~~~~~~~~~ <http://www.focus-fen.net/index.php?id=n111187> http://www.focus-fen.net/index.php?id=n111187
FOCUS Information Agency (Bulgaria) World US may unilaterally recognise Kosovo independence 29 April 2007 | 01:54 | FOCUS News Agency BRUSSELS. The United States could unilaterally recognise Kosovo's independence even if Russia vetoes such a move at the United Nations, a former US envoy to the Balkans and the UN said Saturday. "If Russia decides to use its veto (in the UN Security Council), there will be a declaration of independence in Kosovo, and the United States will recognise Kosovo the same day," Richard Holbrook predicted during a conference in Brussels. He added that he believed several EU states would follow suit. The UN Security Council is due to decide in coming weeks on the status of Kosovo. The territory, a southern province of Serbia, has been under UN administration since mid-1999, following NATO bombardments that forced the Serbian military to cease a crackdown on the ethnic Albanian majority and to withdraw. Holbrook represented the United States at the 1995 Dayton peace accords that ended the Bosnian war and then went on to become a US presidential envoy to Kosovo before being named US ambassador to the United Nations from 1999 to 2001. He is now a member of international foreign policy think tanks. "Russia will bear responsibility if violence is breaking" after a possible decision to veto a UN declaration of Kosovo independence. Russia has sided with Serbia, a traditional ally, in opposing a recommendation by the UN envoy to Kosovo, Martti Ahtisaari, that "supervised independence" be granted. Sweden's foreign minister, Carl Bildt, also in Brussels, attacked Holbrook over his comments, saying "that is playing with fire in Europe, playing with fire with the transatlantic relationship and playing with fire in the Balkans." He said the matter had to be decided by a UN Security Council resolution.
