Serbia asks U.N. for partitioning of Kosovo

Source: The International Herald Tribune | by Dan Bilefsky

Serbia proposed dividing newly independent Kosovo along ethnic lines on Monday, a move that was immediately rebuffed by Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian leadership in Pristina.

The proposal, submitted to the United Nations, is the culmination of a campaign by Serbia to entrench its political and administrative control over the northern part of Kosovo, which has a Serbian majority. Analysts said it was a largely symbolic gesture as the ethnic Albanian leadership in Pristina has vowed never to accept partition, while European countries and the United States would reject it at the United Nations Security Council.

“This proposal is a provocation from Belgrade, and we reject it 100 percent,” Kosovo’s deputy prime minister, Hajredin Kuqi, said in a telephone interview from Pristina. “We want to help create cooperation between Serbs and Albanians in Kosovo – not divisions.”

Kosovo, which declared independence from Serbia on Feb. 17, has been under UN administration since 1999 after NATO intervened to halt the Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic’s repression of the ethnic Albanians, who make up 95 percent of Kosovo’s population.

Serbia regards Kosovo as its medieval heartland and rejects its independence, arguing that it is a breach of international law.

The proposal, which UN officials said they were reviewing, was submitted to coincide with the ninth anniversary of the 1999 NATO bombing of Serbia. According to The Associated Press, the document acknowledges UN jurisdiction over Kosovo, but calls for the Serbian majority to take charge of the border customs, judiciary and police services in the north of Kosovo, which accounts for 15 percent of Kosovo’s overall territory.

Belgrade’s aim of asserting its control over the northern part of Kosovo has contributed to violent confrontations in recent weeks, including a clash on March 17 in which a UN police officer was killed and dozens of others were wounded when peacekeepers seized a courthouse in the northern city of Mitrovica that was being occupied by Serbian protesters.

Many Western analysts and leaders believe that Serbia lost its moral and legal right to govern Kosovo after Milosevic’s ethnic-cleansing campaign against the territory’s ethnic Albanians. But in Belgrade, Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica said the NATO bombing had been part of an attempt by the alliance to take control of Kosovo.

To read the article in its entirety, please click here.