SERBIA/AUSTRIA: United Nations postpones decision on the future status of Kosovo after Serbian President announces early election

The United Nations announced on Friday (November 10) it would postpone a decision on the future status of Serbia's breakaway Kosovo province, hours after Serbia said it would hold an early general election in January. The decision was taken in Vienna by the Contact Group of six major powers guiding Balkan diplomacy, shortly after Serbian president Boris Tadic announced the January 21 ballot in Belgrade. Announcing the early election Serbian President Boris Tadic said while an agreement on Kosovo's future status was proving hard to reach, work on the issue had to continue. Tadic added "Without negotiations on the future status of Kosovo we have instability, not only in Serbia but in the entire region," "Every imposed solution is absolutely unacceptable and I repeat the stand that an independence of Kosovo is an act that could destabilise the entire region in the long term," Tadic said. U.N. special envoy for Kosovo, Martti Ahtisaari, said that he had decided to present his proposal for the settlement of Kosovo's status to the parties without delay after parliamentary elections in Serbia. The Contact Group -- the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Russia -- had originally promised Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority a decision by year end. A European Union source said Brussels "did not see this as a long delay". Diplomats say the major powers are sympathetic to Albanians' demand for independence but wants to avoid boosting support for the ultranationalist Radical Party, Serbia's strongest. Kosovo has been a U.N. protectorate since NATO bombed Serbia in 1999 to force late Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic to pull out his troops, accused of killing ethnic Albanian civilians while trying to crush a guerrilla insurgency. Its 90-percent Albanian population is tired of waiting and blame the limbo for the lack of economic development that has mired the province in poverty and massive unemployment. Kosovo President, Fatmir Sejdiu, said Serbia's elections was delaying a decision on independence, "Especially we are concerned that this delay is linked with parliamentary elections in Serbia," he said. "Unity team continues to believe that a fast solution of Kosovo status is in interest of all Kosovo citizens , region and international community," Sejdiu continued. Lawyer, Fadil Hoxhaj, was unhappy, "We strongly oppose the delay of Kosovo's final status, we oppose it because status is more important then bread that we eat." But journalist Valon Syla said, "I don't think that this will impact the security in Kosovo because there were media reports that delay is possible." Serbia's election will pit the Radicals against the pro-West Democratic Party led by Tadic, now second in opinion polls. Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica's Democratic Party of Serbia -- in power in an unlikely alliance with monarchists and technocrats -- is third. Many voters say they are disappointed at what they see as a failure to deliver on its promises. The next government will first have to weather the likely loss of Kosovo and will also need to revive talks with the European Union and smooth out relations with its neighbours. Talks on a Stabilisation and Association Agreement, a first step to eventual EU membership, were frozen in May as punishment for Serbia's failure to deliver war crimes fugitive Ratko Mladic to the U.N. court in The Hague. The new government will also inherit a suit brought by Bosnia in the World Court accusing Serbia of genocide during the 1992-95 Bosnia War, and a heavy load of court cases related to the war crimes, mafia hits and general lawlessness of the 1990s. The task list also extends to the economy. Despite robust growth of above five percent in the last four years, a third of Serbia's workforce remains unemployed. The announcement of UN delay may cause more tension in divided towns like Mitrovica in Kosovo. The city is divided between Serbs and ethnic Albanians, the line patrolled by NATO soldiers and United Nations police.

ITN Source | November 11, 2006

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