kosovo negotiations get off to a rocky start (with James Bisset comment)

Kosovo negotiations get off to a rocky start

There seems little cause for optimism as Serbians and ethnic Albanians refused to budge from their positions

By DOUG SAUNDERS

Thursday, December 1, 2005 Posted at 4:46 AM EST

From Thursday's Globe and Mail

London  With little international publicity and a great deal of pessimism on all sides, the world's most ambitious nation-building campaign got under way this week in the Balkans.

Nobody has ever believed that the United Nations plan to turn Kosovo from an embattled province of Serbia into an independent, multi-ethnic nation would be easy. Those who are attempting to hold Iraq together, for example, point to the expensive and lengthy diplomatic struggle in Kosovo as an example of how such efforts should be managed -- and how impossible they still can be.

Yet as they spoke in the Kosovo capital of Pristina yesterday, surrounded by an unusually heavy phalanx of armed guards, the UN officials struggling to negotiate the province's separation from Serbia are expressing optimism that Europe's latest nation-state could be created some time next year.

The former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, who was appointed by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to lead talks on Kosovo's status, has spent the past week travelling to the capital cities of the Balkan nations in a preliminary round of discussions. He will present his findings in a dinner speech tonight

There seemed to be little cause for optimism as Serbian and Albanian groups refused to budge from their positions this week, most observers said.

On Monday, Mr. Ahtisaari blasted the Serbian government for urging Kosovo's ethnic Serbs to boycott the political process, and criticized its ethnic-Albanian leaders for failing to address Serbian grievances.

"The negotiating parties are still massed in Belgrade and here in Pristina, trying to find a mutual understanding, but their positions haven't changed from five years ago. It's very difficult to say if they will end up moderating when it comes down to actual talks," said Besa Shahini, director of the Kosovar Stability Initiative, a neutral think-tank in Pristina.

"However, this is a period of calm and sanity in both Belgrade and in Kosovo, so everyone has a desire to get things going. The economies of both places are completely dead because of the uncertainty, so people want to get results so they can start working again."

The talks are doubly poisoned. First, they face the history of the region: the slaughter of more than 10,000 Albanian Kosovars during Serbian ethnic-cleansing campaigns that began in 1998, and the retaliatory killing of at least 1,000 Kosovo Serbs by Albanians following the NATO war against Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic in 1999.

As a result, Serbian residents of Kosovo, who are Orthodox Christians and make up one-tenth of its two million people, live in heavily guarded enclaves with almost no contact with the mainly Muslim Albanians, and refuse to participate in the region's elected legislature.

The war's embers keep flaring up. Yesterday, there were angry accusations and threats of violence across Kosovo after two Albanian leaders were acquitted of war-crimes charges at the Hague; that led leaders in Belgrade to accuse the court of partisanship, and to threaten to shut down the talks.

And the talks are equally poisoned by the mixed agenda of international forces in the region.

Many Serbs see hypocrisy in the current international effort to unite Bosnia's ethnic factions while dividing up Serbia into what will effectively be two states, one Serbian and one essentially ethnically Albanian.

But the UN and the European Union still believe that independence is the only way to bring stability to Kosovo, and most international observers, including U.S. leaders, agree.

However, UN officials quietly acknowledge that, if talks get tough, they may end up giving into a Serbian "plan B" in which the Serb-majority northern part of Kosovo, including the city of Mitrovica, would become part of Serbia.

In statements this week, Serb and Albanian parties showed little sign of tolerance.

"The Albanian people of Kosovo will never again risk living under Belgrade's rule," Hashim Thaci, the former Kosovo Liberation Army commander who now runs the Democratic Party of Kosovo, said in a statement on Monday.

And the Serbian government, considered a moderate alternative to the ultra-nationalist parties founded by Mr. Milosevic, has refused to accept any notion of an autonomous Kosovo, at least publicly. Yesterday, Belgrade officials announced their plan for a "free land of Kosovo" that would be controlled by Serbia.

That would not be very different from Kosovo's current status, which is carefully guarded by thousands of UN officials and international peacekeepers.

The road to independence

After 15 years of nationalist independence movements, ethnic slaughter, outright war and peacekeeping operations, what was Yugoslavia until the early 1990s is now five countries at various stages of independence.

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Three years of bloody ethnic war between Bosnian Muslims, Croats and Serbs ended with the 1995 Dayton peace accord. The agreement set up two separate entities, a Muslim/Croat Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the Bosnian Serb Republic. Overarching these entities is a central Bosnian government. Ultimate authority, however, rests with the EU-run Office of the High Representative as the country continues toward becoming a viable, peaceful, fully independent state.

Croatia

Croatia declared its independence in 1991, but endured nearly five years of sporadic and often bitter fighting with the Yugoslav People's Army and the army of the internationally unrecognized Republic of Serbian Krajina. The Croatian army prevailed and integration of the separatist territories was completed in 1998 under UN supervision.

Macedonia

Its current borders were fixed shortly after the Second World War when it was recognized as a separate nation within Yugoslavia. Although it is quite diverse, with a majority of ethnic Macedonians but a large population of Albanians as well as Turks, Roma and Serbs, Macedonia seceded peacefully in 1991.

Serbia and Montenegro

Serbia and Montenegro held on to the name Yugoslavia after the breakup until 2003, when its parliament voted to create a new, looser union. The two republics are semi-independent states in an arrangement that is to remain in place until at least 2006, after which the two republics can hold referendums on whether to keep or scrap it.

Kosovo province

In 1998, violence flared in Serbia's province of Kosovo after it was stripped of its autonomy. The Kosovo Liberation Army began an armed rebellion, which was brutally put down by the Serbian army until international forces intervened and the United Nations took over administration. It is now a de facto international protectorate but legally part of Serbia. Its status remains the subject of a bitter dispute between the Albanian majority, which seeks independence, and the minority Serbs.

Slovenia

A stable and independent country, Slovenia is the only former Yugoslav republic to join the European Union and NATO. Its independence was relatively bloodless, aided by Western European recognition of the Slovenes' aspirations and the low proportion of other ethnic groups.

SOURCE: BBC.CO.UK

 

EU divided over future status of Kosovo

29.11.2005 - 18:02 CET | By Mark Beunderman

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - EU member states are signalling disagreement on the final status of Kosovo, just as UN-led talks on the future of the territory get under way.

Diplomats indicate that several states - including the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Greece and Italy - are publicly or privately promoting their own ideas, which in some cases go beyond the EU's common position.

EU member states in June agreed that the exact future status of Kosovo should be decided in UN-led negotiations between Serbs and Kosovan Albanians, while setting out some clear EU principles that any outcome must meet.

The EU conditions include the protection of the Serb minority, no return to the pre-March 1999 status (when Kosovo was directly governed from Belgrade), and, notably, no partitioning of the territory.

However, just after UN special envoy Martti Ahtisaari started his initial talks with Belgrade and Pristina last week, Czech prime minister Jiri Paroubek suggested that partitioning Kosovo could be the best solution.

"A solution could be dividing the territory on ethnic lines. The northern part of the region would belong to Serbia, and the majority of the southern part could be given the status of an independent nation", the Czech politician said, according to press reports.

Cacophony of opinions
The Czech move - clearly in breach of EU principles - ran contrary to a previous initiative by Slovene president Janez Drnovsek, who presented earlier this month a plan promoting full independence for an unpartitioned Kosovo.

Mr Drnovsek's plan caused a row in Slovenia itself, with the country's foreign ministry publicly declaring that the president's action did "not reflect" the Slovenian government's position.

An EU diplomat said the Czech and Slovene moves were "worrying", as the EU seemed "incapable of sticking to a common position" over the issue.

Another diplomat described the Czech plea for a partition as "very dangerous".

On top of this, the president of EU candidate state Romania, Traian Basescu, last week while visiting Paris presented a proposal pleading for a type of Kosovan autonomy that falls short of independence from Serbia, which was well received in Belgrade but not in Pristina.

An EU source described the different statements coming out of European capitals as a "cacaphony of opinions."

Wariness about independence
Although most other member states have so far cautiously stuck to the EU´s guiding principles, in public at least, they have privately voiced their own views over the issue.

Italy, Spain and Greece in particular are said to be worried about what will happen if the territory is given fully-fledged independence, having been under the administration of the United Nations since the 1999 war.

Sources said Spain is "nervous" about an independent Kosovo setting a precedent for its own autonomous Basque region, something a Spanish spokesman did not want to comment on.

Both Italy and Greece are reportedly wary about endangering their close political and economic ties with Serbia, with Rome particularly fearful of a future "failed" state in Kosovo which could produce large numbers of refugees.

A Greek spokesman did not confirm Athens' particular worry about Kosovo's independence, but did highlight that Athens as a "powerful" player in the region would play an active "mediating role" between Belgrade and Pristina.

The EU has to pay the bill
The direct influence of the EU on the final status talks is likely to be limited, though not irrelevant.

UN envoy Ahtisaari, a former Finnish president, will lead the talks, probably assisted by diplomats of the Kosovo Contact Group, which is viewed by diplomats as being very influential.

A representative from the EU has a seat in this group, but its six-nation core consists of the US and Russia as well as the UK, France, Germany and Italy.

"EU members who do not have a seat in the contact group are envious about those who do", one insider said.

But an EU diplomat argued that in the end, the view of the EU as a whole can hardly be ignored, as "we will have to pay the bill", referring to a probable Brussels role in administration and military stabilisation of the territory.

Mr Ahtisaari's efforts to broker a deal will initially be limited to shuttle diplomacy between Belgrade and Pristina, with direct talks between Serbs and Kosovan Albanians not expected to start before February.

Diplomats estimate that the negotiations will last at least six months, possibly more than a year.

Politicians representing the Kosovan Albanian majority have pleaded for full independence for Kosovo, but Serbia is opposed to granting Kosovo sovereign nation status. 

 

  http://euobserver.com/9/20437

Note: To protect against computer viruses, e-mail programs may prevent sending or receiving certain types of file attachments.  Check your e-mail security settings to determine how attachments are handled.

Kosovo: New War in the Balkans?

 

STRATFOR (USA)

Kosovo: New War in the Balkans?

November 22, 2005 17 40 GMT

Summary

The current stalemate over Kosovo's status is a perfect example of the palsied international system. One would think that a province that has been a de facto international protectorate for more than six years, by now, would have its status decided; yet the concerned parties in Kosovo ostensibly cannot perform the necessary tasks. The responsibility for this impasse rests first on the shoulders of the Kosovar Serbs and Albanians, who cannot agree, and second on the shoulders of the Contact Group members -- including the United States -- who dare not impose a solution.

Analysis

U.N. status envoy Martti Ahtisaari and his deputy Albert Rohan on Nov. 21 began their Balkan trip in the Kosovar capital of Pristina, with the clear intent of ensuring that status negotiations scheduled for December in Vienna, Austria, do not fail. However, their visit probably will have the opposite effect. At this stage it appears Ahtisaari merely wants to take notice of the contradictory positions at play in the negotiations rather than come up with a clear plan. A further sign of the chaos reigning in and around Kosovo is that disagreement exists both between and among the Albanians and the Serbs.

Two major views have emerged in the Serbian ranks. Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica and Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Draskovic maintain that "Kosovo-Metohija" must remain part of Serbia. It can receive more than autonomy but less than independence, and the inhabitants' minority and property rights must be respected to the utmost. Hence, the Serbian government prepared a resolution Nov. 15 that was adopted by the Serbian Parliament on Nov. 21.

Also on Nov. 15, Serbian head of state Boris Tadic expounded his own views during talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Tadic said Kosovo should be decentralized to create separate Serbian and Albanian entities within the region and allow Serbs to have a relationship with Serbia that would be close but regulated by Kosovar institutions. Earlier, Serbian Vice President Miroslav Labus came forth with a similar proposal, maintaining that a Serbian enclave should be created in northern Kosovo and along the Kosovar part of the River Morava.

What the Serb positions have in common is a simple fact: Kosovo must not, under any circumstances, be allowed to achieve independence.

Here, it must be noted that the international community -- the majority of U.S. and European politicians involved in this process -- are striving to extinguish the independent Serbian enclave in Bosnia-Herzegovina and create a unified state. Hence, it is possible that Tadic and Labus' proposals are designed to safeguard the existence of Serbian entities not only in Kosovo but also in Bosnia.

Events during the last few months testify to the uncertainties among Albanians, too. Though all the Albanians agree that Kosovo must be independent, in October some radical groups attempted to pressure the Kosovar Parliament to declare independence immediately. However, as a result of international pressure -- primarily from Jesen Petersen, leader of the U.N. Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo -- on Nov. 17 a public proclamation was issued stating that Kosovar Albanians want an independent and sovereign Kosovo, and that this position will be represented during negotiations with Belgrade.

The international community could resolve this predicament -- especially if the major powers represented in the Contact Group (the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy and Russia) legally sanctioned the de facto protectorate. That would translate into at least five years of conditional independence for Kosovo, supervised by the Contact Group and protected by international forces, which would give the Serbs in Northern Kosovo not only minority rights (a term they consider an affront in itself) but also the ability to organize themselves -- inside Kosovo -- as a separate entity.

If the Contact Group members are not ready to impose the solution of conditional independence as soon as possible, a new war in the Balkans is almost a certainty. Historical patterns simply are not working: Neither the Ottoman Empire nor Tito's Yugoslavia can be resurrected. But a sort of Bismarckian realpolitik -- a protectorate imposed and supervised by a concert of major powers -- might be worth trying.

Regardless of what path is approached, any removal of international forces will lead to Albanian-Serb bloodshed. Consequently, the international community only has two options. First, the Contact Group could adopt a position of de facto support of Albanian independence. Such a stance would anger Belgrade, but Belgrade currently lacks the tools to retaliate effectively (although the Bosnian Serbs would certainly feel forced to act to protect their own interests). Second, the Contact Group could simply attempt to extend the existing legal limbo.

Unfortunately, another bit of Serbia and Montenegro -- namely, Montenegro -- is champing at the bit to vote on independence itself. And should Montenegro go, the Kosovar Albanians are certain to not wait around for the international community to make up its mind. This leaves just one question in Stratfor's mind: Do the Kosovar Albanians possess the military fortitude to seize their independence should they not receive a blank check from the Contact Group?

Guardian newspaper forced to retract Noam Chomsky interview

Using Emotion to Silence Analysis

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/nov2005/chom-n29_prn.shtml

World Socialist Web Site www.wsws.org



WSWS : News & Analysis : Europe : Britain

Guardian newspaper forced to retract Noam Chomsky interview

By Robert Stevens
29 November 2005

On November 17, Britain's Guardian newspaper ran a statement in its
Corrections and Clarifications column announcing the removal from its
website of an interview with Noam Chomsky.

The interview, conducted by Emma Brockes, was published in the
Guardian's October 31 edition after Chomsky, a professor of
linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was voted
the world's top intellectual in a poll conducted by Britain's Prospect
magazine. Of 20,000 participants in the Prospect poll, 4,800 voted for
Chomsky.

In the published interview, Brockes attacked Chomsky, claiming he had
implied that a massacre of Muslims had not been carried out by Serbian
forces at Srebrenica in July 1995, during the Bosnian war. Her
diatribe marked a new low in the ever more pronounced rightward shift
of a newspaper that still advertises itself as the mouthpiece of
Britain's liberal intelligentsia.

The Guardian dropped the interview only following an open letter to
the newspaper from Chomsky, a complaint from the media organisation
Media Lens, and numerous letters of protest from readers.

The Guardian had initially defended its interview. On November 1, it
published two letters supporting criticisms of Chomsky, supposedly to
balance the "debate". As Chomsky later pointed out in an email copied
to the Media Lens organisation, "Both writers assume that there is a
'debate', as the editors falsely claimed, in which I question the
massacre (or as they pretend, 'massacre') in Srebrenica. That is all
fabrication, as the editors know well. They labored mightily to create
the impression of a debate in which I take the position they assigned
to me, and have succeeded. Now I'm stuck with that, even though it is
a deceitful invention of theirs."

The newspaper also failed to publish Chomsky's entire open letter of
complaint, dated November 13. Instead, they ran a truncated version in
which they insisted, before agreeing to publish, that Chomsky remove
the word "fabrication" from his condemnation of the Brockes article.

Chomsky agreed to do this and later stated that he was mistaken in
doing so. Even then, Chomsky's letter was published alongside one from
a victim of the war in the Balkans under the spurious heading "Fallout
Over Srebrenica". In reality, this "fallout" had been entirely
concocted by the Guardian, which had attributed to Chomsky a statement
he never made.

The newspaper's November 14 retraction admitted as much. It was issued
in the form of an acknowledgement by the "readers' editor" that found
in favour of Chomsky on three significant complaints.

"Principal among these was a statement by Ms. Brockes that in
referring to atrocities committed at Srebrenica during the Bosnian war
he had placed the word 'massacre' in quotation marks. This suggested,
particularly when taken with other comments by Ms. Brockes, that Prof.
Chomsky considered the word inappropriate or that he had denied that
there had been a massacre. Prof. Chomsky has been obliged to point out
that he has never said or believed any such thing. The Guardian has no
evidence whatsoever to the contrary and retracts the statement with an
unreserved apology to Prof. Chomsky."

Brockes' piece was clearly a hatchet job in which she demonstrated a
complete disdain for basic journalistic standards. But why was she
given the task and what was the brief given to her by the Guardian's
editorial staff?

There is no doubt that Chomsky's nomination by the readers of Prospect
will have angered and appalled the Guardian. Both publications
function as liberal apologists for the Labour government of Prime
Minister Tony Blair and both he and his leading adviser, Peter
Mandelson, have written for Prospect. Last year the Guardian published
an article by the editor of Prospect, David Goodhart, in which he
questioned whether an ethnically diverse society and a welfare state
are any longer compatible.

The vote for Chomsky by Prospect's readers on the basis of his left
politics and generally anti-imperialist stance was clearly seen as a
slap in the face. There remains a section of readers who have not got
the message being doled out by both organs.

Why were Brockes and, presumably, the Guardian's editors so determined
to raise the issue of Srebrenica? Because the civil war in Bosnia
represented a political watershed. It was the occasion for a slew of
liberals and radicals to ditch their oppositional stance and make
their peace with imperialismâ€â€a phenomenon that was analysed by the
International Committee of the Fourth International in its December
14, 1995 statement, " Imperialist War in the Balkans and the Decay of
the Petty-Bourgeois Left"

The ICFI noted how representatives of this tendency, in which the
Guardian and many of its leading columnists were to be found, cited
revulsion over Serbian atrocities as the justification for their swing
into the imperialist campâ€â€ignoring similar atrocities by Croat and
Muslim forces. The moral hand-wringing over Bosnia served a definite
political purposeâ€â€to legitimise support for Western military
intervention aimed at the break-up of Yugoslavia and the installation
of various pro-Western regimes that would ensure imperialist control
of this strategic region. The Bosnian war provided an opportunity for
these layers of ex-radicals to realign their politics with those of
imperialism.

This analysis has been amply borne out in the past decade. The
Guardian's role in justifying Britain's military intervention in
Bosnia by citing atrocities such as Srebrenica was only a practice run
for its subsequent abandonment of opposition to the Iraq war and shift
to support for regime-change in Iraq, once again citing the crimes
committed by Saddam Hussein.

An essential function of the pro-war propaganda of the Guardian has
been to intimidate and silence all those who refuse to accept the lie
that the imperialist powers are undertaking a great civilising mission
by organising regime change in the Balkans, the Caucasus and the
Middle East: Hence Brockes' choice of ideological weapon against
Chomsky.

The interview was published under the headline "The Greatest
Intellectual?" Its subhead was designed to be read as an excerpt from
the interview. It stated, "Q: Do you regret supporting those who say
the Srebrenica massacre was exaggerated? A: My only regret is that I
didn't do it strongly enough."

Below, Brockes writes of Chomsky's career as an intellectual: "This
is, of course, what Chomsky has been doing for the last 35 years, and
his conclusions remain controversial: that practically every US
president since the Second World War has been guilty of war crimes;
that in the overall context of Cambodian history, the Khmer Rouge
weren't as bad as everyone makes out; that during the Bosnian war the
'massacre' at Srebrenica was probably overstated."

Chomsky has never put quotation marks around "massacre" in relation to
Srebrenica as Brockes implies. Indeed, he has referred to the massacre
at Srebrenica several times in his writing. More important still, the
question and answer that was used by the Guardian as a subhead was
made up either by Brockes or whoever edited her article for
publication.

The Guardian acknowledged in its retraction:

"No question in that form was put to Prof. Chomsky. This part of the
interview related to his support for Diana Johnstone (not Diane as it
appeared in the published interview) over the withdrawal of a book in
which she discussed the reporting of casualty figures in the war in
former Yugoslavia. Both Prof. Chomsky and Ms. Johnstone, who has also
written to the Guardian, have made it clear that Prof. Chomsky's
support for Ms. Johnstone, made in the form of an open letter with
other signatories, related entirely to her right to freedom of speech.
The Guardian also accepts that and acknowledges that the headline was
wrong and unjustified by the text."

The book by Diana Johnstone is entitled Fools' Crusade: Yugoslavia,
NATO and Western Delusions, and was published in 2002. It is a
critique of the Western coverage of the war and seeks to shed light on
what lay behind the propaganda campaign of the imperialist
governments, which sought to demonize Serbia and lay sole
responsibility for the war at its door.

In 2003, Chomsky was one of a number of prominent signatories to an
open letter opposing the withdrawal of the book by its Swedish
publisher. That decision followed a press campaign in which both
Johnstone and her book were vilified, led by the daily newspaper,
Dagens Nyeter.

Chomsky was simply defending the author's right to free speech and,
while describing Johnstone's book as a "serious" work, has never said
that he fully agrees or disagrees with her analysis.

In his open letter to the Guardian, Chomsky states, "The reporter
obviously had a definite agenda: to focus the defamation exercise on
my denial of the Srebrenica massacre. From the character of what
appeared, it is not easy to doubt that she was assigned this task.
When I wouldn't go along, she simply invented the denial, repeatedly,
along with others."

An indication of just how importantâ€â€personally as well as
politicallyâ€â€it was for the Guardian to discredit Chomsky is Brockes'
description of "my colleague, Ed Vulliamy" as a "serious, trustworthy"
person. This is written in the context of an attack on Chomsky for
daring to question Vulliamy's reporting of the war.

Vulliamy wrote regularly on the war in the Balkans. His essential
theme was that the Serbian regime was responsible for the war, that
the Bosnian people were being systematically wiped out, and that
failure to support Western intervention was tantamount to supporting
Serbian atrocities.

As Diana Johnstone points out in her November 14 article on the
Brockes-Chomsky episode, entitled "Kulturkrieg in Journalism: Using
Emotion to Silence Analysis," it is entirely conceivable that Brockes
based her conversation with Chomsky on a few culled paragraphs from
Vulliamy, even down to his spelling mistakes. Vulliamy had previously
spelled Johnstone's first name incorrectly in printâ€â€a mistake repeated
by Brockes in her article.

Guardian Apologizes to Chomsky

November 17, 2005

Guardian Apologizes to Chomsky

Total Retraction of Emma Brockes's "No Massacre at
Srebrenica" Slurs

By CounterPunch News Service


The following unusually detailed and categorical apology to
Noam Chomsky appears in The Guardian for November 17. The
Guardian's "readers' editor", Ian Mayes, issues this
virtually unprecedented climb-down--in effect a savage
rebuke to its reporter Emma Brockes--after complaints by
Chomsky himself and others, and by detailed exposes, first
by Alexander Cockburn and then by Diana Johnstone on this site.


The headline and text of The Guardian's retractions follow.


Corrections and clarifications
The Guardian and Noam Chomsky
Thursday November 17, 2005
The Guardian


The readers' editor has considered a number of complaints
from Noam Chomsky concerning an interview with him by Emma
Brockes published in G2, the second section of the Guardian,
on October 31. He has found in favour of Professor Chomsky
on three significant complaints.


Principal among these was a statement by Ms Brockes that in
referring to atrocities committed at Srebrenica during the
Bosnian war he had placed the word "massacre" in quotation
marks. This suggested, particularly when taken with other
comments by Ms Brockes, that Prof Chomsky considered the
word inappropriate or that he had denied that there had been
a massacre. Prof Chomsky has been obliged to point out that
he has never said or believed any such thing. The Guardian
has no evidence whatsoever to the contrary and retracts the
statement with an unreserved apology to Prof Chomsky.


The headline used on the interview, about which Prof Chomsky
also complained, added to the misleading impression given by
the treatment of the word massacre. It read: Q: Do you
regret supporting those who say the Srebrenica massacre was
exaggerated? A: My only regret is that I didn't do it
strongly enough.


No question in that form was put to Prof Chomsky. This part
of the interview related to his support for Diana Johnstone
(not Diane as it appeared in the published interview) over
the withdrawal of a book in which she discussed the
reporting of casualty figures in the war in former
Yugoslavia. Both Prof Chomsky and Ms Johnstone, who has also
written to the Guardian, have made it clear that Prof
Chomsky's support for Ms Johnstone, made in the form of an
open letter with other signatories, related entirely to her
right to freedom of speech. The Guardian also accepts that
and acknowledges that the headline was wrong and unjustified
by the text.


Ms Brockes's misrepresentation of Prof Chomsky's views on
Srebrenica stemmed from her misunderstanding of his support
for Ms Johnstone. Neither Prof Chomsky nor Ms Johnstone have
ever denied the fact of the massacre.


Prof Chomsky has also objected to the juxtaposition of a
letter from him, published two days after the interview
appeared, with a letter from a survivor of Omarska. While he
has every sympathy with the writer, Prof Chomsky believes
that publication was designed to undermine his position, and
addressed a part of the interview which was false. Both
letters were published under the heading Falling out over
Srebrenica. At the time these letters were published,
following two in support of Prof Chomsky published the
previous day, no formal complaint had been received from
him. The letters were published by the letters editor in
good faith to reflect readers' views. With hindsight it is
acknowledged that the juxtaposition has exacerbated Prof
Chomsky's complaint and that is regretted. The Guardian has
now withdrawn the interview from the website.


[No need to worry--the article will live forever on the
innumerable right-wing sites that copied it, and no doubt
its admittedly false allegations will forever remain part of
the Chomsky lore endlessly repeated by his detractors.--DC]


--
Dan Clore

RE: Hague court bids to rein in former Kosovo PM

 

RE: Hague court bids to rein in former Kosovo PM
31/10/2005

Your articles notes that the former Kosovo prime minister and Kosovo Liberation Army leader Ramush Haradinaj, although indicted for war crimes against Serbs, Roma and fellow Albanians, has been allowed by a preliminary judgment of The Hague Tribunal's judiciary to return to the province and resume political life while awaiting his trial.

This extraordinarily lenient treatment should come as no surprise. After all, the international community's recent decision to discuss the status of Kosovo handsomely rewards KLA ethnic cleansing. Apparently, it is asking too much of Kosovo's Albanians, having won outright, to welcome back the many Serbs, Roma and other non-Albanians whom they expelled during the early days of the NATO occupation and to stop harassing those Serbs who stayed behind. To ditch "standards before status" is to appease the province's Albanians in their non-negotiable demand for an independent and ethnically pure Kosovo.

So much for Gen Wesley Clark's comment during the bombing of Serbia that "There is no place in modern Europe for ethnically pure states." To add to the irony, there now appears to be a place in Europe for Croatia, a more or less ethnically pure state as a result of its expunging of the Krajina Serb nation.

Yugo Kovach
European Co-ordinator
The Lord Byron Foundation for Balkan Studies (www.balkanstudies.org)
22 The Barons
Twickenham, Middx TW1 2AP
United Kingdom
020 8892 1979
01258 880 283


United Kingdom
------------------------------------------------------------

Hague court bids to rein in former Kosovo PM

ISN SECURITY WATCH (20/10/05) - Prosecutors at the Hague-based International War Crimes Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) late on Wednesday lodged an excoriating appeal to prevent Kosovo's former prime minister Ramush Haradinaj from returning to political life.

The appeal was couched in unusually strong language and noted angrily that despite being indicted for extremely serious crimes, Haradinaj was gradually “being reinstated as a key player in the political scene in Kosovoâ€Â.

Hague prosecutors said they would submit more evidence to the Appeals Chamber on Thursday or at the very latest on Friday. However, the contents of these submissions are to remain confidential as potential witnesses could be identified if they were made public.

Haradinaj, 37, is a former commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK/KLA). His indictment, along with that of two subordinates, was made public last March. It accused the three men of 37 counts of abduction, murder, torture, and "ethnic cleansing", committed against Serbs, Roma, and fellow Albanians in 1998.

When his indictment was made public, Haradinaj was prime minister of Kosovo and was widely acclaimed as having achieved much during the 100 days he was in office. On his departure for The Hague, Soren Jessen-Petersen, the head of the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), publicly lamented the fate of his “close partner and friendâ€Â.

On 6 June, Haradinaj was released from custody pending trial. The terms of his conditional release allowed him to pursue limited work within his own party, the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo. Haradinaj’s defense team then asked for these terms to be relaxed, a proposal supported by UNMIK.

On 14 October, the UN Tribunal agreed, saying: “The accused may appear in public and engage in public political activities to the extent which UNMIK finds would be important for a positive development of the political and security situation in Kosovo.â€Â

On 17 October, the prosecution succeeded in stopping this, pending further submissions, the major one having come late on Wednesday.

In its appeal, the prosecution says that the lifting of restrictions - which would not, however, permit Haradinaj to become prime minister again while he awaits trial - creates “a terrible perception†for victims and witnesses and an impression of unfairness, since similar privileges have not been granted to other indictees.

The prosecution says that if upheld, the decision to allow Haradinaj to return to politics would strike fear among his victims and witnesses, who would gain the impression that “power still resides in the hands of the accusedâ€Â.

They also reminded the judges of the so-called Dukagjini Case, in which at least five witnesses in a case of murder involving Haradinaj’s brother Daut and his co-accused, Idriz Balaj, were killed.

No date has been set for the Appeals Chamber to make a final adjudication on the case, but it is expected within the next few weeks.

The fact that UNMIK has lobbied hard for the relaxation of Haradinaj’s terms of release confirms stories circulating in Pristina that the UN and Western diplomats are keen to have Haradinaj play a key political role in the coming months.

Kosovo is now entering a particularly tense period, as talks on its future status are likely to begin by December.

Haradinaj’s successor as prime minister is Bajram Kosumi. However, not having been a guerrilla commander, his authority is limited and his administration has been weakened by media reports of alleged corruption.

One diplomat who deals with Kosovo told ISN Security Watch that he believed that Haradinaj could “play a useful role in terms of telling hardliners he knows to stay calmâ€Â.

Agron Bajram, the editor of the daily newspaper Koha Ditore, told ISN Security Watch that he, like most Kosovo Albanians, would be “delighted†if Haradinaj could return to politics, because he had been a “much-needed†figure while in power and could play a major role in unifying the Albanian side during the upcoming talks on Kosovo’s future.

By contrast, Dusan Batakovic, a senior advisor on Kosovo to Serbian President Boris Tadic, told ISN Security Watch: “We see this as appalling. This unbalanced approach to indictees of different sides is a sending a very wrong message to both Serbs and Albanians.â€Â

What is clear is that since Haradinaj's release, the UN and diplomats in Kosovo have courted him in ways that would have been deemed outrageous and inappropriate if the indictee had been a Serb or Croat.

For example, on 26 September, a huge party was held at the Hotel Grand in Pristina to celebrate the wedding of Haradinaj’s brother. Among the guests were deputy UNMIK chief Larry Rossin and other senior officials and diplomats.

Haradinaj is frequently seen dining in fashionable restaurants in Pristina with foreign guests, who also visit him at his home in the village of Gllogjan.

Oddly, considering the alleged power and influence of Haradinaj, armed men in masks and uniforms have recently begun setting up checkpoints and searching cars not far from Gllogjan.

The Kosovar Albanian press has reported that a group calling itself “The Army for Kosovo’s Independence†has threatened UN officials with death and kidnapping if they act in any way to prevent Kosovo’s independence.

Officials from the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR) have said they were only aware of criminal activities.

(By Tim Judah in London)
http://www.isn.ethz.ch/news/sw/details.cfm?ID=13210

Serbia fights to hold on to Kosovo, Montenegro

Serbia fights to hold on to Kosovo, Montenegro

As Kosovo status talks begin and Montenegro prepares for an independence referendum, Serbian analysts say the government in Belgrade could survive losing Montenegro, but losing Kosovo would have far-reaching consequences.

 ISN By Igor Jovanovic in Belgrade for ISN Security Watch (27/11/05)


Serbian lawmakers last week passed a resolution enabling the government to participate in negotiations on the future status of its UN-administered southern province of Kosovo, but at the same time making it clear that an independent Kosovo would be unacceptable.

The 21 November resolution essentially calls for Kosovo, which has a majority ethnic Albanian population, to be given autonomy, just short of independence.

Last Thursday, three days after the resolution was adopted by Serbian parliament, a team was formed to participate in the Kosovo status negotiations. That team will include Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, Serbian President Boris Tadic, Foreign Minister Vuk Draskovic of Serbia and Montenegro, and Thomas Fleiner, the director of Switzerland’s Federalism Institute, who will serve as an advisor to the team.

The Serbian resolution is in direct opposition to a resolution adopted by the Kosovo Assembly a few days earlier, which states that independence is the only option for the province.

The status talks started on 21 November with the arrival of UN special envoy Martti Ahtisaari in Pristina, the capital of Kosovo.

The Serbia resolution advocates a compromise solution for Kosovo, but says it “will proclaim any imposed solution illegitimate, illegal, and invalid†- a warning to the international community not to attempt to force the independence issue unilaterally. The representatives also advocated direct negotiations with the Albanian side, another veiled rejection of international interference.

Prime Minister Kostunica told lawmakers that a solution for Kosovo’s status must guarantee the preservation of Serbia and Montenegro’s sovereignty as well as essential autonomy for Kosovar Albanians.

Kostunica said Serbia was “not only defending its national interest, but also the principles on which today’s international law is basedâ€Â.

All caucuses except the Democratic Party, led by Serbian President Tadic, voted for the resolution. However, although the Democrats disagreed with some aspects of the resolution, they concurred that independence for Kosovo was unacceptable.

Tadic proposed that Kosovo remain part of Serbia, but be divided into two entities, one Serb and one Albanian. The proposal, which was first unveiled by Tadic during his recent visit to Russia, has been rejected by ethnic Albanian leaders.

The two entities would have both joint and separate institutions similar to the way Bosnia and Herzegovina was divided up by the Dayton Peace Agreement, which ended the 1992-1995 war there. That model, which the international community in Bosnia is now hoping to revise, has proven to be politically complicated, bureaucratically inefficient, and extremely expensive.

The planned Serb entity of Kosovo would have institutional links to Belgrade in areas such as education, health, and some forms of security. Tadic’s associates said the Serbian president’s proposal focused more on concrete details, while the existing resolution was centered around a vague notion of “more than autonomy, less than independence†for Kosovo.

But Tadic’s idea of dividing up Kosovo has been rejected out of hand by the US and the EU, though Russia and China oppose full independence for Kosovo and are more likely to accept such a plan.

The head of the Coordinating Center for Kosovo, Sanda Raskovic-Ivic, who is also the vice-president of Kostunica’s Democratic Party of Serbia, said the 21 November parliamentary resolution on Kosovo should not be taken lightly.

Raskovic-Ivic told the Belgrade daily Politika that the Serbian side would insist on “the point that Serbia’s borders cannot be changedâ€Â. But she also stressed that “more than autonomy, less than independence†was a compromise between two extremes - the Kosovar Albanian “independence or nothing†and the Serbian “centralism or nothingâ€Â.

According to the resolution, the ethnic Albanians (who have the overall majority in the province) will be offered judicial, executive, and legislative power in areas where they are the majority, while the same principle would apply to Kosovo Serbs in those municipalities where they are in the majority.

“There is no politician in Serbia who would accept […] independence for Kosovo, even if it were conditional,†Raskovic-Ivic said.

Cedomir Antic, political advisor to Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Miroljub Labus, who is also the leader of the G17 Plus party - the second-largest party in Serbia’s ruling coalition - said any kind of independence for Kosovo would rule out any Serbian financial aid for the province.

“This would lead to a new displacement of Serbs from Kosovo,†Antic told ISN Security Watch. Some 100,000 Serbs remain in Kosovo, while around 200,000 fled the province after 1999 when international security forces took control.

In the meantime, EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn has urged Belgrade to play “a constructive role†in the resolution of the Kosovo’s status.

In an attempt to assuage Belgrade’s fears that Serbia’s conduct during the Kosovo status talks could determine the outcome of the country’s EU membership bid, EU officials said the two issues were not directly related.

EU Foreign and Security Policy High Representative Javier Solana told Belgrade media in October he did not believe that the Kosovo status talks would have any effect on Serbia’s Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) talks with Brussels - the first steps towards EU membership for Western Balkan nations.

“I do not think the negotiations on Kosovo’s future status should be a problem. Those are two separate processes. One refers to relations between Serbia and Montenegro and the EU, and the other is linked to processes whose direction is set not by the EU, but by the UN, even though it is important for us,†Solana said.

According to opinion polls conducted by Media Gallup in late September, 35 per cent of Serbian citizens believe that the best solution for Kosovo is autonomy within the existing borders.

Seven per cent of those polled said the best solution would be to create a Kosovo Republic modeled along the lines of the union of Serbia and Montenegro, while 12 per cent favored full Serbian control over Kosovo - the pre-1999 set up. Only 2 per cent advocated the preservation of the current state as a UN-administered province.

Kosovo, Montenegro slipping away
As the debate over Kosovo’s status intensifies, Montenegro is also threatening to leave the state union with Serbia and declare independence.

Serbia’s ruling parties are largely united over the need to preserve the union with Montenegro. Only G17 Plus advocates an independent Serbia without Montenegro, but it has reached a consensus with its coalition partners to create a strategy for maintaining the common state.

But Montenegro is slipping away. Montenegrin President Filip Vujanovic said in early October that a referendum on the independence of Montenegro, the smaller of the union’s two republics, would not be postponed and would be held between February and April 2006.

Serbian Democratic Party spokesman Andreja Mladenovic told ISN Security Watch that his party advocated the preservation of the state union, primarily because the EU had clearly said “this is the quickest way to obtain EU membershipâ€Â.

“But if the people of Montenegro choose independence and if the referendum is held according to international standards, the Serbian government will respect the referendum’s results,†Mladenovic said.

Branko Radujko, advisor to the Serbian president, told ISN Security Watch that Tadic also advocated the preservation of the common state as the fastest track to EU membership.

Serbia and Montenegro Foreign Minister Draskovic, who is also the leader of one of the ruling Serbian parties, the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO), said he would do everything in his power to save the state union.

However, G17 Plus’ Cedomir Antic says Serbia is “a hostage†in the union with the much smaller Montenegro, which - even though it contributes only 5 per cent of the joint budget - has the right to veto all decisions in the common state.

Earlier this month, the European Commission cautioned Montenegro against making any unilateral moves as it prepares for its independence referendum.

The EU has warned Montenegro against embarking on any moves towards an independence referendum until a broad consensus was reached on how it should be conducted. Otherwise, it said, the international community would not accept the outcome.

“The issue should be dealt with in a way that preserves internal and regional stability and is compatible with the continuing progress of Serbia and Montenegro towards membership,†the EU said in a statement.

Brussels in 2003 acknowledged that Montenegro had the right to organize a referendum on independence. However, the EU wants the strongly pro-independence government of Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic to hash out an agreement with Montenegrin parties that oppose the move, with Serbia, and with the international community.

According to a September survey conducted by the Podgorica-based nongovernmental Center for Democracy, independence is still the favored solution in Montenegro, with 41.6 per cent of respondents in favor of independence and 34.5 per cent opposed.

However, despite the disagreements, Antic believes that the possible separation of Montenegro “will go down absolutely peacefully†as far as the Serbian side is concerned.

Belgrade political analyst Slobodan Antonic said the Serbian government would easily survive a possible split with Montenegro, but added that no Serbian government could survive Kosovo’s independence.

“That would probably lead to early elections. If the elections are held soon after the declaration of Kosovo’s independence, the parties with nationalist rhetoric, such as the Serbian Radical Party, are very likely to come to power,†Antonic told ISN Security Watch.

The Radicals - whose leader, Vojislav Seselj, is on trial at the UN’s Hague-based war crimes tribunal for atrocities committed in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina - is the single strongest party in the Serbian parliament, holding 81 out of the total 250 legislative seats.

According to the latest public opinion polls, the Radicals now enjoy the support of around 32 per cent of voters in Serbia, while the second-ranked pro-European Democratic Party, led by President Tadic, has 11 per cent less.

Antonic said that if the Radicals won power it would most likely complicate the country’s EU membership bid, even though the party does not officially oppose association with the EU, but does oppose the extradition of Serbian war criminals to the UN court, which is a major precondition for EU membership talks to begin.


Igor Jovanovic is ISN Security Watch’s senior correspondent in Serbia. He has worked with Serbia’s Beta News Agency since 1998 and is the former News Editor for Belgrade’s Radio Index. He also contributes to Transitions Online magazine and the Southeast European Times.
http://www.isn.ethz.ch/news/sw/details.cfm?ID=13641

Kosovo sellout

The New York Times

November 26, 2005


In Meeting With Rival Factions, U.N. Envoy Paves Way for Kosovo Talks

By NICHOLAS WOOD

BELGRADE, Serbia and Montenegro, Nov. 23 - The United Nations took a step closer to starting talks on the future of Kosovo, perhaps the most intractable issue remaining from the Balkan wars of the 1990's, with a visit by its chief negotiator to the region this week.

The envoy, Martti Ahtissari, a former president of Finland and recently appointed as the United Nations' negotiator, met Tuesday and Wednesday with the leaders of Kosovo's two factions, ethnic Albanians and Serbs, in Pristina, Kosovo's capital, to prepare for possible face-to-face negotiations between the sides early next year.

His tour paves the way for negotiations that are expected to end six years of legal limbo for Kosovo, during which uncertainty over that Serbian province's future has frustrated both its populations and the threatened the chances for long-term stability in the region.

Kosovo has been under the control of a United Nations interim administration since it was wrested from Serbia's control in June 1999 after a 78-day NATO-led bombing campaign. The air campaign came after Serbia sent troops into the province against an ethnic Albanian rebel movement, and evidence emerged of widespread atrocities by the troops against the Albanian majority.

Since then the United Nations has established a regional government with substantial local control. But the mission's role in the province is seen by international officials as increasingly untenable because of the failure to resolve its future status.

Officially Kosovo remains a part of Serbia, contrary to the wishes of the Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the estimated two million people and who want independence. Last year 50,000 ethnic Albanians rioted in the region, forcing 4,000 Serbs and others to flee their homes and killing 19 people.

The difficulty of Mr. Ahtissari's task was underlined just before his visit as Serbian and Albanian political leaders reiterated their diametrically opposing views. On Monday, Serbia's Parliament passed a resolution agreeing to the negotiation process, but rejecting any solution that would remove Kosovo from Serbia. On Tuesday, Kosovo's Albanian leaders told Mr. Ahtissari that they would not accept anything less than independence.

"I insist on the direct recognition of Kosovo's independence that will calm down the region," Kosovo's president, Ibrahim Rugova, said after meeting in his home in Pristina with Mr. Ahtissari. "The time has come to wrap up this business."

Much of the negotiations are expected to focus on how Kosovo's Serbian population, which numbers up to 130,000, can best be protected and have a degree of autonomy from Albanian-dominated institutions.

While the United Nations officials say the final agreement will be the result of negotiation, senior Western diplomats across the region concede it will be difficult to defy Kosovo Albanian demands for independence, despite their failure to prevent attacks on minorities. Forcing Kosovo to remain within Serbia would run the risk of provoking an Albanian insurgency and destabilizing the region, they said.

But some politicians warn that insufficient consideration is being given to what impact Kosovo's independence would have on Serbia.

"Everyone seems to be concerned about the future status of Kosovo; that it will be more or less independent, conditional independence or independence with international supervision," Dimitrij Rupel, Slovenia's foreign minister and current chairman in the office of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said in a recent interview. "But they haven't thought thoroughly about what might happen in Serbia."

The negotiations come at difficult time for Serbia. Next year Montenegro is expected to hold a referendum that could also lead to it breaking away from Serbia and becoming an independent state.

Serbia's democratic parties also remain weak, despite five years of democratic government since the fall of the former Yugoslav president, Slobodan Milosevic, Mr. Rupel said.

Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica's coalition government has introduced difficult economic and political changes that have yet to bear fruit. Public enterprises are being restructured with job losses, social security payments have been scaled back, and public expenditures have been cut to ensure economic stability.

This environment, especially if Kosovo and Montenegro were to become independent, could be exploited by the ultranationalist Serbian Radical Party, which holds the largest number of seats in Parliament, said Vuk Jeremic, the foreign affairs adviser to the reformist president, Boris Tadic.

"We may experience a nationalist wave," Mr. Jeremic said in a telephone interview. "The Radicals will say, what have five years of democracy brought us? The improvements may not be very obvious at this stage." If Kosovo were lost, he said, "I think there will be little we can use to contain them."

Mr. Rupel said he had urged other European foreign ministers at a recent meeting in Brussels to consider how Serbia might be compensated for any possible losses in Kosovo. "I think part of the solution will be finding something attractive for the Serbs," he said. Asked what the response of his counterparts had been to his proposal he said, "They didn't have an answer."

Membership in the European Union some time in the future "isn't really a carrot," he said. Aid or compensation, financial or political would have to be sufficient to strengthen democratic forces enough to make people overlook the loss of Kosovo.

Mr. Jeremic said the whole region needed an additional aid package, to ensure stability after a decision on Kosovo. "There has to be a new initiative for the Balkans within the European Union," he said.

But he emphasized that Serbia could not be bought off on Kosovo. "No matter how high a price you pay for Kosovo, it would still be a sellout," he said.
"The compensation has to be found within Kosovo. The compensation will have to be at the expense of Albanians' maximalist platform."

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/26/international/europe/26kosovo.html