UNMIK-KFOR-OSCE Press Briefing: 18 October 2000

UNMIK Spokeswoman Susan Manuel
KFOR Spokesman Major Steve Shappell
OSCE Spokeswoman Roland Bless

UNMIK Spokeswoman Susan Manuel
   
This press briefing will be followed by the OSCE's special briefing on its six-month monitoring report on the criminal justice system in Kosovo so they will come to the podium at noon.

Father Sava is not here today.

Dead reporter

We would like to note with sadness the death of Italian reporter Antonio Russo, a war correspondent for Italian Radio Radicale. Mr. Russo was murdered in Georgia on Monday, after a long tour of reporting on Chechnya. He was well-known to many of you and to the rest of the world as one of the  few international journalists who remained in Kosovo during the air strikes and very well-regarded as a professional and humanitarian. We deeply regret the news of his death.

SRSG

SRSG Bernard Kouchner was in Zagreb yesterday where he proposed that the UN and Yugoslav leadership begin talks on the issue of Kosovo at a Balkans summit to be held in Zagreb on 24 November. Dr. Kouchner suggested that he would represent Kosovo, possibly along with a delegation of Kosovo political leaders. Dr. Kouchner made public his proposal following a meeting with Croatian president Stipe Mesic.

KTC

The Kosovo Transitional Council has been meeting this morning. In addition to a briefing on elections preparations, they are discussing the Housing and Property Claims Commission, with a presentation by Commission chairman Alan Dodson. As you know, the commission is tasked with adjudicating disputes over private residential property. The regulation on the functioning of the Commission has been endorsed by the Interim Administrative Council and will be signed soon.

IAC

The IAC yesterday endorsed a draft regulation establishing the administrative Department of Civil Security and Emergency Planning. That department had already been functioning under co heads Roland Nilsson and Bislim Zyrapi, although its exact role and functions had yet to be codified by a regulation.

Another draft regulation which they endorsed would amend the applicable law in Kosovo to include a 40-year sentence as a possible punishment available to judges in sentencing the most serious of crimes. As there was no death sentence permitted in Kosovo when the applicable law regulation was signed last December, the longest sentence available to judges on the books in Kosovo was 15 years. So again this would add a 40-year sentence for the most serious crimes to the law in Kosovo. This of course would extend the maximum prison term which may be meted out in the case of the most serious crimes.

These regulations must be signed by Dr. Kouchner before they become official.

Police

UNMIK Police is continuing its investigation that led to the arrest of 27 people last Saturday. The joint UNMIK Police-KFOR operation was mounted to find four key figures connected to crime in the Pristina area, including possibly the murders of Rexhep Luci and Shefki Popova. Two of the targeted suspects were arrested Saturday.

In further developments yesterday, the international investigating judge Marti Harsia extended for one month the detention for investigation for seven of the suspects, who are being held on suspicion of conspiring to commit murder, possession of weapons and kidnapping.

16 people who were arrested in that sweep as connected with prostitution were released yesterday after questioning. Four associates of the primary suspect were released after being investigated. They will face various minor charges including organized criminal activity, weapons violations and illegal possession of documents.

Weapons and other evidence found during the sweep have been sent to Germany for forensic investigation. It will be at least 14 days before any results will be known.

Yesterday afternoon, five people were arrested when a group of PDK supporters attempted to disrupt an LDK rally near the Stimle Municipality building. UNMIK Police and KFOR used batons and pepper spray to contain the situation. The crowd dispersed rapidly, and there was no property damage and no injuries After more than 40 peaceful political rallies held so far in the current political campaign, this incident yesterday was very unusual and an aberration. It is regrettable but so far in general, this have been a very organized and peaceful electoral campaign of course and OSCE will be taking the appropriate measures regarding yesterday's incident.

Good news and bad news from Strpce where yesterday roadblocks were lifted and demonstrations ended by Serb residents protesting the theft of three cows. Unfortunately,
the cows have not been recovered.

In Mitrovica yesterday, UNMIK Police arrested several suspects believed to be part of an organized group of thieves. This was in southern Mitrovica. Police stopped some men who looked suspicious because of the black dust on their clothes and hands which indicated to police that the suspects had been messing about in the battery factory. In a police interview, the three admitted to stealing 25 kilograms of various materials from the battery factory, and said that they had stolen items from there previously. UNMIK police then arrested two people who had purchased the stolen goods and recovered four trucks loaded with stolen materials.

Media Opportunity

Finally the Department of Public Utilities is giving a press briefing tomorrow at 12 noon at the new economics Faculty to explain the situation which we envisage for the winter with electricity, water and garbage collection.  Speakers will be the department co-heads, Joan Pearce and Gjergj Rrapi. Also Skender Agolli, an expert on water and Jo Truschler, co-ordinator from the PUD, who will discuss waste treatment. Following the briefing, media will be taken by bus to the Pristina District Heating Plant to see preparations underway for winter. They will be returned to the UNMIK government building by 2:30 p.m. Please coordinate with Sylvana to get on the bus if you are interested.

KFOR Spokesman Major Steven R. Shappell
 
Weapon Seizures

As KFOR continues to fulfil its mandate, it remains committed to ridding Kosovo of the weapons of war. Yesterday throughout the day, as we do every day, KFOR units conducted search operations for the purpose of rooting out illegal weapons wherever they may be.  These operations included deliberate cordon and search operations based on credible information, and random searches intended to discover weapons of war wherever they may be.  I will briefly discuss just two of those searches.

Late last night in Multinational Brigade West, a KFOR patrol stopped and searched a Volkswagen Golf at a checkpoint east of Decane / Decani.  The car did not have any license plates.  Inside the car, the soldiers discovered 70 rounds of small arms ammunition.  UNMIK Police then searched the house of the vehicle driver, but found no weapons or additional ammunition.

Early this morning in Multinational Brigade Centre, KFOR soldiers stopped and searched a vehicle in the village of Shkabaj / Orlovic.  During the search, the soldiers found an AK-47 assault rifle and a full ammunition
magazine.  The items were confiscated, and the two occupants of the car turned over to UNMIK Police.

Armoured Vehicle Rolls

Yesterday morning in Multinational Brigade North, a KFOR armoured personnel carrier broke a track while driving on the main road near the battery factory in Mitrovice / Mitrovica.  As a result of the broken track, the vehicle rolled into a ditch on the side of the road.  No civilian vehicles were involved in the accident.  Four of the eight soldiers riding in the armoured vehicle were injured. Three of the four injured soldiers were treated for minor injuries at the scene.  The fourth injured soldier, who suffered a whiplash injury, was transported to the French Military Hospital for treatment.

And finally, it gives me great pleasure today to introduce KFOR's new Chief of Public Information and my new boss, Lt. Colonel Massimo Fogari. Colonel Fogari is from the Italian army where he serves at the headquarters as the Chief of Public Information.

Sir Welcome.

OSCE Spokeswoman Roland Bless

Elections

The Elections Complaints and Appeals Sub-Commission met yesterday. They technically dealt with 12 cases. Seven political parties around Kosovo were fined ranging from 250 to 2000 Deutsche Marks. Five cases were dismissed.  The decisions have been served to the parties right now. You can expect a press release in the usual format including these decisions either later this afternoon or early tomorrow morning depending on when the parties receive the notices. Tomorrow the Central Election Commission (CEC) is going to meet accreditation of domestic observers. Last amendments are expected to be made to some of the electoral rules. The CEC will also be determining their meeting schedule on election day and deal with all details necessary in view of elections. A quick check programme. My third item right now is that statistical figures stand at 32,000 people who  have shown up at any of the quick test centers throughout Kosovo. The "no show" missing on the list stands at 2.75%. It is always between 2-3 percent so far and the mis-spelt names hovers around 6.2 -6.3 percent. That is a sample of 32,000.

Elections Press and Media Center

 For tomorrow evening I would like to invite you all to the opening of the elections press and media center which is in the basement of the elections building behind the OSCE headquarters. The press center will be mostly used for briefings in the run up to the elections and on election day. Some briefings will continue to be held in this auditorium especially when Dr. Kouchner is involved. The press center contains handouts, it has maps and charts on the walls to give you a quick reference for all the statistical and numerical data that you would like to have on elections day. It has about 16 workstations including Internet-based-packages for your information and for use by all the colleagues we expect to come during the next week.

OSCE press briefing at noon today

As Susan already said we are going to have another press briefing just after this one where we will present the six-month legal monitoring report to you.

Thank you.

Questions

Q: Susan you read part of Bernard Kouchner's speech in Zagreb. There is a part where he urged a dialogue between  FRY and Kosovo Albanians. Does this mean that you are speeding up now the process of negotiations between Albanians and  the FRY before the general elections in Kosovo?

SM: Well, there is no date set for general elections but they will  certainly not be held next month. I think he saw this Balkans Summit which will be held next month as an opportunity to get together. So if you say speeding up, I am not sure of what you mean but obviously the changes in Belgrade have opened up opportunities for talking so that was his proposal yesterday. He also proposed to bring along some political leaders from here but this is simply in the idea and proposal stage.

Q: My follow-up question to that is Mr. Kouchner base his decision on who he takes along  on the results of the municipal elections, that is, those who got the most votes on average?

SM: As far as I know, the idea has not been refined as to who will join the delegation.

Q: Is it up to Mr. Kouchner to decide who he takes along?

SM: Yes.

Q: The Foreign Minister of Albania, Pascal Milo has already arrived and as far as we know he is not going to meet Mr. Kouchner. Why is Mr. Kouchner not meeting the Foreign Minister of Albania?

SM: He made a decision apparently sometime ago that in this pre-election period, he would not meet any leaders from neighbouring countries inside Kosovo. As you know he has met President Mesic in Croatia and the leadership of Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in Skopje last week, so he is sticking to this policy that until elections: he will meet them outside but not inside Kosovo.

Q: At the press conference afterwards, is anybody from UNMIK going to be present to respond to the details included in the OSCE report? Are we going to have a simultaneous chance to pose questions to Sylvie Pantz?

SM: The problem is that they have not yet digested the report. There will be people from Judicial Affairs but they plan to hold a follow-on press briefing either on Friday or Monday.

Q: They have had this report for about three weeks. That seems a rather long time to digest it.

SM: The report has gone through several drafts and the latest draft was last night.

Q: They have only just removed one paragraph as far as I know.

SM: Well I don. t know the details of what has been removed but I know there have been many revisions.

Q: What is the average penalty or fine or imprisonment for somebody who is caught with a weapon because it seems you arrest on average two to three people a day for illegal possession of fire arms or ammunition. If we take this as an average, you might have arrested like four, five six hundred people in the course of this year alone. Are they all still in jail? What happens if I get caught with a weapon?

SM: The jails have limited capacity. I believe there are very few people in jail on weapons violations. That is why these gentlemen were released yesterday pending charges. Police, do you have any idea of sentences or punishment for weapons?

Police:We will have to inquire.

SM: OK we will inquire.

Q: It might be easier for all of us concerned if we could have somebody or spokesman from the UNMIK Police on the podium. Do you think it might be possible to have them on the podium perhaps three times a week as well.?

SM: Yes, we have discussed that. We could discuss it again. I think there is a lot of merit to that idea.

Q: What is going to be the UNMIK position now on elections decided for Serbia on 23 December concerning Kosovo? No only in terms of security. Mr. Kouchner's decision is not to meet leaders from neighbouring countries in Kosovo. What if Serbian leaders decide to come here to start their electoral campaign?

SM: Foreign Minister Milo is here. We didn. t prevent him from coming here, nor did we prevent Serbian politicians from coming here with a few exceptions whom we thought could pose a security threat. I don. t see how that relates at all to Kouchner's policy on his not meeting with political leaders of neighbouring countries in the run-up to our elections of 28 October. If you ask me whether we are going to repeat the monitoring, that decision has not been taken yet. It's pretty a long way off. Do you know when we took the decision to monitor the FRY elections 24 December? The decision was taken only days before we actually did it.

Q: Susan, are you going to recognise the results of  Yugoslav elections because in the last elections set on 24 September, Bernard Kouchner said they were not fair and democratic elections. Are you going to recognise this time the democratic way of organising these elections in Yugoslavia?

SM: Dr. Kouchner was commenting strictly on the elections as they were taking place in Kosovo. He was not commenting on the entire Yugoslav elections.

Q: But will he declare the next elections free and fair.

SM: How can I say two months in advance how those elections will be run? We don. t know if they will be run in a democratic organised way. It's two months down the road.

Q: On the arrests that were made in Pristina a few days ago, who are the primary suspects?

SM: We are not going to give any names until there have been some charges.

Q: So the primary suspects and their four accomplices are all in jail now?

SM: No. There are seven people in jail suspected of various crimes. The goal of the operation was to get four serious suspects in very serious crimes. Two of those are currently in detention. Two of the four who were the main object of the sweep that took place on Saturday.

Q: And the others? (inaudible)

SM: Two are at large.

Q: Has there been any request from Belgrade to help organize the Serbian elections on 23 December and if there were such a request do you have any idea how you would respond to it?

SM: Again there is still no discussion with Belgrade on anything other than informal conversations. No there has been no proposals about the elections yet.

Q: How would you respond if there were such a request. For example one of the objections to the presidential elections being carried out in Kosovo was that the Kosovo's electoral list was not up to date neither was the Federal electoral list. Would you be willing to give them a hand in updating the Serbian electoral list?

SM: I can't say at this point. Sorry.

Q: I find it ridiculous that the UN cannot be at the next press conference. That a spokesperson or somebody from the Department of Justice cannot be there. They have had this report for an extremely long time. As I understand the adjustments of this report have only been small in the last few days. They are extremely well aware of its contents and it is ridiculous that they cannot be here to respond to those criticisms made in this report and delaying it for three days is just the way to avoid the news and just hope that the media is not going to cover it.

SM: Ok, your comments are on record now and since it is not a question I cannot answer it.

Q: I am asking you that there should be somebody here and I am lodging a complaint if they are not.

SM: OK, thanks.

Q: Who from the Department of Justice would actually be the person who could respond to this or would be responding to this if there was a response? Somebody must be responsible?

SM: Yes they will have a response, they are responsible and Ms. Sylvie Pantz will be here at the briefing.

Q: She is the one who will be responding?

SM: She feels she has not really digested the report to the point to be able to speak detail by detail on it.

Q:& When she heard that the report was coming out, she didn't digest it:  she threw up. If she is in the audience can we ask her questions?

SM: You are journalists, you have to do your job.

Q: Since you are still here can we ask you to respond to it?

SM: I have not digested the latest version of the report but I would say in general we very much appreciate this report. We asked for it, we take it all very seriously. There are parts that the Department of Justice does not agree with. The OSCE is here to monitor,  developing  and training the judiciary and the whole human rights sector in Kosovo so we take this report seriously, and we are working on improving the system. There are parts, as I said, we don. t agree with and for those kind of details you really have to get from Judicial Affairs or once we have digested it.

Q: I read in a media report that two prosecutors, these are Kosovo Albanians, resigned allegedly because they received threatening phone calls from cases they were working on, specifically cases that involve & .. crime. Can you confirm that these people have resigned?

SM: Can you tell if this happened last week and where?

Q: It is in a local newspaper called Kosova Live. It was reported yesterday in the agency, both of them apparently prosecutors from Prizren and they were apparently dealing with people who formerly were members of the KLA and involved in some very serious crimes.

SM: OK, I will find out and give you a call later.