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UNMIK-OSCE-EU-UNHCR Press Briefing, 6 September 2001 PDSRSG Gary Mathhews Today's briefing was preceded by the announcement by PDSRSG Gary Matthews and DSRSG Daan Everts that the extension of civil registration-voter services, has been extended by two weeks, until 22 September. The following are Mr. Matthews' remarks. Mr. Everts are not currently available. Matthews This operation which began on the 30 of July was intended as an opportunity for those who could not register last year, to be counted as residents of Kosovo. It targets primarily the Kosovo Serbs, as well as others who for other reasons were not to able register previously. AT the same thousands of Kosovo Turks who did not previously register, as well as Kosovo residents who either turned 16 or who returned from other countries have registered during this period. The number of confirmed Kosovo registrants is now more than 1,050,000. While normal civil registration has been ongoing since December and will continue, this particular UNMIK operation was designed to target the non-Albanian populations who have been isolated or who for a variety of reasons could not reach the municipal civil registration centers. This operation has involved very close cooperation between UNMIK's Civil Administration and the OSCE. We deployed 34 mobile teams, working at over 120 sites. Mr. Everts went on to say that as of this week, some 3,000 Kosovo Serbs are registering each day in Kosovo, so that there are some 23,000 new registrants amongst the Kosovo Serbs, with about 60,000 in Serbia and Montenegro. Mr. Everts credited not only UNMIK and the OSCE, but also the support from Belgrade authorities and local leaders, and from Patriarch Pavle. ************************************* Susan Manuel, UNMIK Spokeswoman Yesterday at the Kosovo Transitional Council, Dept of Education and Science co-heads Daxner and Rustemi introduced the draft regulation on education which we hope to be promulgated before the election. This spells out the plans for reform and the future of the entire Kosovo education system, including primary and secondary schools and higher education. The point is a complete overhaul to bring education in Kosovo in line with European standards and most crucially to ensure democratization of the system. AT 4 a.m. this morning UNMIK special police units from Pakistan seized 11 garbage trucks at the Pristina landfill site, in order to resume garbage services to Pristina which has suffered a garbage strike for the past week. Six other trucks will be moved when keys are located. The trucks had been misappropriated by certain workers who were protesting in favor of the proposed municipal candidate as director of Hygenika Teknica and over the dismissal of four workers. The result of their strike has been an unacceptable mountains of dangerous garbage. Garbage collection should resume soon, with the garbage going temporarily to the Kosovo Polje landfill site as we still do not have access to the Pristina landfill. Mike Todd will explain the rest of this mess. SRSG Hans Haekkerup yesterday visited Istog/Istok and met with the President and members of the municipal assembly and listened to their concerns. He took their questions and explained UNMIK's program for returns as well as other issues. He then went to the site in the Osojanje valley where some 70 Kosovo Serbs have returned and are rebuilding their homes. There too he met with the local residents and took into account their concerns on needs for their existence… Tomorrow he meets again with Serbian deputy prime minister Covic in Pristina. On the agenda are plans for Mitrovica, education, detainees, missing persons, location of the Coordinating center office and participation of Kosvoo Serbs in judicial structures. On 4 September, Mr. Dragan Arsic, a Kosovo Serb farmer was found stabbed to death in his field in Vrbocvac near Vitina. He was 52. Police are investigating, have no known suspects at this point. In northern Mitrovica, in little Bosnia-unknown suspects threw hand grenades at two separate houses resided in by Kosovo Serbs…No injuries were reported… The local community office in Urosevac / Ferizaj would like to announce multiethnic carnival on 14 and 15 September. I will have the details for you on Monday. Also from the police, a strange incident occurred during the contest to judge Miss Mitrovica over the weekend. This I have to mention seems to have been Miss Southern Mitrovica ..as only one community was involved.. Unhappy with the elimination of their choices for the finalists during the Miss Mitrovica selection process, several young men in the audience became extremely violent, attacking other young men who happened to agree with the choice of the judges who included the Regional Administrator Angus Ramsay. The Polish special police unit -apparently in full riot gear--had to be called in and several of the admiring boys who could not control their passion were hauled away in handcuffs. During the fighting and the riots, one of the candidates for Miss Mitrovica kept on singing a song about the loveliness of Mitrovica, unperturbed by the action on the floor. I'm embarrassed to say I do not have the name of the victorious Miss Mitrovica. Laura O'Mahony As you heard, the deadline for Voter Registration is being extended by two weeks to accommodate the increase in demand. For now I'll just give you the latest Voter Registration figures -up to Tuesday September 4th. We'll have yesterday's figures within the next few hours. Within Kosovo: Total New Registrants - Kosovo
Albanian: 10,473 In the region of 80,000 people were added to the Civil Register since
last year's Voters' List was compiled. All of those people need to
find out where to vote. Clearly, from that first figure I gave you -
10,000- very few have gone along to a Voter Services Centre to get that
information. Now that the deadline has been extended, the OSCE strongly
urges them to do so. It only takes a few minutes but it will save them,
other voters and polling station staff a lot of trouble on election
day. This afternoon, the Head of the Commissariat for Refugees and IDPs in Serbia will be making a brief visit to Kosovo. Dr Sanda Raskovic-Ivic will be updated on the in-Kosovo voter registration process by Ambassador Everts. Certification Process The Central Election Commission meets later this evening. They'll be
reviewing some more applications for certification from political
entities. Tomorrow, political parties will be briefed on the ongoing
certification process at the regular meeting of the Political Party
Consultative Forum. The deadline for receipt of candidate lists from the
political entities is 5pm next Monday September 10th. All of the entities
- the 18 which have been certified so far as well as At its meeting today, the CEC will discuss the format of the ballot paper and look at the proposed rule governing the role and conduct of the Polling Station Committees. The Polling Station Committees have a key role to play on election day - their job is to help ensure that operations run smoothly in each voting centre. A special training programme will take place around Kosovo next week. Today and tomorrow - at the Grand Hotel - the teams, which will conduct
the training, are being briefed. Each team includes one international and
two local trainers, one of whom is also an MEC (Municipal Election
Commission) member. The training programme will stress the importance
of Meanwhile, training for the women candidates who'll be contesting the elections continues in Mitrovica this week. The three-day workshop gets underway tomorrow. It is the second in a series of five being held throughout Kosovo. The programme focuses on specific campaign techniques to help candidates reach out to voters - including, for example, public speaking skills. Questions: Following the Everts- Matthews announcement on registration Q: Why isn't anyone registering displaced Bosniaks - there are over 20,000 of them from Kosovo. DE: No that's incorrect. In Kosovo most of them registered, and the displaced ones in Bosnia have been approached to send in their registration forms and ballots by mail. They are covered by Vienna. So are those in Germany and Switzerland. And over 40,000 of them have replied to Vienna and applied for ballots. We have sent our subcontractor, who is organizing the mail in service, the IOM, to look into the Bosniaks to make sure they're not overlooked. Q: So how many have registered? DE: I don't know because this is not done by ethnicity, this is not a census, we don't ask religion or other questions. This is for habitual residents of Kosovo - people who have a home a stake here, people who want to be part of the process. We will never be able to tell you exactly. We have estimates from the Serbs because we know how many have registered as Internally Displaced Persons from Serbia. But for the rest we talk in estimates. Q: You said you don't know the number of ethnicities, but do you know the number of Turks? DE: No, but our representatives tell us that the turnout in the Prizren region has been very high so we feel that the Kosovar Turks will join in the voting. Q: When we talk about Serb registration we still have some leaders in Northern Kosovo who are boycotting the registration. Did you have success there? DE: North Mitrovica has been the most intransigent part of the Kosovo Serb community but even there we see the first breaches. Already in Leposavic people have very firmly committed to registering, 1500 have registered. But northern Mitrovica is difficult, partly because of the leaders there. Very remarkable because President Kostunica is their supreme guide and has appealed for them to register and they have stubbornly refused. But Oliver Ivanovic went out and demonstrably registered the other day. And he has always cautioned against it and now he's changed his heart and hopefully this will encourage others. South of the Ibar we have had another response. In Gracanica it has been an amazing success, hundreds a day registered and we keep centers open late in the evening. Q: I would like to know if there has been progress on the Serbs voting this year? DE: Of course we have been understanding of the position the Serb leaders took. They said registration was good, we can commit to it. It's good that we're counted and it's a political necessity. They've always said elections, we hold off until we can see enough progress on certain issues of vital interest to us. This was pressure on UNMIK to perform on missing, returns, general safety conditions. Now that the time has come, mid-October as Belgrade indicated, is there enough comfort on Serb leadership that UNMIK is serious about addressing their concerns. I think it's yes. It's very hard for any Serb leader, if hundreds of Serbs have registered, to do that second act that will bring them right into that assembly in considerable force. They will have 10 set aside seats and with 100,000 voters, if they are not too many parties, they can have another 8 or 9 seats. They'd be stupid if they don't seize that opportunity, which they will not have again. GM: It's in the Serb community's interest to vote and be part of the process and UNMIK has been open and forthcoming in that regard. And the talks between Haekkerup and Covic are part of the process. It would be a tragedy if the Serbs marginalize themselves and are not part of the provisional self government. They will have real, meaningful representation. And I add that we are up to 200 a day for civil registrations for Mitrovica. Q: If you don't register by ethnicity how do you know the number of Serbs and Albanians registered? DE: It's not exact. But if 1500 people register in Leposavic you know they're all Serbs. The Serb community is more delineated than all the other ones. It's not scientific but it's a good estimate. Questions following the regular UNMIK briefing: Q: The new legislation that is signed regarding the penal code: Does it wipe out UNMIK regulations? SM: The penal code is a criminal code several books long that replaces the Yugoslav and Kosovo criminal codes. I assume it excerpts from those codes, but it will be the criminal code for Kosovo and an UNMIK regulation. It has been worked on for more than a year by local and international legal experts. It has not been signed yet. It doesn't replace UNMIK regulations. It is an UNMIK regulation. Q: Was there a complaint filed to the Macedonian government for the Blace border closing? And how much is that costing to the UN? SM: I don't think there's been a formal complaint or demarche. These are protesters and not the government. Our main problem is fuel, but the damage isn't as bad as we thought. Traders are finding other routes. But it's obviously frustrating for all of us in Kosovo who can't move in or out. MT: The damage with revenue collection is not so bad because we collect at other points. But obviously the instability puts traders off. SM: I think while the talks go on in Macedonia it's considered a fragile time for demands.
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