UN transfers mortal remains
to kosovan families re-burial
31 October - The United Nations office responsible for missing
persons and forensics in Kosovo said today it was informing Kosovan
families about the recent transfer of mortal remains from Serbia.
The Office on Missing Persons and Forensics
(OMPF), in cooperation with the UN civilian police’s Missing
Persons Unit, is handing over a group of 33 mortal remains from
Meja for group re-burial on Sunday.
The UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo
(UNMIK) said in Pristina that there would be an additional handover
tomorrow of three separate sets of mortal remains to family representatives.
UN envoy warns Security
Council that Kosovo still faces serious problems
30 October - The top United Nations envoy for Kosovo warned the
Security Council today that the province was still plagued by
problems as it recovers from the war in 1999.
During a briefing to the Council in New York,
Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Special Representative for Kosovo,
Harri Holkeri, urged Kosovo's leaders to do more to discourage
inter-ethnic violence and to improve dialogue between Kosovo and
Serbia and Montenegro.
Noting that Serbia and Montenegro continued
to operate parallel courts and coordinating structures in Kosovo,
he said: "Belgrade must work with Kosovo structures and replace
this unacceptable policy with a commitment to truly multi-ethnic
organs of government in Kosovo."
But Mr. Holkeri also said that Kosovo Albanian
leaders in Pristina must stop making their participation in any
talks conditional on changes to government structures and the
setting up of new ministries.
"Such bargaining is not acceptable. Dialogue
is one of the standards approved by the Security Council,"
he stressed.
Many refugees, especially from minority communities,
remain afraid to return to their homes because of ethnic violence,
he said.
According to the envoy, the unemployment rate
in Kosovo is about 57 per cent, and the public is becoming frustrated
with the government's inability to reduce the rate.
But he said Kosovo's economy is showing signs
of progress, and welcomed the government's agreement to resolve
problems with the electricity supply.
Mr. Holkeri said firm commitment is needed from
all parties, including the UN Interim Administration Mission in
Kosovo (UNMIK), to ensure that the situation improves.
"The short-to-medium term outlook for Kosovo
is uncertain, but the strong desire of Kosovo's people to live
in a peaceful, stable, lawful society is crystal clear."
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UN agency launches internet
portal on Women in peace and war
30 October - An Internet portal offering comprehensive information
on the dangers and responsibilities facing women and girls during
armed conflicts and women's roles in peace building was unveiled
today by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM).
UNIFEM Executive Director Noeleen Heyzer said
the portal
would address the information gap, providing accurate reports
and helping to track progress towards implementing Security Council
resolution 1325. That text was unanimously adopted in October
2000 and urges an enhanced role for women in preventing conflict,
promoting peace and assisting in post-conflict reconstruction
within UN operations.
The resolution, she said, "is a watershed
political framework that makes women - and a gender perspective
- relevant to negotiating peace agreements, planning refugee camps,
programmes and peacekeeping operations and reconstructing war-torn
societies."
She said two experts she appointed, "the
world's first female Defence and Finance Ministers," Elisabeth
Rehn of Finland and Ellen Sirleaf-Johnson of Liberia, had found
an epidemic of violence against women and girls in the 14 conflict
zones they visited.
Their report recommended that UNIFEM systematically
collect, analyze and share information on the roles of women in
conflict, conflict prevention and peace building, Ms. Heyzer said.
Visit
the page on Kosovo >>>
UN Police charge five
Kosovo Albanian men with war crimes
28 Octobre - United Nations police arrested five Kosovo Albanian
men Monday on charges they had committed war crimes during the
1999 conflict in the region, the UN mission in the province said
today.
A spokesman for the UN Interim Administration
Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) told a press briefing in Pristina that
police arrested the men in the town of Kacanik early Monday. Their
names have not been released.
Spokesman Neeraj Singh said the five have been
charged with "war crimes-related charges, which relates to
actions against (the) civilian population during the armed conflict
of 1999, and details of that we cannot disclose until we have
further information from the investigation."
The spokesman said the operation to arrest and
charge the men was led by the Kosovo Department of Justice's Central
Criminal Investigation Unit, and was not related to investigations
being conducted by the UN International Criminal Tribunal for
the former Yugoslavia, which is based in The Hague, the Netherlands.
UN War Crimes Tribunal
sentences Bosnian Serb to eight years in jail
28 October - The United Nations war crimes tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia today sentenced a Bosnian Serb man to eight years in
jail for killing and torturing inmates at a detention camp.
Sitting in The Hague, the Netherlands, a three-judge
panel of the UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia (<"http://www.un.org/icty/latest/index.htm">ICTY)
today issued its judgement in the case against Predrag Banovic.
Mr. Banovic pleaded guilty in June to one charge
of crimes against humanity after he reached a plea agreement with
prosecutors, who dropped four other charges. The prosecutors and
defence recommended Mr. Banovic receive an eight-year jail term
during a pre-sentencing hearing last month.
The trial's presiding judge, Judge Patrick Robinson,
said in the judgement that Mr. Banovic was a security guard at
the Keraterm detention camp in Bosnia and Herzegovina's northwest
in 1992.
The judges said camp detainees had "suffered
brutal, inhumane and degrading conditions during their confinement,
in addition to humiliation, harassment, physical and psychological
abuse." Many detainees were killed and others were severely
beaten.
Judge Robinson stated: "The Trial Chamber
has found that the Accused abused his position while on duty at
the camp, mistreating and humiliating detainees in total disregard
of human life and dignity."
Mr. Banovic will be credited with the 716 days
he has already spent in custody in a detention unit in The Hague.
He will remain in the Tribunal's custody until arrangements for
his transfer to a jail in another state have been finalized.
In other news, the Tribunal's President, Judge
Theodor Meron, has granted Milan Simic's request for an early
release from his prison term, the UN court announced today.
Mr. Simic, who was president of the Bosanski
Samac Assembly from May 1992 to June 1993, will be released on
3 November. He had been sentenced to five years in jail in October
last year after pleading guilty to two counts of torture as crimes
against humanity.
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Pristina and Belgrade
should work together to help Kosovans, Annan says
24 October - United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today
called upon both sides in the newly established contacts between
Pristina and Belgrade to work together to improve the daily lives
of the residents of Kosovo.
In a report
to the Security Council on the activities of the UN Interim
Administration in Kosovo (UNMIK), released today, Mr. Annan says
he welcomes the dialogues which opened 14 October in Vienna, adding,
"I call on both sides to make their best efforts to ensure
that the talks…result in concrete actions leading to a measurable
improvement in the daily lives of the residents."
Mr. Annan also compliments the provisional government
of Kosovo for what he says was its efforts to address the needs
of the people of the province. But, he says, security problems
for the minority Serbs remains a matter of serious concern.
"I am encouraged by indications that the
Provisional Institutions increasingly focus on adopting policies
and legislation which address the concrete and immediate needs
of the population of Kosovo, and I welcome signs of a strengthened
cooperation and consultation with UNMIK," he writes.
But, he says, "More remains to be done
to ensure adequate levels of political participation by minorities
in municipal affairs."
He says the "continuing existence of parallel
administrative structures in Kosovo, which are supported by Belgrade,
is an impediment to the consolidation of fully representative
and multi-ethnic institutions and an obstacle to the full integration
of Kosovo Serbs into those institutions. These structures should
be dismantled and replaced by cooperation with the multi-ethnic
Provisional Institutions."
Mr. Annan also says "the security situation
in Kosovo, which has been marred in recent months by a number
of serious incidents involving minorities, remains a cause for
serious concern…violence targeting minorities is unacceptable
and must be condemned in the strongest terms. Kosovo's leaders
should follow their welcome condemnation of the attacks with concrete
steps aimed at ensuring that they do not recur."
He says, however, that "despite setbacks
resulting from recent violent incidents involving Kosovo Serb
victims, the overall rate of returns continued to accelerate."
President Ibrahim Rugova of the Kosovo Provisional
Institutions of Self-Government (PISG) began talks with Belgrade
officials 14 October in Vienna on the future of the province.
It was the first such face-to-face meeting since the 1998-1999
war.
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Four Serbian officers
indicted by UN War Crimes Tribunal
21 October - The United Nations war crimes tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia has indicted four senior Serbian army and police officers
for their alleged role in the forced expulsion of hundreds of
thousands of Kosovo Albanians during the conflict in Kosovo in
1998-1999.
The International Criminal Tribunal for the
former Yugoslavia (ICTY)
this week lifted a confidentiality order on the indictments against
Nebojsa Pavkovic, Vladimir Lazarevic, Vlastimir Djordjevic and
Sreten Lukic, which had been confirmed on 2 October. The quartet
face charges of crimes against humanity and violations of the
laws or customs of war, but have not yet been arrested.
Mr. Pavkovic is a retired Colonel General and
former Chief of Staff of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia's
army, Mr. Lazarevic was a senior army commander in the Yugoslavian
and then Serbia and Montenegro armies until his dismissal this
year, Mr. Djordjevic is a former chief of Serbia's public security
department while Mr. Lukic is the current chief of the public
security department.
In the indictment, the Tribunal's Prosecutor,
Carla Del Ponte, accuses the men of directing or encouraging "a
systematic campaign of terror and violence directed at Kosovo
Albanian civilians living in Kosovo" with the aim of effectively
deporting them from the province.
The indictment states that the armed forces
and police of the former Yugoslavia and then Serbia shelled towns
and villages, burnt and destroyed personal and public property,
and committed acts of brutality against civilians to create a
climate of fear so that Kosovo Albanians would want to leave their
homes.
Security Council backs
direct talks in Vienna on Kosovo
16 October – The United Nations Security Council today welcomed
the opening of talks between the Government of Serbia and Montenegro
and the Kosovo Provisional Institutions of Self-Government (PISG)
and called upon both parties to work on technical level problems.
The talks were held Tuesday in Vienna.
A press
statement issued by the Council President said members "welcomed
the opening of a direct dialogue on practical issues of mutual
interest between authorities in Belgrade and Pristina."
They also called upon "all parties on both sides to participate
fully in the technical dialogue as it moves to expert-level working
groups," the statement said. "The working groups will
focus on practical issues of mutual interest such as energy, transportation,
missing persons, and refuges and internally displaced persons."
Besides representative from both sides, also attending the talks
were ranking diplomats from the so-called Contact Group - the
United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy and the
Russian Federation - as well diplomats from the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Union and the Organization
for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
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Kosovo provisional President
to represent Pristina in UN-backed Vienna talks
13 October – Since it has proved “impossible”
to include leaders of the Kosovo government in tomorrow’s
Belgrade-Pristina talks on the future of the province, the Pristina
delegation would be led by President Ibrahim Rugova of the Kosovo
Provisional Institutions of Self-Government (PISG), according
to the head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo.
Press reports from Kosovo had said PISG Prime Minister Prime Minister
Bajram Rexhepi had refused to attend the talks.
In a press statement issued yesterday in Kosovo, Harri Holkeri,
the Special Representative of Secretary-General Kofi Annan for
Kosovo and head of the UN Interim Administration Mission (UNMIK),
said, “The whole international community has worked tirelessly
to support President Ibrahim Rugova and other Kosovo leaders who
wish to give the people of Kosovo the chance to be represented
on a broad basis at the opening of direct talks between Pristina
and Belgrade in Vienna on Tuesday.
“Since it has proved impossible to include leaders of the
Government of Kosovo in the delegation, Kosovo will be represented
by President Rugova, who is the symbol of the unity of a multi-ethnic
Kosovo. Nexhat Daci, President of the Assembly, will also be in
the delegation,” he said.
Also scheduled to attend are ranking diplomats from the so-called
Contact Group – the United States, United Kingdom, Germany,
France, Italy and the Russian Federation – as well as NATO
Secretary-General Lord Robertson, European Union High Representative
for Common Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana and Chairman-in-Office
Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, of the Organization for Security and Cooperation
in Europe (OSCE).
Mr. Holkeri said, “Whatever the difficulties within the
Government, we hope that when the real technical talks in the
Working Groups begin, Kosovo’s Institutions will make a
full commitment to help resolve the issues to be discussed, which
are of direct practical interest to all the people of Kosovo.”
Kosovo: UN envoy applauds
Pristina's decision to attend Vienna talks
10 October – The head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo
today welcomed the decision by Kosovo President Ibrahim Rugova
to attend talks next week in Vienna with officials from Serbia
and Montenegro.
"I, along with the rest of the international community, applaud
President Rugova's decision, which is an act of a truly responsible
leader," said Harri Holkeri, the Special Representative of
Secretary-General Kofi Annan for Kosovo and head of the UN Interim
Administration Mission (UNMIK).
Mr. Holkeri yesterday reacted to reported reluctance of the provisional
institutions of self-government to go to the 14 October meeting
with Belgrade officials, by urging Kosovo to attend.
Also scheduled to attend are ranking diplomats from the so-called
Contact Group - the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France,
Italy and the Russian Federation - as well as NATO Secretary-General
Lord Robertson, European Union High Representative for Common
Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana and Chairman-in-Office
Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, of the Organization for Security and Cooperation
in Europe (OSCE).
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UN envoy says Vienna talks on Kosovo are
door to success
9 October - The head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo today
urged representatives of the Pristina provisional institutions
of self-government to attend planned talks with Belgrade officials
next week in Vienna.
Harri Holkeri, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's
Special Representative for Kosovo said, "I support the dialogue
as an important element in reaching the standards endorsed by
the international community and resolving practical issues important
to Kosovo."
Officials from Belgrade and Pristina were invited
to the talks on the area's future, along with representatives
of the so-called Contact Group - the United States, United Kingdom,
Germany, France, Italy and Russian Federation - and ministerial-level
delegates from NATO, the European Union and the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
Asked by a reporter in Pristina about reported
reluctance of Kosovo officials to attend, Mr. Holkeri said, "Time
is running and we have to make our preparations. But the door
is open."
Mr. Holkeri said a primary goal of the UN Interim
Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) is to work itself out
of a job, and "I try to convince everybody that I am here
to make myself unnecessary, UNMIK is here to retreat and we need
cooperation with the society, with the leaders to do so, but perhaps
we need further consultations, we need further mutual understanding
that we can do that together. I need help from the Kosovo Albanian
side to make myself unnecessary and Vienna talks is one, very
important door or gate on that road."
UN envoy welcomes upcoming
Pristina-Belgrade talks in Vienna
8 October - The head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo has
labelled the next week’s talks between leaders of Belgrade
and Pristina governments as the only way to solve outstanding
problems.
Harri Holkeri, the Special Representative of
Secretary-General Kofi Annan for Kosovo and head of the UN Interim
Administration Mission (UNMIK), said in a televised speech, “Dialogue
is a way to generate both political and economic capital. It is
a critical step, an absolutely imperative step, towards the kind
of future that Kosovo deserves.”
The text of the speech was released by UNMIK
in Pristina today. The Belgrade-Pristina talks are scheduled for
14 October in Vienna.
Mr. Holkeri said, “If, and only if we
talk, can we make progress on resolving the fate of missing persons.
If, and only if we talk, can we help Kosovo’s economy by
solving outstanding problems in the sectors of energy, transport
and communications. If, and only if we talk, can we facilitate
the return of displaced persons and work towards the multiethnic
society to which we have all committed ourselves.”
Also scheduled to participate in the discussions
are representatives of the so-called Contact Group – the
United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy and Russian
Federation – as well as ministerial-level participants from
NATO, the European Union and the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
“The issues to be discussed are the issues
that matter to the daily lives of Kosovans,” Mr. Holkeri
said. “As Kosovo moves towards its European future, its
leaders must be ready to talk with their neighbours – all
their neighbours. This is what leaders do.”
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UN Mission Chief invites
leaders from Pristina, Belgrade for direct talks
7 October - The head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo today
sent out formal invitations to the leaders of Kosovo and Serbia
and Montenegro to participate in direct talks next week in Vienna.
Harri Holkeri, the Special Representative of
Secretary-General Kofi Annan for Kosovo and head of the UN Interim
Administration Mission (UNMIK) said that he had also invited ranking
diplomats from the so-called Contact Group – the United
States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy and the Russian
Federation – to participate as facilitators in the dialogue.
NATO Secretary-General Lord Robertson,
European Union High Representative for Common Foreign and Security
Policy Javier Solana and Chairman-in-Office Jaap de Hoop Scheffer,
of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE),
have confirmed that they would be present in the meeting as guarantors,
UNMIK said in a statement released in Pristina today.
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