“Fact-finding mission to restart Kosovo talks”

Serbian prime minister Vojislav Koštunica welcomed Friday the announced UN fact-finding mission to Kosovo.

Source: B92, Beta
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“That would be the first and very important step for starting a new negotiating process, which would be joined by a new international mediator,” Koštunica was reported as saying on the government website.

“The legal framework for the formation of the Security Council mission is Resolution 1244, which gives indications that new and real negotiations will this time be conducted within the existing Resolution of the Security Council,” Koštunica said.

According to Koštunica, Serbia is preparing for the arrival of the mission, and is “cooperating with Russia very closely”.

Koštunica added that “favorable conditions for continued negotiations on Kosovo were gradually created” after the UN Security Council session of April 3.

Earlier, the UN Security Council announced it had decided to send a fact-finding mission to Kosovo at the end of April.

“The mission will visit Kosovo ahead of the final phase of the province's status settlement,” Britain's ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, the current Council President told the press Thursday night following consultations with the Council.

The mission, headed by Belgian Ambassador to the UN Johan Verbeke, will arrive in Kosovo the last week of April.

The UN delegation will be comprised of ambassadors, or their representatives, of the 15 UN SC member states.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon yesterday met with the Priština negotiating team for the future status of Kosovo, led by Kosovo President Fatmir Sejdiu, Tanjug learned from its diplomatic sources in the UN.

The meeting came as a part of the international conference dedicated to the preparation of a strategy for the initial 120 days of Kosovo, if the UN Security Council manages to adopt the resolution to grant independence to the province.

The conference began Thursday and, according to diplomatic sources in New York, the gathering will serve as another round of consultations related to Priština’s announcements of a unilateral proclamation of independence should Russia postpone the resolution’s adoption or use its veto.

Diplomacy & IR

Kosovo on EU-U.S. summit agenda

The annual summit of the EU and the U.S. that takes place in Washington today will touch on the future status of Kosovo.

Politics Monday, April 30, 2007 09:52 Comments: 14
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