Premier Zivkovic, Coordination Center chief Covic with Bishop Artemije, Milan Ivanovic and Rada Trajkovic in Belgrade  MORE

ZIVKOVIC AND COVIC MET REPRESENTATIVES OF THE SNC IN BELGRADE
The collocutors assessed as unacceptable the process of transfer of competences onto provisional institutions of self-administration in the Province

COVIC: NO ONE HAS RIGHT OF MAKING CALCULATIONS WITH KOSOVO
No Serbian politician has the right of making calculations, and if the international community thinks that Kosovo is lost for Serbia, it has to say so to the people of Serbia, and let us see what happens then, Covic said


STEINER: BOMBING OF THE RAILWAY BRIDGE IS AN ACT OF TERRORISM
Strongly condemning the incident, Steiner said "such terrorist acts are directed against the entire population of Kosova. I expect every political leader in KosovO to join me in the condemnation of this act."

MOMCILO TRAJKOVIC FOR PARALLEL TALKS ON STATUS AND STANDARD
Albanians are deliberately complicating the situation over the security and the freedom of movement, so that they force the Serbs into leaving Kosovo, so that they can enter the dialogue over the status without them, says Trajkovic.

KOSOVO VILLAGE'S LESSON FOR IRAQ
The bar's owner, a demonstrative Serb, complained to us that he was under constant menace from his Albanian neighbors. Sandbags stacked against his window may be meant to reinforce his accusation. He owned an acre or so of land just outside Mogila where, he said, the Albanians had put land mines to keep him from planting - a charge the Americans dismiss. But Serbian concerns are not ignored. Road checks shut down the village when necessary, and speed bumps have been placed on the road to deter drive-by shootings.

COVIC: ENDANGERED CULTURAL HERITAGE IN KOSOVO AND METOHIJA
"A continuing process of cultural heritage destruction is taking place in Kosovo-Metohija and the future is uncertain," said Covic, adding that the Centre will put every effort into protecting the cultural heritage of Kosovo-Metohija.

PRESS STATEMENT BY SECURITY COUNCIL PRESIDENT ON KOSOVO


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ZIVKOVIC AND COVIC MET REPRESENTATIVES OF SNC KIM AND SNC NORTH KOSOVO IN BELGRADE

The collocutors assessed as unacceptable the process of transfer of competences onto provisional institutions of self-administration in the Province

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BETA
Belgrade - April 16, 2003

A joint appearance of the Serbian national community in Kosovo and Metohija, through the implementation of the state strategy initiated by Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic is a necessity.

This was emphasized at the meeting of the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister of the Serbian Government Zoran Zivkovic and Nebojsa Covic, with the representatives of the Serbian National Council of central and northern Kosovo and Metohija, in Belgrade.

The collocutors assessed as unacceptable the process of transfer of competences onto provisional institutions of self-administration in the Province, in the way the UNMIK Head Michael Steiner had proposed it, emphasizes the communiqué of the Government’s Press Office.

It has been agreed to continue and intensify the process of cooperation and consultations between the Serbian community from the Province and the state institutions in Belgrade, too.

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COVIC - NO ONE HAS RIGHT OF MAKING CALCULATIONS WITH KOSOVO

No Serbian politician has the right of making calculations, and if the international community thinks that Kosovo is lost for Serbia, it has to say so to the people of Serbia, and let us see what happens then, Covic said

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TANJUG
Belgrade, April 16, 2003

Serbian Deputy Premier and head of the Kosovo-Metohija coordination centre, Nebojsa Covic, has said that no one in Belgrade has the right of giving up Kosovo-Metohija, as well as that the position of the democratic opposition in Serbia very much depends on what is going on in the province.

"No Serbian politician has the right of making calculations, and if the international community thinks that Kosovo is lost for Serbia, it has to say so to the people of Serbia, and let us see what happens then," Covic told a National Radio Television program late on Tuesday.
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STEINER: BOMBING OF THE RAILWAY BRIDGE IS AN ACT OF TERRORISM

Strongly condemning the incident, Steiner said "such terrorist acts are directed against the entire population of Kosova. I expect every political leader in KosovO to join me in the condemnation of this act."

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Radio 21, Pristina
April 16, 2003

PRISTINA, April 16 - Kosova UN administrator Michael Steiner today said that the bombing of the railway bridge in Zvecan municipality on 12 April was "an act of terrorism and not an ordinary crime".

"This is what the whole world is trying to combat," he said to journalists at the site of the railway bridge near Banjska in Zvecan municipality that he visited today. The bridge was severely damaged in the explosion on the night of 12 April. Two men suspected to be behind this incident also died in the explosion.

Strongly condemning the incident, Steiner said "such terrorist acts are directed against the entire population of Kosovo. I expect every political leader in Kosovo to join me in the condemnation of this act."

He announced that UNMIK police and KFOR would increase their presence in the area and on the bridges connecting Kosovo and Serbia. He said UNMIK police had established a special task force to investigate this crime.

The Police Commissioner Stefan Feller, who accompanied the SRSG on his trip, said investigations were ongoing and three persons had been detained in connection with these investigations.

Mr. Feller also condemned the act and said that the "international police and the KPS will work together to find the perpetrators."

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TRAJKOVIC FOR PARALLEL TALKS ON STATUS AND STANDARD
Albanians are deliberately complicating the situation over the security and the freedom of movement, so that they force the Serbs into leaving Kosovo, so that they can enter the dialogue over the status without them, says Trajkovic.

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FREE SERBIA
Jagodina, April 16, 2003

Momcilo Trajkovic, the president of the Serb parliament committee for Kosovo and Metohija, stated that the talks on the Kosovo status and the achieving of the democratic standards in the province are topic’s that should be discussed in parallel, because postponement could damage the interests of the Serb community.

"The question of the status can not be solved quickly, but waiting for fulfillment of standards so we can discus the status can be dangerous for the Serb community," stated Trajkovic for Jagodina TV station "Palma Plus."

Trajkovic evaluated that the "Albanians are deliberately complicating the situation over the security and the freedom of movement, so that they force the Serbs into leaving Kosovo, so that they can enter the dialogue over the status without them." "In such a confusion, the Serb community would be left without perspective. I am afraid that when the so called time for discussions on the Kosovo status arrives, the answer will already be obvious, because there will be no more Serbs in the region," stated Trajkovic.

Trajkovic is to the stances that "if we were to have the answer to the question regarding the status, then the problems of the security issues, the return, and the economic development can be solved much faster." Unfortunately the international community is the one that is pacing the dialogue on the status of this region. Our main assignment is to bring out the facts for sooner start of these talks," concluded Trajkovic.

"Applying the Dayton principal for solving the Kosovo problem would mean that there is no possibility for changing of the state borders. This would make us very happy, because this would mean that Kosovo can not be independent," finished Trajkovic.

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KOSOVO VILLAGE'S LESSON FOR IRAQ

The bar's owner, a demonstrative Serb, complained to us that he was under constant menace from his Albanian neighbors. Sandbags stacked against his window may be meant to reinforce his accusation. He owned an acre or so of land just outside Mogila where, he said, the Albanians had put land mines to keep him from planting - a charge the Americans dismiss. But Serbian concerns are not ignored. Road checks shut down the village when necessary, and speed bumps have been placed on the road to deter drive-by shootings.

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THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR - OPINION
April 16, 2003 edition

By Richard C. Hottelet

MOGILA, KOSOVO - You walk down Main Street - the only through street - in this village in southeastern Kosovo and you get a worm's eye view of military occupation - what is right and what can be wrong. In short, you see how grandiose macropolitics rests on the microrealities of everyday life. It holds some lessons for Iraq.

Mogila is a latent source of friction in this part of the former Yugoslavia under occupation by Anglo-American forces. It has a small, mixed population of ethnic Serbs and Albanians who, after nearly four years of peace and benevolent foreign control, mistrust and hate each other.

NATO's Kosovo force, KFOR, occupies the province with a UN mandate to preserve security while promoting transition to civil authority. It is a military responsibility that American, German, and French commands share in multinational brigades under a UN political administration. The American command keeps an anxious eye on Mogila and two similar neighboring villages.

Earlier this year, an Albanian boy threw a stone at an automobile. The Serbian driver got out and slapped his face. There followed hue and cry. A hand grenade was thrown at a nondescript Serbian bar. Shots rang out. Those responsible, all Albanians, were identified, but when the witnesses were to testify to the police they couldn't remember a thing.

As we walked along the narrow, potholed street with crumbled asphalt edges, young US Army Capt. William Taylor, of Gambrills, Md., described his work, essentially as head of a city police precinct with his men mainly on foot patrol, getting to know the inhabitants and keeping in touch door to door.

A sergeant opened his reference book, an album of photographs and descriptions of those who count as community leaders or who figure in what the Army calls "spheres of influence": municipal administrators, shopkeepers, schoolteachers. He chats with them all about their views and problems - for early warning of possible trouble.

We passed the small white car of the newKosovo civil police service, on the Serb side of town. A good sign, said the captain, they're beginning to patrol, too. We entered a shabby little storefront Serbian bar, a dimly-lit room with a smoky wood stove and a stove pipe stretched overhead out the window. Inside were an old woman, a couple of Serbs, and several Gypsies, or Roma as they are more politely called. (The Roma are an additional Kosovo tragedy. Having thrown in their lot with the Serbs when the Serbs were on top, they are despised and abused by the Albanians.)

The bar's owner, a demonstrative Serb, complained to us that he was under constant menace from his Albanian neighbors. Sandbags stacked against his window may be meant to reinforce his accusation. He owned an acre or so of land just outside Mogila where, he said, the Albanians had put land mines to keep him from planting - a charge the Americans dismiss. But Serbian concerns are not ignored. Road checks shut down the village when necessary, and speed bumps have been placed on the road to deter drive-by shootings.

What violence there is afflicts the two communities; it has not been directed against KFOR, whose troops have been neither threatened nor attacked. Albanians are grateful to be free of Serbian oppression. Serbs are protected, their children escorted to school. They each want more, but privately appreciate the reality of disinterested peace, as smiles and waves to the soldiers show. The real test will come increasingly as the occupation winds down.

There is no doubt that Kosovo, sooner or later, will be an independent, ethnically Albanian state. Overall, Albanian houses are being repaired, largely with money from the Albanian diaspora, while Serbs are dwindling, clustering in progressively decrepit little enclaves, or selling their property and moving out.

Meanwhile, the guarantor of stability is the presence of KFOR.

The picture is paradoxical. The GI looks fearsome - inseparable from his (or her) weapon, in full uniform topped by a heavy Kevlar helmet with its mount for night-vision goggles. Those on fixed guard duty, as at Serbian Orthodox churches, wear 20 pounds of body armor. But the touch is light and the real job is painstakingly to stitch a torn society together, if possible.

Here, soldiers have been the primary interaction with a population split, vengeful, and largely demoralized by brutal conflict. In Iraq, too, the first and possibly decisive contact is with the troops. In both cases, the people are fortunate.

The US has no better ambassadors than the GIs when their instinctive amiable generosity is given free rein, unconstrained by the ideological agenda that figures so strongly in the Middle East.

Richard C. Hottelet was a longtime television correspondent for CBS. He was in Kosovo last week.

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ENDANGERED CULTURAL HERITAGE IN KOSOVO AND METOHIJA

"A continuing process of cultural heritage destruction is taking place in Kosovo-Metohija and the future is uncertain," said Covic, adding that the Centre will put every effort into protecting the cultural heritage of Kosovo-Metohija.

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SERBIAN GOVERNMENT
Belgrade, April 16, 2003

The Mnemosyne centre for protection of Kosovo-Metohija heritage presented the final report of a project entitled "Urgent Protection of Natural and Cultural Heritage in Metohija" at the Belgrade National Theatre on Tuesday. The project was carried out in cooperation with Italian INERSOS.

Branko Jokic, the director of the Pristina Museum whose exhibits were moved to the Belgrade Ethnographic Museum, said that the project aims to mobilise people into action and protection of the cultural heritage that belongs not only to Serbia, but also the Europe and the world.

"We expect the valid standards of protection to be applied in Kosovo-Metohija as well," said Jokic, noting that international institutions have failed to give their support and assistance in the past four years. The Coordinating Centre for Kosovo-Metohija and Italy's INERSOS backed the project, Jokic added.

Coordinating Centre head Nebojsa Covic said the Centre has taken a firm approach to this problem. "A continuing process of cultural heritage destruction is taking place in Kosovo-Metohija and the future is uncertain," said Covic, adding that the Centre will put every effort into protecting the cultural heritage of Kosovo-Metohija.

Alessandro Gonzales, the First Secretary of the Italian Embassy to Belgrade, addressed the gathering on behalf of the Italian government and the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, saying that the Italian government had set aside 2 million EUR to help Serbia revitalise and restore cultural and historic monuments in Kosovo-Metohija. Italy will continue to provide its support through INERSOS, said Gonzales.

Expert teams visited cultural and historic monuments in Metohija municipalities in western Kosovo, including Decani, Djakovica, Istok, Klina, Malisevo, Orahovac, Pec, Prizren, Srbica, Suva Reka, Strpce and Urosevac, and established that the Decani Monastery, Pecka Patrijasija churches, the Sveti Arhandjeli Monastery, Bogorodica Ljeviska Church and local monuments and churches in Velika Hoca need special treatment and protection.

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PRESS STATEMENT BY SECURITY COUNCIL PRESIDENT ON KOSOVO

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Press statement by Security Council President on Kosovo
Press Release SC/7729

Following is the press statement on Kosovo, delivered today by Council President Adolfo Aguilar Zinser (Mexico):

Members of the Security Council strongly supported the decisions by the Secretary General's Special Representative in Kosovo, Michael Steiner, to declare as having no legal effect the enactment of legislation on Higher Education by the Kosovo Assembly on 3 April 2003.

They expressed their concern about this action by the Assembly and called on the Provisional Institutions of Self-Government to focus their work on competencies under their purview, in a way fully consistent with 1244 and the Constitutional Framework.

Members of the Council strongly reaffirmed the need for strict observance of resolution 1244 and full respect for the authority of the Special Representative.

Members of the Security Council reiterated their support for the process of transfer of competencies as set out in Chapter 5 of the Constitutional Framework to the Provisional Institution of Self-Government (PISG), in full compliance with the provisions of resolution 1244.

Members of the Security Council called on the Kosovo PISG and all Kosovans to cooperate genuinely for this transfer to be successful.

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ERP KIM Info-Service is the official Information Service of the Serbian Orthodox Diocese of Raska and Prizren and works with the blessing of His Grace Bishop Artemije.
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