Ceku sets independence declaration date

Ceku sets independence declaration date

Faced with a threatened Russian veto, the West looks likely on Friday to shelve the latest, watered-down UN resolution on the fate of the province, the agency reported.

November 28 marks Albanian independence day.

Ceku said the Kosovo parliament should adopt a resolution setting the date on his return from Washington, where on Monday he is due to meet with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

"It is a day of celebration," he told reporters after meeting UNMIK chief Joachim Ruecker.

"The United Nations has failed to act," he added.

Ceku said he had proposed the move to his fellow leaders on Kosovo's so-called “Unity Team”, a pact of government and opposition leaders.

He did not say whether the rest of the team had agreed.

Ceku said the resolution would invite the European Union to take over supervision of the territory from the United Nations, as proposed in a UN blueprint for “supervised independence” and which Serbia and Russia have rejected.

Moscow has rejected the latest draft UN resolution, which calls for another 120 days of Serb-Albanian talks and would mandate the EU to take over from the UN mission. Russia says it amounts to independence by the back door.

Janjić: Ceku starts election campaign

“Ceku’s statement should be interpreted as a beginning of his election campaign,” Dušan Janjić, director of the Forum for Ethnic Relations, said Friday.

He noted that elections in Kosovo were due in November, and that a winner would have to “keep up Ceku’s promise.”

“The campaign will soon gather pace, and the Albanian leaders will continue to come out in public with deadlines for the proclamation of independence.”

In Janjić’s opinion, Ceku’s remark that the negotiations at the UN Security Council failed was not realistic.

“There is an agreement to temporarily shift the Kosovo debate to the Contact Group. The negotiations should pick up in September, and a new resolution most likely will not be adopted before October,” he said.

According to Janjić, the “realistic” timeframe for the adoption is March 2008, which is why Ceku is now “bothered.”

“His statement has nothing to do with the failure of Russia and the U.S. to see eye to eye on Kosovo, rather with his and Ruecker’s position to provide independence for the province,” he explained.

“Even if someone declared independence on November 28 on behalf of Kosovo, it would not have any significant bearing whatsoever without the resolution in place.”