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UNMIK Press Briefing: 14 March 2001 UNMIK Spokeswoman, Susan Manuel UNMIK Spokeswoman, Susan Manuel Security Council SRSG Hans Haekkerup leaves today for New York and Washington. He will address the Security Council on Friday. He will have a press briefing after that and we will try to get you the press briefing notes by Saturday morning. Then he goes to Washington on the 19th. Gary Matthews, the Principal Deputy to the SRSG, has been addressing the Kosovo Transitional Council today and he repeated what Mr. Haekkerup said yesterday to the Interim Administrative Council that he believes that the meeting with the Security Council will be difficult as the image of Kosovo is now as a source of instability by the international community. So he will have to do some explaining of the situation. Mr. Matthews briefed the KTC on the release of 148 Kosovo Albanians from Serbian prisons as a result of the two amnesty laws passed recently. We are expecting more, including the 143 from the Djakova group. We are in active consultation with Belgrade on trying to ensure their release or return. Incidents in Mitrovica Tony Welch, the Regional Administrator of Mitrovica, has been briefing
the KTC on the discussions which have been ongoing with the Serb
representatives of the northern part of town and the Kosovo Albanians in
the southern part of town. Unfortunately, as you know, the situation has
been marked by violence which began very early this morning. So the situation is not yet resolved. It is a very unfortunate development and a sign of how fragile the tensions still are in Mitrovica. As we said earlier, the dialogue has begun this week with representatives of the Kosovo Serb community, starting in Merdare on Monday with Mr. Haekkerup meeting several of the representatives of Northern Mitrovica. The dialogue has been continuing with Mr. Tony Welch, meanwhile Mr. Gary Matthews went yesterday to Southern Mitrovica and met with the Kosovo Albanians representatives. This is all in an effort to improve the security to free up the movements to and in Northern Mitrovica, to find an alternative to the 'bridge watchers' situation. These dialogues and meetings will obviously go on, but today the nerves are rather raw. Currently, UNMIK officials, KFOR and KPC, the Regional Commander Veseliu, are meeting on how to keep the situation calm in the rest of Mitrovica. Clearly, we ask at all the communities to exercise restrain and not respond to the provocations going on right now. Railway station robbed Yesterday, a bomb destroyed a vacant Serbian house in Partes village in the Gjiliane area. This triggered protests from the Kosovo Serb community who assaulted an Albanian driver and burned four trucks. Three other vehicles were damaged. The UNMIK Regional Administrator, Mr. Pino Verdecchia, has been visiting the village and tried to calm the crowd. Yesterday, in Kosovo Polje, the railway station was robbed, and two
staff members tied up. What seems to have been salaries or redundancy
payments of at least 200,000 Deutsche Marks was
stolen. The United Nations Environment Program has come with its final report on depleted uranium and we have a press release on it outside. The scientists, who were here in November 2000, visited 11 sites out of the 112 identified by NATO as having been targeted by ordnance using depleted uranium. Several laboratories around Europe have examined the samples that were collected. The general conclusion of the report is that no widespread ground contamination has been found. Mr. Pekka Haavisto who headed the group is quoted as saying: "There are still considerable uncertainties, especially relating to groundwater". He recommends that additional work be done to reduce these uncertainties and to monitor the quality of the water. But he said: "At this moment, there are no signs of DU contamination in the groundwater or drinking water. "However, we know something from science about the migration of uranium in the soil. It might take several years when it goes into the soil and probably then into the ground water." The report says that there are many penetrators still lying on the ground. One should not collect those and keep them in their pockets for very long as there will be some Beta radiation of the skin over a prolonged exposure. They recommend that UNMIK or KFOR officials visit all the DU sites, remove the slightly radioactive penetrators which there has been ongoing by KFOR, decontaminating areas where feasible and providing information to local populations on precautions to be taken. UNHCR Spokeswoman, Astrid van Genderen Stort FYROM-Kosovo border As of 14th of March the number of registered arrivals from FYROM in Kosovo stands at 1150. Most of the refugees are in Viti/Vitina municipality and a smaller number has found shelter in Ferisaj/Urosevac and Kacanik. The latest number of arrivals came from Brest village. As of 13th March, MTS Vitina had registered 22 families/ 134 persons from Brest only. These refugees mostly arrived on 10th of March, whereas some claim to have arrived on 9th March and the 11th of March. The refugees reported that they fled following the fighting in the Brest area around 8th and 9th March. Many of the refugees were stuck as the road to Skopje/Kumanovo was blocked. With no alternative available the inhabitants from Brest were forced to flee to Kosovo instead. Inside FYROM update The situation in the Northern border region between FYROM and Kosovo
remained relatively calm for the fourth consecutive day. On 13th of
March, the number of internally displaced persons who have relocated from
villages in the border region of Crna Gora Mountain stands at 649. No new
arrivals were recorded yesterday, but previous arrivals during the 9th,
10th and the 11th March have been verified. There are reports of
people accommodated in villages where assessment is not concluded, and
joint efforts to consolidate the number of arrivals are continuing at the
moment. UNHCR is closely monitoring the situation at the FYROM-Kosovo border and the Kosovo-southern Serbia boundary line. Contingency plans are in place and are constantly being adjusted to the ongoing developments in the area. So far no displacement from southern Serbia has been reported and UNHCR can only hope that the developments in the area will not lead to further displacement. The signing of a peace agreement in the area is seen as a positive sign by UNHCR and we hope that adherence to this agreement will allow civilians to remain in the area and allow others to return to their homes. Questions Q: Inaudible question regarding the buffer zone. AV: We really don't know what to expect, but we have planning for quite a large influx. Q: inaudible AV: It could be up to ten to twenty thousand people. If you just look a
t the village of Veliki Trnovac which is in the Ground Safety Zone and
which could be affected by the situation. That village is 13,000
inhabitants. So it could happen. Every time when there is an influx it
could rise to that. However, the sizes that we had so far are relatively
calm. There is no displacement seen. So we don't
know. |