Latest Kosovo attacks aim to break up last major Serb community - Serbian body
BBC Monitoring Europe (Political) - December 27, 2005, Tuesday

Text of report by Serbian radio on 27 December

[Announcer] Sanda Raskovic-Ivic, head of the Kosovo Coordinating Centre, said that the latest attacks on Serbs in [Kosovska] Mitrovica were not accidental and aimed to break up the only remaining larger Serb community in Kosmet [Kosovo-Metohija].

[Raskovic-Ivic] Northern Kosovo was not chosen by accident, as it is the most compact and the only multiethnic urban milieu in Kosmet, and the aim is to break it up, to intimidate it using this or that method or pressure. There are various forms of pressure, from pelting buses with stones, cutting power, to shooting - which could end fatally - and that is definitely the worst.

[Announcer] Further on Kosovo. Decentralization is a crucial topic in the forthcoming talks on Kosmet. The Serb community in the province cannot survive without it. That is the position of Serbia's negotiating team. Branislav Kostadinovic reports.

[Kostadinovic] The status of Kosovo and Metohija will depend on our team's negotiating capacity, but most of all, ordinary everyday questions that concern Serbs and other non-Albanians, said Raskovic-Ivic, adding that because of this, talks with the Albanian side will focus on decentralization. That is crucial for us and the international community accepts that, she said.

Another member of the negotiating team, Dusan Batakovic, agrees that this is the most important question. The horizontal connection of Serb municipalities in the province and their direct link with Serbia will determine the survival of the Serb community in Kosovo, said Batakovic.

Based on recent signals from the international community, political analysts believe that talks will not focus on the final status of Kosmet but on the position of Serbs in the future status. It will be wrapped in such a way that both sides will be able to claim victory, Albanians with independence and Serbs that they have protected their sovereignty.

Source: Radio Belgrade in Serbian 1400 gmt 27 Dec 05

Copyright 2005 British Broadcasting Corporation
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