Kosovo again on world's list of hot spots

Kosovo again on world's list of potential hot spots
Deutsche Presse-Agentur - January 3, 2005, Monday [01:43:35 Central European Time]

Belgrade - Internationally administrated Kosovo has again climbed onto the list of the world's potential hot spots - for the first time since the ouster of Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic's forces in 1999, the International Crisis Group said late Sunday. The Brussels-based security watchdog, considered highly influential in Balkan processes in the last decade, placed Kosovo on its so-called "crisis risk alerts" list of danger zones as a source of high-voltage instability in 2005.

ICG warned that a possible war-crimes indictment against the newly appointed Kosovo Prime Minister Ramsh Haradinaj would spark a "dangerous political crisis" ahead of the mid-year start of talks on the province's final status.

The Hague-based United Nations Prosecutor Carla del Ponte had said that more than a dozen fresh indictments - including at least one against ethnic Albanians - would be made public by December 31. But she failed to meet the self-imposed deadline.

Haradinaj is a former Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK) regional chief. In Kosovo, UCK veterans warned the U.N. Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) and NATO-led peacekeepers (KFOR) of "inevitable emotional response of Albanians, which could easily turn to more violence", as was seen in March 2004.

If the province manages to pass the "war crimes test", the fragile province will still have problems to ensure peace in 2005, due to the start of talks on its final status, with Serbs and Albanians bitterly opposing the other side's ideas. dpa ra ff