[ALBSA-Info] {QIKSH =?ISO-8859-1?Q?=AB?=ALBEUROPA=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BB?=} Thaci Says Kosovo Still Seeks Independence

[Nikoll A Mirakaj]

Thaci Says Kosovo Still Seeks Independence 

ZURICH, Oct 9, 2000 -- (Reuters) Hashim Thaci, a former Kosovo Liberation Army guerrilla who heads Kosovo's Democratic Party, on Sunday welcomed the ousting of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, but declared that Kosovo still sought independence.

In interviews with two German-language Swiss newspapers, Thaci said Kosovo's majority ethnic Albanians were "not looking at all for a dialogue with Belgrade".

He was convinced that new Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica would be "good for the Serbs and the whole region, a step in the direction of democracy".

"A new era is beginning in the Balkans. But for Kosovo it doesn't play such a big role. We want to be independent from Belgrade and from Kostunica," Thaci was quoted as telling the SonntagsBlick Sunday newspaper.

"I am convinced that this change will help Kosovo. However, one can't forget that Kostunica visited Serb paramilitary units during the war," he added. "I urge him to release all political prisoners immediately."

Thaci said that Milosevic should be tried by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, which indicted him and four members of his cabinet last year for alleged war crimes against ethnic Albanians in the Serb province of Kosovo.

"He should be held accountable to the war crimes tribunal for all of his massacres," he told SonntagsBlick.

The SonntagsZeitung, which interviewed Thaci at a rally near Zurich, said he was in Switzerland to gather support ahead of the October 28 municipal election in Kosovo.

Some 12,000 of the 150,000 Kosovo Albanians in Switzerland are eligible to vote, according to the paper which said the former Zurich student still had refugee status in the Alpine country. Thaci was heading on Sunday for Germany, home to even more potential supporters.

Thaci predicted that his party - heir to the disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) - would win more than 50 percent of the municipalities.

It was the emergence in 1997 of the KLA and younger radicals like Thaci that pushed Kosovo towards the crisis that resulted in Belgrade withdrawing its troops in June 1999 after three months of NATO bombing.

Ibrahim Rugova, leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) and Thaci are now the main rivals for power, in a field of some 20 parties with 5,500 candidates seeking office in 30 municipalities.

More than one million people are able to vote in the election, which Western governments insist is simply about local government, not final status.

(C)2000 Copyright Reuters Limited

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