-------- Original Message -------- Subject: [KDN2] AP Kosovo's president predicts decision on province's final status within months Date: Wed, 27 Dec 2006 12:01:04 -0300 From: sibercor2000 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Kosovo Daily News 2 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
http://calibre.mworld.com/m/m.w?lp=GetStory&id=234641341 Kosovo's president predicts decision on province's final status within months Released : Wednesday, December 27, 2006 7:54 AM PRISTINA, Serbia-Kosovo's president said Wednesday that he expects a decision on Kosovo's final status within months. President Fatmir Sejdiu said chief U.N. envoy Martti Ahtisaari will deliver his proposal on the province's future immediately after the Serbian elections in January. Sejdiu said he expected the U.N. Security Council to take up the issue shortly after that. "We expect for this process to be quick and immediately after, in the few following months, to be at the level of Security Council," he told reporters. Sejdiu, who is head of Kosovo's negotiating team, said he anticipates a decision by the U.N.'s decision-making body "in the first months of next spring." Kosovo has been administered by a U.N. mission since mid-1999, when NATO launched an air war to halt a crackdown by Serb forces on separatist ethnic Albanian rebels. The province is patrolled by some 16,000 NATO-led peacekeepers who are in charge of the overall security in Kosovo. The province's ethnic Albanian majority wants full independence, but Belgrade wants to retain some control over what it considers a crucial part of Serbia. Ahtisaari, the former Finnish president who has facilitated months of talks between the two sides, initially planned to present his proposal, expected to involve some form of independence for Kosovo, to the U.N. by the end of 2006. However, that plan was postponed to allow for the Jan. 21 parliamentary elections in Serbia. Ahtisaari is now due to make his final recommendation on the province's future early next year. Sejdiu said he expected Ahtisaari's proposal to include "the essential substance of what Kosovo needs, and we also insist it entails the independence formula."
