hotair

Kosovo declares independence from Serbia
Serbia denounces declaration; Russia seeks U.N. Security Council action

PRISTINA, Kosovo - Kosovo's parliament declared the disputed territory a nation on Sunday, mounting a historic bid to become an "independent and democratic state" backed by the U.S. and European allies but bitterly contested by Serbia and Russia.

Serbia immediately denounced the declaration as illegal, and Russia also rejected it, demanding an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council, which was set for Sunday afternoon.

President Bush said the U.S. would work to prevent violence after the declaration and the European Union appealed for calm, mindful of the risk that the declaration could plunge the turbulent Balkans back into instability.

In the Kosovo Serb stronghold city of Mitrovica, hand grenades were thrown at buildings of the European Union and United Nations following the declaration.

One grenade exploded at the U.N. mission causing no significant damage, a Western source in the city said. EU officials evacuated their building, which houses the team preparing a mission to supervise Kosovo's independence.

"Officials abandoned the (EU) building. Security guards said two hand grenades had been thrown. One had exploded," the source told Reuters.

"Kosovo is a republic — an independent, democratic and sovereign state," Kosovo's parliament speaker Jakup Krasniqi said as the chamber burst into applause. Across the capital, Pristina, revelers danced in the streets, fired guns into the air and waved red and black Albanian flags in jubilation at the birth of the world's newest country.

Sunday's declaration was carefully orchestrated with the U.S. and key European powers, and Kosovo was counting on swift international recognition that could come as early as Monday, when EU foreign ministers meet in Brussels, Belgium.

But by sidestepping the U.N. and appealing directly to the U.S. and other nations for recognition, Kosovo set up a showdown with Serbia — outraged at the imminent loss of its territory — and Russia, which warned that it would set a dangerous precedent for separatist groups worldwide.

Ninety percent of Kosovo's 2 million people are ethnic Albanian — most of them secular Muslims — and they see no reason to stay joined to the rest of Christian Orthodox Serbia.

Krasniqi, Prime Minister Hashim Thaci and President Fatmir Sejdiu signed the declaration, which was scripted on parchment, before the unveiling of a new national crest and a flag: a bright blue banner featuring a golden map of Kosovo and six stars, one for each of its main ethnic groups.

"From today onwards, Kosovo is proud, independent and free," said Thaci, a former leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army, which battled Serbian troops in a 1998-99 separatist war that claimed 10,000 lives. "We never lost faith in the dream that one day we would stand among the free nations of the world, and today we do."

"Our hopes have never been higher," he told the assembly. "Dreams are infinite, our challenges loom large, but nothing can deter us from moving forward to the greatness that history has reserved for us."

Thaci pledged the new nation would be "a democratic, multiethnic state" — an attempt to reach out to Serbs who consider Kosovo the cradle of their medieval culture and religion.

But he also had stern words for the Serbian government, which last week declared secession illegal and invalid, saying in the Serbian language: "Kosovo will never be ruled by Belgrade again."

Thaci on Sunday signed 192 separate letters to nations around the world — including Serbia — asking them to recognize Kosovo as a state.

Serbian President Boris Tadic rejected the independence bid immediately, declaring Sunday's proclamation "unilateral and illegal." Kosovo's 10 minority Serb lawmakers boycotted the parliamentary session in protest.

And Serbia's government minister for Kosovo, Slobodan Samardzic, said Sunday that Serbia would increase its presence in the roughly 15 percent of Kosovo that is Serb-controlled — an apparent attempt to divide the province.

Serbia's government ruled out any military response as part of its secret "action plan" drafted earlier this week as a response, but warned that it would downgrade relations with any foreign government that recognizes Kosovo's independence.

Russia's Foreign Ministry said Moscow supports Serbia's "just demands to restore the country's territorial integrity."

Russian President Vladimir Putin has argued that independence without U.N. approval would set a dangerous precedent for "frozen conflicts" across the former Soviet Union and around the world. He is pressuring the U.N. Security Council to intervene.

Before Kosovo's parliament voted, President Bush said the U.S. will work to prevent violent clashes after the independence declaration. The State Department was reviewing the development with European allies as the province sought swift recognition from the West.

"The United States will continue to work with our allies to do the very best we can to make sure there's no violence," Bush said several hours before Kosovo's parliament approved the declaration.

‘Aligned with Europe’
"We are heartened by the fact that the Kosovo government has clearly proclaimed its willingness and its desire to support Serbian rights in Kosovo," Bush said. "We also believe it's in Serbia's interest to be aligned with Europe and the Serbian people can know that they have a friend in America."

Kosovo had formally remained a part of Serbia even though it has been administered by the U.N. and NATO since 1999, when NATO airstrikes ended former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic's crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists.

Kosovo is still protected by 16,000 NATO-led peacekeepers, and the alliance boosted its patrols over the weekend in hopes of discouraging violence. International police, meanwhile, deployed to back up local forces in the tense north.

Spontaneous street celebrations broke out anew on Sunday, with giddy Kosovars waving Albanian and American flags and dancing in the streets.


The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

As much as I hate to do it, I am forced to agree with the Russians on this one. Recognizing Kosovo’s independence is going to establish a very dangerous precedent. A precedent that could have very severe consequences, not just for the US, but for the rest of the world.

What Serbia is experiencing, is the result of not enforcing any kind of compressive immigration policy. Albanians have been flooding into the Kosovo region of Serbia for years, and now they are refusing to leave. Instead they want to create their own little country, by carving the heart out of Serbia.

As things stand right now, the US is not very far behind Serbia. With people from Mexico, Central America, and South America flooding into the US. At the current rates (of uncontrolled immigration), within the next twenty-five years of so, these people will become the majority residents of Texas, Arizona, and even California.

What is going to happen when these people decide that they want to secede from the US, and start their own little countries?

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So long, and thanks for all of the fish!!!

Heretic

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"Enough!!" -so rang Barack Obama's voice off the walls of Mile High Stadium

Black_Knight

I remember knowing a Romanian cabbie Molosavich supporter too boot. If I recall correctly, he argued that the Bosnians encroached on Serbian lands and that's what the whole genocide in the 1990s was about. I'm sure there's some flaws in that reasoning, but I don't think it's very bright to try and take land away that was given to you to live on.

I've had a rough week so I'm not thinking straight.

hotair

The business between the Bosnians, and the Serbs, was all together a different matter. Though they started a chain reaction with their feuding. The war in/about Kosovo, started when the Albanians living in Serbia (Kosovo) decided that they wanted their own country, which triggered the civil war there, that ended finally with the (US lead) NATO air campaign.

It is not that I have anything against Albanians. Nor am I a big supporter of Serbia. The cleansing campaign against the Albanians in Kosovo was just plain wrong. It is simply that I am not sold on the idea of giving everyone, and their grandmother, their own separate country just because they do not want to return to their own (old) country.

If the Albanians were so unhappy in Serbia, why then did they not just go back home to Albania? It would have saved a lot of people from having to die in the civil war, that erupted when their first attempt of cessation failed.

History has pretty well established that this strategy of just giving everyone their own country does not work all that well. They have divided India into five separate countries since its independence from Great Britain (so far). With two of them (India, & Pakistan) developing nuclear weapons to obliterate each other with. This is bad enough, even without the specter of the Pakistani government becoming destabilized.

I understand Russia’s fears, and quite frankly I am not sure that I agree with them completely. Their issues are totally different from what is happening in Serbia! Georgia, and Chechnya are countries that had lost their independence, and now they want it back. Russia (former Soviet Union) has over the years, invested a lot of time, money, and effort into developing both Georgia, and Chechnya into what they are today. It is really impossible to say one way or the other, whether or not either people would have been able to develop to where they are today without the Russians (USSR) helping them.

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So long, and thanks for all of the fish!!!

BillCosby

I really don't care one way or the other about the place but I have always wondered how much of this was just the will of nato/clinton & american interests.................

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Preventive war is not war!!!!Counter-terror is not terror

Malkavian

*shrugs* that all may be true, but they would not be independent if Russia didn't conquer them. They would be all swallowed up by the Ottomans, or Persians, or remnants of Mongols... It was a way of life back then. Lol, US itself is built on conquest of the Native's land, US just did a better job of exterminating them, so US doesn't have Russian problems anymore.

Anyway, the key point here, Russia is not universally hated in the former territories. Russia backs three separatist movements in countries that are important to the West - Moldova (not really important, as far as i know), Azerbaijan (oil pipelines), and Georgia (NATO base)... Should West recognize Kosovo, Russia might officially recognize those movements... That'll throw those countries into chaos and possibly another civil war.

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Woof!

BillCosby

Not sure what the point is.. It is ok for the Russians to invade because someone had to???.........

They have been shitting on Russia ever chance they get......... IMO it is nuts to keep doing it & I agree that @ some point they are gonna start pushing back..... & I don't mean just flyovers...........

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Preventive war is not war!!!!Counter-terror is not terror

Malkavian

The point is, it wasn't anything unusual... If Russia played nice in the past 1,000 years, it would have been destroyed. This goes for any country in the area. Ottomans used those territories to stage attacks on Russia, then fortunes changed, Russians were using those territories to stage attacks on Ottomans. Does it make any of it right? No. But Russia is no different from any other empire... American, British, French, Turkish, Mongol etc...

Here and now though, i don't think any state would allow a secessionist movement to flourish. US fought a civil war over it, and i'm betting will fight another one it it has to... Russia is no different.
Russia has a lot of influence in important places...
The whole Kosovo thing is quite grim as Russia has quite a bit of minorities, and is not willing to disintegrate, which is sensible.

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Woof!

hotair

It was not really a question of conquest. Both Chechnya, and Georgia originally asked Russia for their protection from the Ottoman Empire. In both cases the price of protection was occupation.

It was all part of the game of Empire. Nations competing for resources, and trade.

In the Caucasus is was a three way affair between The British Empire (in India), The Russian Empire, and the Ottoman Empire. Smaller countries either found a friend, or they get eaten up by one of the big players.

Even if Russia does not officially recognize these movements, the threat still exists. Since they are just going to give away countries, why should it stop with Kosovo?

This is were it started in the first place. The Albanians decided that since everyone else (of the former Yugoslavia) was getting their own country, they felt that they should get one too.

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So long, and thanks for all of the fish!!!

hotair

Note: While a member of the British Common Wealth, India was originally made up of the modern countries of India(1), Pakistan(2), Nepal(3), Bangladesh(4), and Sri Lanka(5). Now I count five countries there.

At one time Pakistan was called West Pakistan. While Nepal, and Bangladesh were known as East Pakistan. Though that did not last very long, and finding a map with those names is very hard to find.

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So long, and thanks for all of the fish!!!