[ALBSA-Info] Kosovo envoy links Yugo sanctions to detainees

[Gazhebo at aol.com]

Kosovo envoy links Yugo sanctions to detainees

By Gareth Jones

LUXEMBOURG, Oct 9 (Reuters) - The international community's top official in 
Kosovo said on Monday that the lifting of sanctions against Belgrade should 
be linked to progress in freeing Kosovo Albanians detained or missing in 
Yugoslavia. 

United Nations chief administrator Bernard Kouchner also said the advent of a 
more democratic government in Belgrade did not signal an end to the problems 
of Kosovo, a Serbian province under international administration since last 
year's war. 

``I don't want the release of all (Kosovo Albanian) prisoners, no, but a 
symbolic gesture, yes, that would open the hearts of the people,'' Kouchner 
told a news conference after briefing a gathering of European Union foreign 
ministers. 

``I think that to offer a lifting of the sanctions (against Belgrade) and, in 
parallel with that, the release of some prisoners would be something very 
important,'' he said. 

Kouchner added that he did not know the exact number of Kosovo Albanians 
detained or still missing since a NATO-led force took control of the province 
last year in the wake of the alliance's bombing campaign against Yugoslavia. 

``Every day in Kosovo there are demonstrations (demanding the release of the 
detainees),'' he said. 

EU ministers are expected later on Monday to announce a lifting of the oil 
embargo and of a flight ban imposed against Yugoslavia over its brutal 
crackdown on Kosovo's ethnic Albanians. 

The move follows last week's removal of Slobodan Milosevic as Yugoslav 
president in a virtually bloodless popular uprising and the swearing-in of 
the opposition candidate Vojislav Kostunica as the Balkan nation's new 
leader. 

KOSOVARS WORRY ABOUT AID, INDEPENDENCE 

Kouchner said he had informed the EU ministers about Kosovo Albanian worries 
that the resumption of international aid to Serbia proper could divert scarce 
resources from their province. 

He said the ethnic Albanians, who form the overwhelming majority of Kosovo's 
population, also feared that any new Western rapprochement with Belgrade 
would scupper their hopes for eventual independence from Yugoslavia. 

``Every Albanian that I meet, moderate or not, wants independence. Therefore, 
to try to solve the final status of Kosovo now could lead to a new open 
conflict,'' he said. 

Kouchner said the international community should leave the sensitive issue of 
Kosovo's final status to one side and continue focusing on the building of 
civil and political institutions in the war-shattered province. 

He said the Kosovo Albanians were highly suspicious of Kostunica, a 
nationalist who has already made clear that the territory must remain part of 
Yugoslavia. 

``It would be childish to pretend that they have been fighting only against 
Milosevic,'' he said. 

``They have also been fighting against a regime, against the way in which the 
two communities (Serb and Albanian) have been unable for centuries to 
establish a relationship of equality.'' 

Kouchner said he was keen to establish a working dialogue with the new 
administration in Belgrade. 

Kosovo faces municipal elections on October 28, which Kouchner described as a 
key element in the drive for political stability in the region.