Keepin touch

Whether you have a question, comment, suggestion or any problem in the purview of the government, send us your message and we will try to respond as soon as possible. If your problem is not in our purview, we will forward your message to the relevant institution.

The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Position of Serbs and other non-Albanians in Kosovo-Metohija remains dramatic

Belgrade/Vienna, 7 April 2005

Head of the Coordinating Centre for Kosovo-Metohija Nebojsa Covic stated today at the session of the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna that Serbs and other non-Albanians in Kosovo-Metohija still live in dramatically poor conditions, and that basic human rights are still not respected in the province.

Nebojsa Covic

Author: Tanjug

“I would like to remind that there is still no elementary security and freedom of movement for Serbs and other non-Albanians. Constant attacks and incidents aimed against them, as well as continued theft of their property and illegal privatisation create conditions for further ethnic cleansing of these communities”, Covic said.

Covic also pointed out that expelled and displaced persons have not returned, and that besides a declarative readiness of interim institutions and UNMIK, no efforts have been exerted to facilitate their return.

“The Kosovo assembly and government are not truly multiethnic, and there is no protection in interim institutions of local self-government to non-Albanian communities from the domination exerted by the majority community”, assessed the head of the Coordinating Centre.

Stating that Serb and other non-Albanian national communities have practically no faith in the political and administrative system in Kosovo-Metohija, he underlined that Kosovo is far from a modern multiethnic and democratic society.

According to him, the new reality in Kosovo-Metohija is the fact that one national community, the Serb one, is disappearing under the pressure and violent activities of the majority community.

Covic said that the international community policy, once defined as “standards prior to status”, will be reformulated as the “standards and status” policy and emphasised that in spite of this optimism, we cannot ignore the fact that years even decades will be needed to establish the standard of a truly multiethnic society in the province.

Stating that Belgrade readily awaits the announced processes in Kosovo-Metohija, Covic pointed out that in order for the solution to be sustainable, it is necessary to evaluate success achieved in attaining standards according to the results, and not declarative intentions.

At the session of the OSCE Permanent Council, the head of the Coordinating Centre also spoke about the activities of Belgrade in south central Serbia. He reminded that at the end of 2004 the Serbian government confirmed its dedication to the programme of political-security stabilisation and economic-social development to be fully realised in municipalities of Presevo, Bujanovac and Medvedja.