Rehn and Solana on EU Kosovo plan

Rehn and Solana on EU Kosovo plan

Serbia’s negotiating team will hold a meeting prior to the next two rounds of decentralization and cultural heritage protection talks. This is the first meeting since PM Koštunica’s visit to the U.S. The meeting will also be attended by the Serbian president Boris Tadić and the Foreign minister Vuk Drašković.

After her four-day visit to Kosovo, the Coordinating center chairwoman Sanda Rašković-Ivić said she encountered fear and apprehension as the dominant state of mind of the Serbian population, but hope as well. ’People are afraid of the Kosovo independence talk. They are almost used to movement restrictions they live under, to the breach of human rights, but what is really worrisome is the possibility of Kosovo’s independence, considering how they live today, when the province is under international jurisdiction.’

She says that she did not see any evidnce of improvement in the field, and Kosovo Serbs have expressed their expectations that the state of Serbia will defend Kosovo in future status talks and keep it within Serbia’. ’I have not seen improvements in terms of more security, freedom of movement, but I have to be critical of our side as well. UNMIK and KFOR are responsible for security, and our country should influence them so that they influence the Albanians and provide that freedom. However, people look to Serbia for economic prosperity and Sebia should deliver on that’, Ivić-Rašković said.

Rašković-Ivić said that decentralization had an important place. ’I have not visited a single place where people have not asked whether their village or area will be included in the decentralization procedure, since they see a key to their survival in this’, she said. The seventh round of talks related to Kosovo status technical issues will be held tomorrow in Vienna. Serbian and Albanian negotiators will discuss protected zones around monasteries and churches and the protection of other monuments in Kosovo.

Suroi: Priština and Belgrade cannot compromise

The Reformist ORA party chairman Veton Suroi said that Priština and Belgrade cannot reach a solution on questions discussed in Vienna even under pressure from the international community. ’There is no possibility of compromise or agreement with Belgrade’, Suroi told the Kosovalive news agency, adding that a possible agreement was possible on the issue of protection of Kosovo’s cultural heritage.

G8 calls for compromise

G8 calls for a compromise solution to the Kosovo problem and calls on the Kosovo leadership to pay particular attention to the implementation of the minority standards as demanded by the international community.

‘We call on all sides to take constructive part in the process of determining Kosovo’s final status and to do everything in order to reach a solution dedicated to preserving Kosovo’s multi-ethnic nature’, statement by the Russian president Vladimir Putin read. Putin presided over the G8 three-day summit in St Petersburg.