NATO to UN: Endorse Ahtisaari plan

NATO to UN: Endorse Ahtisaari plan

The 15 members of the UN Security Council were in Brussels on the first leg of a fact-finding tour of Kosovo and Serbia, and planned to meet with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer on Thursday.

"This information mission is an important one, it comes at the right time," the NATO spokesman said. "The secretary-general will want to see a resolution as quickly as possible."

The envoys were holding meetings Wednesday with NATO and EU officials at the Belgian Foreign Ministry.

"We are here to learn what's going on in Kosovo," U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said as he arrived at the ministry.

"We will have in-depth meetings on both the European dimension and the NATO dimension of this Kosovo issue," said Belgium's UN Ambassador Johan Verbeke, who was leading the mission.

The AP reports that although Washington backs Ahtisaari's plan, it remains unclear whether it can garner a simple majority in the 15-member Security Council.

Several non-permanent members of the body — such as South Africa, Ghana, Congo and Indonesia — are deeply skeptical about setting a precedent in international law that would allow for changes to their colonial-era boundaries.

"We are new in the council, so we want to learn about a problem which we are not very familiar with," Indonesian Ambassador Hasan Kleib said.

Before the UN mission’s trip to Europe, Johan Verbeke, Belgian Ambassador to the UN and head of the mission, held a press conference Tuesday at the UN Headquarters where he disclosed the details of the mission.

"The Security Council's fact-finding mission to Belgrade and Kosovo was meant to assist the fifteen-member body in its eventual decision regarding the future status of Kosovo,” he said.

Verbeke added that, with such “important decisions” looming in the near future, the five-day trip to Belgrade and Kosovo will ensure that its members “are fully informed on the matter, beyond what they have already gathered from numerous written and oral reports.”

“Participants are particularly interested to hear first-hand from local leaders and to see the situation on the ground with their own eyes,” he asserted.

The mission will help us to “act responsibly on what is obviously a delicate matter,” Verbeke said.

He said the trip was not meant to “sidestep Martti Ahtisaari's own findings, but to ensure that the Council can act upon his recommendations in an informed manner.”

When asked,  Verbeke declined to say whether the group expected to return from the mission with a viewpoint different from that of  Ahtisaari.

On Wednesday evening, participants of the mission will fly to Belgrade to meet with Serbian president Boris Tadić and prime minister Vojislav Koštunica, as well as with the country's civic leaders, to “measure the state of mind in Belgrade” in regards to the Kosovo issue, Verbeke said.

From Belgrade, the group will proceed to Priština for a two-day stay, where a meeting with president Fatmir Sejdiu and prime minister Agim Ceku had been scheduled, Verbeke said.

The group will also speak with civic leaders, such as representatives from the Kosovo Serb community and those of other minorities, as well as religious leaders from the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church and the Imam of Priština.

Verbeke said the group “will visit Serbian and multi-ethnic enclaves within the region, as well as an Albanian village, so that their trip can yield a “comprehensive and balanced” outlook, but those visits have yet to be finalized.”

On its return Saturday, the group plans to stop in Vienna, where it will hold a meeting with Martti Ahtisaari to discuss “the Special Envoy's proposals in light of their findings, and to pose questions,” Verbeke said.