Kosovo celebrates first year of sovereignty

KOSOVO AND Serbia traded barbs yesterday as the mostly ethnic-Albanian state celebrated its first year of independence from Belgrade.

As thousands of people thronged the streets of the capital, Pristina, Serb politicians met in their stronghold of northern Kosovo to denounce the new country and vowed never to recognise its sovereignty.

“Serbia is continuing its interference and has the tendency to destabilise us,” said Kosovan president Fatmir Sejdiu, who claimed that “the mentality of the conflict and hate is still present in the heads and institutions in Serbia”.

“These destabilising policies of Belgrade do not help Serbs or the region,” he told parliament, while outside flag-waving crowds paraded through Pristina and slow-moving cars honked their horns.

Many bars and cafes handed out food and drinks ahead of a street party in celebration of independence, which came nine years after Nato bombs drove Serb forces out of Kosovo.

The bombardment ended a brutal Serb crackdown on Kosovo’s separatist rebels, which killed some 10,000 people and drove about one million from their homes. The war was followed by vicious reprisals, with about 200,000 Serbs and Roma forced to flee what had been their homeland for centuries.

Most of Kosovo’s remaining 100,000 Serbs live in areas adjoining Serbia, north of the Ibar river that divides Mitrovica.

In nearby Zvecan, Kosovo Serb leaders met visiting politicians from Belgrade and held a session of their self-proclaimed assembly, which serves as a symbol of their refusal to accept Pristina’s rule.

“This parliament rejects as non-existent and without any legal validity all acts . . . which unilaterally proclaimed the independence of Kosovo and the forming of institutions of Kosovo as a quasi-state,” said a declaration.

Alongside many hardline nationalist Serbs in Zvecan was Goran Bogdanovic, the minister for Kosovo in a government led by the party of liberal Serb president Boris Tadic, who says he wants to lead Serbia into the European Union but not at the cost of relinquishing Kosovo.

“Serbia is a democratic country which protects its rights. We do not want conflicts and fear, we do not want friction,” said Mr Bogdanovic, whose government pays the wages of many Kosovo Serbs.

“All we are doing is aimed at improving the lives of citizens and protecting our territorial integrity and sovereignty in this region.”