[ALBSA-Info] {QIKSH =?ISO-8859-1?Q?=AB?=ALBEUROPA=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BB?=} Fw: Yugoslav Changes May Weaken Kosovo Albanian Drive (Reuters, October 6, 2000)

[Nikoll A Mirakaj]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Wolfgang Plarre" <wplarre at bndlg.de>
To: "ALBANEWS" <ALBANEWS at LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>; "alb-information-list"
<alb-information at egroups.com>
Sent: Friday, October 06, 2000 2:14 PM
Subject: NEWS: Yugoslav Changes May Weaken Kosovo Albanian Drive (Reuters,
October 6, 2000)


> http://news.excite.com/news/r/001006/09/news-yugoslavia-kosovo-future-col
>
> Yugoslav Changes May Weaken Kosovo Albanian Drive
>
> Updated 9:43 AM ET October 6, 2000
> By Jeremy Gaunt
>
> PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (Reuters) - Ask an ethnic Albanian in the streets
> of Kosovo's capital if he thinks the apparent overthrow of Slobodan
> Milosevic in Belgrade will change anything for him and the chances are
> he will shrug and say "No."
>      Kosovo, the view goes among ordinary Albanian Kosovars and
> political leaders alike, has nothing to do with Serbia. For them, Kosovo
> is an all but independent country following the West's military
> intervention last year and its administration with a 40,000 strong
> NATO-led protection force.
>      But Western analysts and Kosovo's Serbs, surveying the rapid rise
> to near power of opposition leader Vojislav Kostunica on Friday, are not
> so sure.
>      They said the prospect of democracy arriving in Belgrade will
> weaken the ethnic Albanian drive for independence and allow more Serbian
> influence in the region, which the West says remains an integral part of
> Yugoslavia.
>      "If you get proper change in Belgrade, you can start talking about
> status issues," said one Western diplomat.
>      The West has insisted that Kosovo should be given broad autonomy
> within a democratic Yugoslavia.
>      "What the international community will need to do is convince
> Albanians that change in Belgrade is good for all the Balkans as well as
> Kosovo," the diplomat said.
>
> END OF SERB ISOLATION?
>
> Oliver Ivanovic, a Kosovo Serb leader in the divided city of Mitrovica,
> said he was trying to persuade members of his embattled community that a
> Kostunica presidency would be good for the Serb future in Kosovo.
>      "It is not a disaster. It is not a tragedy. They must not fear," he
> told Reuters. "Perhaps it will be much better for the Serbs of Kosovo."
>      Ivanovic said democracy in Belgrade would have two effects on the
> Kosovo Serbs, a much diminished group after angry Albanians returned
> from refugee camps and thousands of Serbs fled in fear of retribution.
>      It would end the Kosovo Serbs' isolation and dampen ethnic Albanian
> drives for independence.
>      "They (the Milosevic government) were ready to forget Kosovo and
> Kosovo Serbs," he said. "(The new government) will be free to come here
> to talk. Serbs in Kosovo will not be alone."
>      Ivanovic said the international community would embrace democrats
> in Belgrade and that ethnic Albanians would have a harder time achieving
> independence.
>
> DEMOCRACY CAN'T HURT
>
> For their part, ethnic Albanians have tried to shrug off prospects of
> democracy in Belgrade as an irrelevance to everyday life in a more or
> less independent country.
>      "It could be in Romania. It's nothing to do with Kosovo. It's not
> part of our country," Zeka Emrlla said late on Thursday in one of
> central Pristina's growing number of trendy bars.
>      It was an attitude that reflected the formal position of many of
> Kosovo's ethnic Albanian leaders.
>      "Kosovo will not be part of Serbia whether it's a dictatorial
> Serbia or a democratic Serbia," Hashim Thaci, head of Kosovo's
> Democratic Party said recently.
>      But analysts said a democratic Belgrade would change things,
> although not overnight.
>      Bernard Kouchner, the international community's chief administrator
> in Kosovo, said a lot of work remained to rebuild the province but that
> democracy in Belgrade could not be a bad thing for resentful Serbs and
> ethnic Albanians.
>      "It's difficult to expect a worse relationship," he told Reuters.
>


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