RADIO FREE EUROPE/RADIO LIBERTY, PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC
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RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 8, No. 180, Part II, 21 September 2004

UN HOPES FOR PROGRESS ON KOSOVA. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan
spoke on 20 September in New York to the foreign ministers of
Germany, France, Russia, Romania, and Italy, as well as to an unnamed
top U.S. diplomat, about his recommendations for speeding up
discussions on Kosova's final status and stepping up the reform
process there, RFE/RL reported (see "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 20
August, and 10 and 17 September 2004). Norwegian diplomat Kai Eide,
who drafted a recent report on Kosova for Annan urging a quicker
resolution of the status issue, and Soren Jessen-Petersen, who heads
the UN civilian administration in Kosova (UNMIK), also participated.
Romanian Foreign Minister Mircea Geoana told RFE/RL that "we just
cannot stay idle and wait for time to go by and then eventually
decide on various [issues]. The conversation today [centered] on the
process of decentralization and transfer of competencies" from UNMIK
to local elected officials. He also noted that "there are some voices
saying we should wait...[for] a general review of the standards
before entering any discussion about status, while others are saying,
with some logic, that we should press for standards and
have...devolution and decentralization [at the same time] and make
the whole process work [as a whole]." PM

CROATIA'S PRESIDENT TELLS RFE/RL HIS COUNTRY WILL RESPECT ANY 'LEGAL'
SOLUTION IN KOSOVA... In an online interview with users of RFE/RL's
South Slavic and Albanian Languages Service website on 20 September,
Croatian President Stipe Mesic dismissed the argument that possible
independence for Kosova will lead to fragmentation of other states in
the region
(http://www.danas.org/article/2004/09/20/f6ab65dd-5c21-4aae-b816-81e2
ed0a6179.html). Mesic argued that the Croatian authorities will
"accept any legal and legitimate decision" on Kosova's final status,
adding that his advice to other Balkan countries is to accept
European standards and look toward the future rather than the past.
Asked who was the greater man, the late Yugoslav President Josip Broz
Tito or Croatian President Franjo Tudjman, Mesic replied that it is
impossible to compare the two because they lived in different times
and under different circumstances. Mesic declined to take a stand as
to who was at fault regarding the tensions in the 1990s between
Tudjman and Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic. Mesic argued that
this is a matter for historians to decide since neither Tudjman nor
Izetbegovic is alive and hence able to answer. PM

...AND SAYS YUGOSLAVIA IS A THING OF THE PAST. In the 20 September
online interview, Mesic said that three states existed in the 20th
century under the name Yugoslavia and all of them failed. Mesic said
he believes that the future of the former Yugoslav republics is to
join the European Union, which some of them will do sooner, others
later. Asked whether he, as the last president of the second or
communist-era Yugoslavia, feels some responsibility for the demise of
that state, Mesic replied that it was clear to him when he arrived in
Belgrade in 1991 that federal Yugoslav institutions had ceased to
function. The solution, he felt, was to reach a new political
agreement among the republics. But, Mesic argued, Serbian President
Slobodan Milosevic did not want such a compromise. Instead, Milosevic
sought to break up Yugoslavia and create a greater Serbia, Mesic
argued. In the course of carrying out his plan, Milosevic indulged in
genocide and other war crimes, and for that he is now answering
before the Hague-based war crimes tribunal, Mesic said. PM