Friday 19th September 2008 MEDIA HEADLINES IN ENGLISH

You’re listening to NEWS REPORT, a summary of today’s media, prepared by UNMIK ON AIR

OSCE appoints new mission chief,
Best solution – Mladic surrender, and
Haiti and UN overwhelmed by disaster

KOSOVO
Ambassador Werner Almhofer from Austria has been appointed the new Head of the OSCE Mission in Kosovo. He replaces Ambassador Tim Guldimann who leaves Kosovo by the end of this month. Ambassador Almhofer served as an attaché to the Austrian embassy in Belgrade and currently is the ambassador to Bosnia Herzegovina.

Serbia’s request to review Kosovo’s independence by the International Court of Justice is regretful, Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said yesterday in Pristina. He pointed out that Denmark will not change its decision regarding Kosovo and called on other countries to recognize Kosovo too.

Commenting on the same issue, Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim Thaci said Serbia’s request should not frighten Kosovo, adding that the initiative did not contribute to the improvement of relations between Belgrade and Pristina. He said that Kosovo’s future passes through both Brussels and Washington, and not through Belgrade.

Head of EULEX Yves de Kermabon is prepared to give further explanations to political leaders in Belgrade on EULEX’s role and mandate in Kosovo. He said that explanations were necessary so that the authorities in Belgrade would accept his Mission’s full deployment.

Foreign Affairs Minister Skender Hyseni was criticized for inability, mismanagement and professional incapability to lobby for Kosovo’s independence in yesterday’s Assembly session. Opposition deputies also asked for Hyseni’s resignation, for which he replied that he is doing the job in the best way possible.

Montenegrin Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic said his country will announce its position on Kosovo’s independence at the UN General Assembly. Before the session, the authorities in Podgorica will have consultations “with the most important political figures in Montenegro.”

The Kosovo government has formed a team as it aims for membership in the International Monetary Fund (IMF), naming Driton Qehaja as the head of the team. Qehaja will be working with several experts in the application process, expected to last six months. Kosovo formally applied for membership in the IMF and the World Bank in July.

A new program is underway to prepare future Kosovo judges and prosecutors. The Kosovo Judicial Institute (KJI) and UNDP launched a legal education program for new judges and prosecutors in order to meet the needs of the Kosovo justice system. Initially, 31 candidates will be trained.

REGIONAL
Serbia’s Prime Minister says that the best thing for Serbia would be to have war crime suspects Ratko Mladic and Goran Hadzic surrendered voluntarily. "As a small country we have no other way to defend ourselves than by respecting international law,” Mirko Cvetkovic said, adding that “Cooperation with the Hague is directly linked to the defense of Kosovo.”

Experts from the US top investigation body, FBI, are set to conduct an independent probe into the mysterious death of an Albanian businessman linked to an arms trafficking row. The expertise in a corruption scandal comes after the request of General Prosecutor Ina Rama.

Europe's security body says talks have broken down with Russia on sending more international monitors to Georgia. The OSCE said the main sticking point was the area in which its 80 monitors could operate. Russia objects to the OSCE monitors' presence in South Ossetia - which Moscow has recognised as independent.

INTERNATIONAL
Haiti's government and the U.N. mission are overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster left by four recent storms, the U.N.'s special envoy to Haiti said. Hedi Annabi called on the international donor community to take extraordinary measures to help Haiti, which was hammered in the space of a month by four damaging storms.

Plants facing stressful conditions like drought produce their own aspirin-like chemical, US researchers say. The chemicals are produced as a gas to boost the plant's biochemical defences, suggesting that monitoring this could give farmers early warning of possible crop failures.

WEATHER
Today is expected to be partly sunny with a high of 13 degrees and a low tonight of 4 degrees; light rain will fall throughout the weekend with temperatures ranging from a high of 9 to a low of 6 degrees Celsius.

And that’s all for today, thank you for listening.