Report describes Putin's statement on Kosovo as "surprise gift" for Belgrade
BBC Monitoring Europe (Political) - February 2, 2006 Thursday

Text of report by Vladimir Radomirovic entitled "When I say Kosovo, I mean Caucasus" published by the Serbian newspaper Politika on 1 February

When yesterday's meeting of the Contact Group was being scheduled, the West had meant to use it to "persuade" Russia to accept its stances in the negotiating process [for Kosovo], Politika has learned.

The foreign ministries of the United States, Russia, Britain, France, Germany and Italy, who gathered in London primarily for a donor conference for Afghanistan, spent yesterday afternoon discussing Kosovo-Metohija, but matters evolved differently than the Western powers had expected before the meeting began.

Circumstances changed after Russian President Vladimir Putin said openly that the solution to Kosovo should have a "universal character" and not be unprecedented, as implied by Western circles. This was how Putin chose to send a signal to Washington not to take for granted Russia's consent to Western plans for Kosmet. If the West insisted on granting Serbia's southern province independence, then it should consider independence for Nagornyy Karabakh - an Armenian region in Azerbaijan, but above all for Transdniestria, a province close to Russia that seeks to break away from Moldova.

If the two regions obtained independence, possibly on the model of Kosovo-Metohija, Russia would considerably extend its influence in post-Soviet territory, something the West - specifically the United States - wants to avoid.

Martti Ahtisaari, special envoy of the UN secretary general for talks on status, complained to Kofi Annan about the Russians prior to Putin's message, saying he was not satisfied with their degree of cooperation on the Kosovo status talks, Politika learned in Washington.

Ahtisaari suggested that pressure be put to bear on Moscow within the Contact Group. There was talk last week in diplomatic circles in Washington about the Kremlin planning to address the public prior to the meeting, which the Americans thought would be a routine statement. How surprised they were to see President Putin. However, the US administration still believes that it will come to terms with the Kremlin, assuring Russia there was no need to fear that possible independence for Kosovo could apply to Chechnya.

"The Russians told us that they want to avoid going against the Serbs," said our source, explaining the circumstances between Washington and Moscow. The former Finnish president could ruin this, as he told US representatives that he had no intention of extending his mandate beyond one year. Washington had planned for the talks to start "softly" to let the Serb side emerge "triumphant" from the talks on decentralization in the province, and then gradually, to move on to talks on status. Ahtisaari's response to the proposal was terse: "No. If I work that way, the talks will draw out for two years and we will accomplish nothing." Washington fears that Ahtisaari could moot the question of status during the talks on decentralization and thus provoke the Belgrade delegation to walk out before the talks were fully under way.

Putin's statement came as a surprise gift for Belgrade and must have sounded disagreeable to Ahtisaari, most likely causing his plan for speedy negotiations to fall flat. It was a message to the Serb and Albanian parties as well, that real talks would not be conducted in Ahtisaari's office in Vienna, but in Washington, Moscow, London and Berlin - the seats of the most influential members of the Contact Group.

Konstantin Zatulin, director of the Moscow Institute for the Community of Independent States, told a Russian news agency that the United States advocated Kosovo's independence and that everything was being prepared for that outcome.

"The West is not willing to understand Putin's proposal for a universal nature of the Kosovo model. Therefore, before agreeing to recognize Kosovo's independence, Russia will have to link its decision to Abkhazia and South Ossetia in Georgia, to Transdniestria and probably Nagornyy Karabakh, which the president mentioned. And if a decision on Kosovo's independence is adopted, Russia should apply the Kosovo scenario to conflict regions in post-Soviet territory, regardless of whether the international community recognizes the universal character of that scenario from the point of international law," said Zatulin and added: "It is clear that if Russia agrees to recognize Kosovo's independence, its relations with Serbia will deteriorate over a longer period. We will have been equated with the West in the eyes of the Serbs. It is up to our leaders to decide whether we are prepared to pay that price," said Zatulin.

Source: Politika, Belgrade, in Serbian 1 Feb 06 pp 1-2

Copyright 2006 British Broadcasting Corporation
Posted for Fair Use Only

Excerpt from Putin's January 31st Press Conference:

Source: RTR Russia TV, Moscow, in Russian 0900 gmt 31 Jan 06

[Female journalist] Georgia's public broadcasting, Tamara Nusubidze. Vladimir Vladimirovich, you said yesterday that the tackling of the Kosovo issue should be of universal nature. Does this mean that, if Kosovo is recognized, Russia will support similar decisions regarding all the frozen conflicts on the post-Soviet territory, including those in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

[Woman's voice] And the second question is this: How do you assess the initiative of the Georgian parliament concerning the withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers from conflict zones. Thank you.

[Putin] As regards decisions on Kosovo, there is UN Security Council resolution 1244 which confirms that Kosovo is an inalienable part of the Serb federation. And we proceed from the principle that the decisions taken by the UN security Council are not of a declarative nature, that they are not prompted by short-term political interests, but they are adopted in order to be implemented. This is the first thing.

Second. As concerns general principles, I think I said last time that we have such examples when in one part of Europe, for example in southern Macedonia, decisions are taken according to which the Albanian population living on that territory gains the right to be represented in the bodies of administration, including the police, in line with their ratio to the other indigenous population living there; say, if there are 20 per cent Albanians there, then there should be 20 per cent of Albanians in the police. Well, in Riga, we have Russians accounting for 60 per cent of the population - so why not extend the same principle to there?

Principles have to be universal, otherwise they cannot inspire trust in the policy we are pursuing. And conversely, we will always be casting doubt on the fairness of one decision or another. The same applies to Kosovo. If someone believes that Kosovo can be granted full state independence, then why should we refuse the same to the Abkhaz or the South Ossetians?

I am not talking at the moment about how Russia will act, but we know, for example, that Turkey has recognized the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. I don't want to say that Russia will also immediately recognize Abkhazia or South Ossetia as independent states, but such precedents exist in international life. I am making an assessment of these things right now, but in order to act fairly, in the interests of all people living in one territory or another, we need commonly recognized, universal principles for resolving these problems. This is what I was talking about yesterday at my meeting with the government.

[End Excerpt]