Pristina, Serbia – For Kosovo’s ethnic Albanians, a new U.N. proposal opens the door to their long-awaited dream of independence, while prompting Serbia’s leaders to warn of secession.
The fault lines run far beyond the Balkans, as Russia and the U.S. appear headed for a confrontation over the plan in the U.N. Security Council.
Russia, a traditional Serb ally, warned Saturday of disagreements with the U.S., which has long backed ethnic Albanian demands for independence.
“So far we don’t have a common view how to resolve this problem,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said after arriving in Moscow from talks in Washington. “Kosovo is a topic on which, in contrast to Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan, the divergence in our positions has a character of principle.”
U.N. envoy Martti Ahtisaari presented his proposal Friday to officials in Belgrade and to ethnic Albanian leaders in Kosovo. The plan, which must be approved by the Security Council, spelled out conditions for internationally supervised self-rule for the province without explicitly mentioning independence.
Kosovo has been a U.N. protectorate since 1999, when NATO airstrikes stopped Serbia’s crackdown on ethnic Albanian rebels.
Nearly 10,000 people, most of them ethnic Albanians, were killed during the war, and nearly 1 million were forced to flee their homes. Some 200,000 Serbs fled the province after the war following revenge attacks by ethnic Albanians. Serbs consider Kosovo their nation’s ancient heartland.
Kosovo’s Prime Minister Agim Ceku said Saturday that Ahtisaari’s document described Kosovo as an independent state and that he strongly believed Ahtisaari would recommend independence in his final report to the U.N.
