WEEKLY SELECTION/YUGOSLAVIA: Outlook Cloudy for Kosovo Talks

By Vesna Peric Zimonjic Reprint | | Print |

Vesna Peric Zimonjic

BELGRADE, Mar 13 1999 (IPS) - Yugoslavia has again rejected western demands for foreign troops in Kosovo where renewed fighting cast a pall over the second round of international peace talks set to begin in Paris Monday.

Kosovo rebels wounded three Serb policemen in the war-torn province, including one shot while fetching his child from a kindergarten. Seven rebels were reported killed in Serb “mopping up” operations in southern Kosovo, according to international monitors.

President Slobodan Milosevic, meanwhile, “decisively rejected the possibility of a foreign military or police presence in Kosovo,” Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said after meeting with the Yugoslav leader in Belgrade.

Russia and Greece, who traditionally have enjoyed friendly ties with Serbia, had attempted to succeed where U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke had failed to get Belgrade’s agreement to an armed foreign force in Kosovo.

Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou said after his talks with Milosevic that the Yugoslav president had stated “there is no need for peace troops…implementation can best be carried through by an extension of the current monitoring mission.”

The issue of a peace-keeping force was a key element in the plan of the six-nation “contact group” to be discussed when all sides meet again in France Monday.

Two weeks of earlier talks at Rambouillet were suspended Feb 23. Milosevic told Ivanov Friday that he was ready to grant self rule to Kosovo but the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) demanded foreign troops as its price for disarming and setting aside its goal of independence.

The rebels repeatedly have indicated their willingness to sign the peace plan hammered out at Rambouillet “despite its faults and shortcomings” but have not done so.

All communiques released by Milosevic’s office have carried the sentence: “Attempts to condition a political agreement (for Kosovo) on our country’s acceptance of foreign troops, which have no business in our territory, are unacceptable.”

For Holbrooke, who spent more than eight hours in talks with Milosevic on Wednesday, such a stand put Yugoslavia on a “collision course” with the international community.

Ivanov declined to comment on a personal message from Russian President Boris Yeltsin that he delivered to Milosevic.

According to Serbian independent media reports from Moscow, the message, besides stressing the need that Kosovo talks should resume on March 15 in Paris, and that the Contact Group’s political plan for Kosovo should be accepted, added that the presence of foreign troops to be “considered” by Belgrade, “in a manner and framework acceptable” to it.

The Belgrade independent daily Danas quoted sources in Moscow as saying Russia was suggesting a force led by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe as opposed to a NATO force and that it could involve Russian troops.

Western hopes of putting maximum pressure on Belgrade have been undermined by the delay in the KLA’s signature on the peace plan. “Milosevic has managed to concede nothing on Kosovo thanks in part to the unwillingness of some KLA leaders to sign the agreement” one Western diplomat said.

The European Union’s Kosovo envoy, Wolfgang Petritsch, told journalists in Belgrade on Thursday that he had spoken to Hasim Thaqi, head of the KLA political directorate, and that the guerrillas were “very close” to signing the agreement.

In the meantime, Serbian authorities pressed ahead with action against the KLA, regarded here as a terrorist organisation. The Serbian ministry of Interior announced that arrest warrants against eight KLA top leaders were still valid.

The eight, including Jakup Krasniqi,the KLA’s official spokesman, Rame Buja, member of the KLA political team and Hashim Thaqi, who emerged as the leader of KLA delegation, were part of the 16-member ethnic Albanian group in Rambouillet last month.

Some of them have already been sentenced, in absentia, for criminal activities like murder, kidnapping or attacks on military or police personnel.

They travelled to France in February only after international guarantees for their safety. “The arrest warrants appeal to all those who know anything about these persons’ whereabouts, or if they recognise them on the basis of photographs, to notify the nearest police station immediately” the statement of Interior ministry said.

For the time being, it remained unclear if the Serbian authorities aimed at not letting the KLA delegation travel to France again Monday.