LOCAL PRESS

Djuric: Stability is Serbia’s interest in Kosovo and Metohija (Tanjug)

The Head of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija Marko Djuric has pointed out in talks with UNMIK Head Farid Zarif in Kosovska Mitrovica that Belgrade’s key interest in Kosovo is stability and that “Serbia, with reinforced power” after it enters the provincial government and assembly, will continue to fight for the rights of its citizens. Djuric conveyed to the UNMIK Head in Kosovo that the Serb representatives are actively participating in the formation of the new “provincial administration, new provincial government” and that Serbia intends to support the Serb participation in this government with the goal of resolving some accumulated problems.

The problems include, as Djuric put it, forceful seizure of property from the Serb community in Kosovo and Metohija and criminal privatization that is conducted in the province. “Our message to the UNMIK Head was that Serbia would continue to fight, once it enters the provincial government and assembly, for the right of every citizen in Kosovo and Metohija, for every land, house, monument and the right to exist in a dignified manner and to survive where we are at home,” said Djuric. He stressed that the key task in the future period is the establishment of the Union of Serb Municipalities, the adoption of the Statute of the Union and the struggle for achieving those parts of the Brussels agreement that refer to the Union. “I discussed with UNMIK Head Farid Zarif the current political-security situation in Kosovo and conveyed that Serbia’s key interest was stability in the province,” said Djuric, adding that they also discussed economic development projects in Kosovo and Metohija. I am certain that Serbia can count and rely on the UN support and understanding, after all Serbia is a UN member state and our talks had been in the spirit of mutual understanding and the wish to achieve what is the goal of all reasonable politicians, and this is stability, concluded Djuric. UNMIK Head Farid Zarif didn’t give statements to journalists following the meeting behind closed doors.

Mihajlovic: Democratic move by the Serb list (RTS)

The Head of the Serbian government Office for Media Relations Milivoje Mihajlovic told the morning broadcast of Radio and Television of Serbia (RTS) that the Serbs supported the election of Isa Mustafa as the Kosovo Assembly speaker primarily in order to prevent irregularities in the formation of this assembly. Mihajlovic assessed that this is a democratic move by the Serb (Srpska) list, and on the other side demonstration of power of the Serb MPs in the Kosovo Assembly. “Several months ago we talked about the Serbs being the key factor in the formation of the Kosovo government and now this is being realized,” said Mihajlovic. He assessed that nine MPs of the Serb list can seriously influence who will be ruling Kosovo, and primarily how it will be ruled in Kosovo, adding that he has in mind their influence on the protection of Serb interests and survival of Serbs. “That team of nine MPs will really contribute significantly to the improvement of the position of Serbs in Kosovo,” said Mihajlovic.

REGIONAL PRESS

Fule: I am proud of rapid response assistance mechanism (Fena)

“I am proud of the rapid response assistance mechanism”, said at the opening of the donors’ conference for B&H and Serbia in Brussels, EU Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule. “The EU member states have supported and participated in the rescue during the floods in Serbia and B&H. I would like to emphasize that Slovenia was the first that came to B&H, and France was the last one to leave,” Fule said. He also thanked other countries that are not EU members for help, such as the U.S., Russia, Norway, Belarus, etc. “Nobody remained indifferent to the situation, all countries of the world offered their help,” Fule added. He added that the aim of the conference is not only to collect pledges for assistance, but also the provision of policies and projects so that the countries could tackle with such disaster in future. “Such improvements are expensive, but still not as expensive as repairing the damage caused by floods or other natural disasters,” concluded Fule.

Dodik requests that Hill be declared persona non grata (Srna)

The Republika Srpska (RS) President Milorad Dodik requested the B&H Presidency and Foreign Minister to protect the office of the RS President from assaults and launch a procedure to declare the charge d’affaires of the U.S. Embassy in B&H Nicholas Hill persona not grata. “I ask you to launch a procedure to declare Nicholas Hill persona non grata, in keeping with the laws and procedures defined by treaties, in order to secure his departure as soon as possible," Dodik says in an open letter. Dodik says that thus would be protected the institution of the RS President and the dignity of all institutions in B&H as stipulated by the Dayton Accords and the B&H Constitution. “Otherwise, it will be clearly confirmed that B&H represents a de facto protectorate of foreign powers and that it cannot protect its citizens and institutions from inappropriate interference and assaults by foreign diplomats serving in B&H,” the RS President has said. Hill in his statements, Dodik says, exceeded the bounds of diplomatic speech and one’s relation to the internal and political issues of the host country, as well as exceeding the bounds of polite speech in general. “His candid assessments of the character of the highest functionaries in Republika Srpska, his exceedingly negative comments directed at the office of the RS President, which I hold, have exceeded the bounds of tolerance. This especially having in mind that it is perfectly clear that these messages are being sent on the eve of the elections, with the obvious purpose of doing harm to the holders of political office in the RS while being of benefit to the opposition,” Dodik says. While respecting Hill’s right to his own opinion and particularly respecting the power and reputation of the U.S., which Hill represents, Dodik feels that it is high time the B&H Presidency and Foreign Minister took measures in their power and put an end to such public discourse evident in individual diplomats, especially Hill. “Since according to the provisions of the General Framework Agreement on Peace in B&H and the B&H Constitution you are in charge of foreign policy, which includes relations with other countries and their diplomatic representatives in B&H, I take this opportunity to request that you protect the office of the RS President from the assaults which in a last while have increased in intensity,” says Dodik. He says that the public will in this case have an opportunity to gauge the character of B&H and its institutions in accordance with the further actions of the B&H Presidency and Foreign Minister, while the RS will determine its further steps.

INTERNATIONAL PRESS

EU Shrinks Kosovo Rule-of-Law Mission (BIRN, by Valerie Hopkins, Edona Peci, 18 July 2014)
The EU’s rule-of-law mission, EULEX, is cutting personnel and reducing its role in war crimes and corruption cases, but some are not sure if Kosovo can deal with sensitive prosecutions itself
EULEX is not going away just yet, but it’s getting smaller – and less potent.
The EU Rule-of-Law Mission, in place since one day before Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence, will shed nearly nearly 30 per cent of its 2,070-strong staff and 20 per cent of its 111-million-euro budget  as it transfers more of its duties to local authorities under a new mandate that begins in October.
“EULEX will be working more with Kosovo and less for Kosovo,” a spokeswoman for EULEX said in an e-mail.
During its six-and-a-half years in place, EULEX has had a broad, sometimes decisive role in overseeing and shaping Kosovo’s justice and law and enforcement systems with a complement of international judges, prosecutors and police at its core. Its most prominent role has been handling cases – particularly corruption and war crimes – deemed too sensitive for the local authorities.
While the mission intends to see through existing investigations, its prosecutors will no longer initiate new cases in line with a law passed just before parliament dissolved in April and an agreement between Kosovo’s president and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. Meanwhile EULEX judges will be outnumbered by local counterparts on judicial panels. EULEX personnel will be available to “monitor, mentor and advise” their local colleagues in their new duties.  
These changes however, are not set in stone. The EU mission says it may “request new cases to be assigned to EULEX prosecutors and request a EULEX majority on court benches in extraordinary circumstances.”
It is the first major step towards a stated goal of transferring all so-called “executive powers” to local authorities by 2016, when the new EULEX mandate expires.
“We consistently encourage and support local actors in stepping up to the plate and taking responsibility,” Maja Kocijancic, a spokesperson for Ashton, told BIRN in an e-mail.
To date, EULEX has dealt with around 2,500 criminal cases, 350 of which are considered high-profile corruption, war crimes, or organized crime cases, including the Medicus organ-trafficking case. The mission has also dealt with a further 40,000 civil cases, mostly property-related, according to a EULEX spokesperson.
While some of the most sensitive cases - those involving former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army - will be handled by a new international tribunal in Brussels, most of the onus is being placed on Kosovo’s institutions to pick up the slack.
While there are few enthusiastic supporters of EULEX in Kosovo — its mere presence is perceived as an affront to the young country’s sovereignty — there is little indication that the country’s own institutions are ready to pick up the slack, which is itself a sign of the mission’s own shortcomings.
“There is no good time ever for EULEX to leave, but every second should be used to make local rule-of-law institutions more independent,” said Shpend Kursani, a Pristina analyst who has studied the mission extensively.  “The presence of EULEX, with the powers it had so far, did not contribute to that, because EULEX has been a parallel mission above the local institutions and not one that has improved their work,” he said.
Nevertheless, there are signs that the process may not be a smooth one.
Some EULEX staff have privately expressed unhappiness about how the mission is cutting 600 positions – 400 international and 200 local – in part through an open competition process.
Kosovo’s acting chief prosecutor, Sevdije Morina, also complained that she has been left in the dark about EULEX investigations.
"So far, EULEX prosecutors did not share the information they received during their investigations,” said Morina, who will be overseeing EULEX prosecutors in the Office of the Special Prosecutor, which to date has handled some of the country’s most sensitive cases.
Few local prosecutors have actually worked on war crimes cases, which are particularly challenging in Kosovo when the defendants are former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army.
The 2013 EU progress report on Kosovo noted that positions for prosecutors in the special prosecution chamber were unfilled and momentum to prosecute high- level crimes was lacking: “At the moment, there is a lack of capacity and commitment to investigate crimes that fall under the jurisdiction of the special prosecution,” the report stated.
Morina, however, expressed a commitment to taking on tough cases, including war crimes.  
“Although the war was a just fight for liberty, as anywhere else, there have been some violations [of the laws of war],” she said. “Any violation has to be investigated and the cases must be resolved.”
Morina acknowledged that sensitive cases are difficult in Kosovo, but expressed hope that her prosecutors are up to the challenge.
"There are no reasons for prosecutors in Kosovo to be scared,” she said.
In January, after a strategic review of EULEX’s mandate was completed and plans for downsizing were taking shape, a group of international judges also raised concern that their local counterparts would be unable to take over the caseload.
“We have not yet reached the stage where the more complex and very sensitive cases, such as war crimes, serious corruption and organized crime, should be completely handed over to the local judiciary,” the 17 judges wrote to Mats Mattson, the head of EULEX’s executive division, suggesting the transition should happen more slowly.
This will be new terrain for judges, but Enver Peci, head of the Kosovo Judicial Council, says local judges are ready.
“We don’t have any problems leading trials with EULEX judges in terms of professionalism,” he said.
“However, when it comes to sensitive war crime cases that involve ethnic Serbs, the Kosovo Judicial Council believes EULEX judges should continue to deal with these cases until an agreement of the reintegration of Serb judges is achieved.”
Nora Ahmetaj, Executive Director of the Centre for Research, Documentation and Publication in Pristina, said she was concerned about Kosovo judges’ ability to handle war crimes, as EULEX “has failed to strengthen the domestic judiciary”.
“It is essential to increase the local judges’ capacities, so that they get prepared to take the leading role in processing war crime cases,” she said.
EULEX, for its part, said that while it is cutting back, it remains committed to the integration of Kosovo’s Serb minority and the implementation of the April 2013 agreement that is incorporating Serb institutions in northern Kosovo into Pristina’s institutions – including bringing Serb judges into Kosovo courts.
EULEX has already achieved some measure of success in the north: customs collection began at the borders with Serbia early this year, Serbian interior ministry employees were removed from so-called ‘parallel institutions’ and the police force in north Kosovo, which used to answer to Serbia, was integrated into the Kosovo Police.
The renewed mandate comes as both Serbia and Kosovo are lagging behind on implementing unrealistic deadlines set in the April 2013 agreement. Serbia held early elections in March and Kosovo’s parliament dissolved in April in anticipation of early elections, so Eurocrats and parliamentarians rushed to get a new EULEX mandate on the law books before it was set to expire in June.
Bodo Weber, a German policy analyst, said that the EULEX transition is happening haphazardly “in the rush to the new mandate”.
“They created a mess,” Weber said. “From a legal point of view, this is all problematic and is making a mockery of the principles of the rule of law.”
While EULEX’s new mandate expires June 2016, it remains unlikely that it will make a precise end date to mission even as it continues to transfer more responsibility to the local authorities. The EU has invested more than a half-billion euros in the mission thus far, in one its most expensive foreign policy undertaking to date.
A former EULEX employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said there’s a sense in the mission that it was just starting to hit its stride with recent prominent corruption cases, including the charges against Uke Rugova, the son of Kosovo’s first president, Ibrahim Rugova, a national hero who died in 2006.
“I wish they would stay as long as possible,” the former employee said.
Chaotic scenes in Kosovan chamber (herald.scotland.com, 18 July 2014)
LAWMAKERS in Kosovo have wrestled for control of parliament, as it sat for the first time since an inconclusive June election triggered a constitutional crisis unprecedented in the young state's short history.
An opposition bloc, supported by deputies representing some of Kosovo's ethnic minorities, elected the leader of the largest opposition party as speaker of parliament, but only after lawmakers from the party of outgoing Prime Minister Hashim Thaci declared the session adjourned and walked out.
The chaotic scene spoke to a deepening crisis over who will rule the impoverished country of 1.7 million people for the next four years.
Thaci's Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) emerged from the election as the biggest party with 30 per cent of votes. But three opposition parties have united in a bid to outmanoeuvre the PDK and thwart Mr Thaci's bid for a third consecutive term as prime minister.
The election of Isa Mustafa, leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), as speaker suggested the party may have the makings of a working majority, although the PDK looked certain to declare his election illegitimate.
Outgoing deputy prime minister Hajredin Kuci, a member of the PDK, said: "The government of Kosovo will send this issue today to the constitutional court."
The opposition bloc has so far failed to bring on board a fourth party - Vetevendosje (Self-Determination) - and it was unclear whether the alliance would settle instead for the support of the ethnic minorities.
They accused Mr Thaci's administration of corruption, nepotism and failure to press economic reforms - accusations he denies.
All parties seek a closer integration with the EU but some take a harder line on negotiations with Serbia, a process crucial to both countries' hopes of one day joining the bloc.
Vetevendosje has also called for a halt to the sale of big state enterprises as a condition of joining the government.
Kosovo's president should nominate a candidate for prime minister.
Kosovo lawmakers struggle for control of parliament (Reuters, by Fatos Bytyci, 17 July 2014)
PRISTINA - Rival lawmakers struggled for control of Kosovo's parliament on Thursday, as it sat for the first time since an inconclusive June election triggered a constitutional crisis unprecedented in the young state's short history.
An opposition bloc, supported by deputies representing some of Kosovo's ethnic minorities, elected the leader of the largest opposition party as speaker of parliament, but only after lawmakers from the party of outgoing Prime Minister Hashim Thaci declared the session adjourned and walked out.
The chaotic scene spoke to a deepening crisis over who will rule the impoverished country of 1.7 million people for the next four years.
Thaci's Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) emerged from the election as the biggest party, with 30 percent of votes. But three opposition parties have united in a bid to outmanoeuvre the PDK and thwart Thaci's bid for a third consecutive term as prime minister.
The election as speaker of Isa Mustafa, leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), suggested the party may have the makings of a working majority.
In an urgent meeting the PDK said it would not recognise the voting and would take the case to the constitutional court.
"The losing political parties  today have violated the highest institution," PDK said in a statement.
"PDK considers invalid all the decisions taken from the occupiers of today's session and will not recognize these decisions that came from an illegal, anti-democratic and anti-constitutional process."
The opposition bloc has so far failed to bring on board a fourth party - Vetevendosje (Self-Determination) - and it was unclear on Thursday whether the alliance would settle instead for the support of the ethnic minorities.
They accuses Thaci's administration of corruption, nepotism and failure to press economic reforms - accusations he denies.
All parties seek a closer integration with the European Union, but some, notably Vetevendosje, take a harder line on negotiations with Serbia that are crucial to both countries' hopes of one day joining the bloc.
Vetevendosje has also called for a halt to the sale of big state enterprises as a condition of joining the government.
The opposition says their candidate for prime minister is Ramush Haradinaj, a former guerrilla commander twice indicted and twice cleared of war crimes by the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague.
Kosovo's president should in the next few days nominate a candidate for prime minister who would then have 15 days to name a cabinet and win its approval by parliament.
It remains unclear when the parliament will proceed with voting on a new government.
Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, almost a decade after NATO air strikes drove out Serbian forces accused of expelling and killing ethnic Albanian civilians in a two-year counter-insurgency war. (Writing by Matt Robinson; Editing by Andrew Roche)
Bosniak Fighters Jailed for Prijedor Killings (BIRN, 18 July 2014)
Former Bosniak fighters Semir Alukic and Fikret Hirkic were convicted of killing two Serb civilians and attempting to murder two others near Prijedor in 1992.
The district court in Banja Luka on Thursday sentenced Alukic to 12 years in prison and Hirkic to seven years for the wartime crimes against civilians in the villages of Kozarac and Podgradje near Prijedor.
According to the verdict, Alukic and five other fighters killed a man by shooting at his car in Kozarac on August 29, 1992, then burned the vehicle.
Alukic and Hirkic were both convicted of shooting at Serb houses in Podgradje, killing one man and trying to kill two women, who managed to escape.
The presiding judge said the court accepted as mitigating circumstances the fact that the defendants have families, the crime took place long time ago and the men behaved properly during the trial.
As aggravating circumstances, the judges took into account the fact they burned the bodies after the killings.
The verdict can be appealed at the supreme court of Bosnia's Serb-led entity Republika Srpska.
Croatian Serb Leader Denies Links to Paramilitary Arkan (BIRN, by Marija Ristic, 17 July 2014)
Former Croatian Serb leader Goran Hadzic told his war crimes trial that he didn’t work with notorious paramilitary boss Zeljko Raznatovic, alias ‘Arkan’, despite photo and video evidence.
Hadzic told the Hague Tribunal on Thursday that despite evidence to the contrary, he wasn’t an ally of the notorious Serbian paramilitary leader Arkan and had no control over him and his feared ‘Tigers’ unit during their military operations in Croatia.
“I didn’t even want to have a conversation with him… I refused all his offers to be part of my security,” said Hadzic, the former president of the Republic of Serbian Krajina, a self-proclaimed Serb statelet in Croatia during wartime, who is accused of crimes including the deportation of tens of thousands of non-Serbs and the murders of hundreds more from June 1991 to December 1993.
The Hague Tribunal prosecution presented various photos and videos picturing Hadzic and Arkan together, but the Croatian leader insisted that “Arkan was following me on his personal initiative” in an attempt to forge an alliance.
Hadzic also denied that there was a plan to form an army of local Serbs in Croatia, with assistance from the Belgrade authorities and Arkan, despite prosecution evidence that the two men wore the same paramilitary uniforms.
“I am not sure if it is the same uniform. I was wearing the one I had, and I don’t know how Arkan was dressing,” Hadzic said.
Hadzic also couldn’t remember where the photos with Arkan were taken.
“I don’t remember. It is very hard for me to answer, as Arkan is dead, so he cannot answer either. I just don’t remember,” he explained.
Arkan was indicted by the Hague Tribunal for war crimes in 1996, but he never faced trial as he was killed in Belgrade in 2000.
In his indictment, Hadzic is alleged to have been part of a joint criminal enterprise, together with Arkan and former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, which aimed to permanently expel non-Serbs from Serb-controlled areas of Croatia to create a ‘Greater Serbia’.
But Hadzic denied any such goal.
“My aim was to protect my people and to stay in Yugoslavia,” he explained.
The trial continues.
Slobodan's Ghost (RFE/RL, by Brian Whitmore, 18 July 2014)
Similar tactics. Similar myths. Similar futures?
There's a specter haunting Vladimir Putin -- the specter of Slobodan Milosevic.
As the Ukraine crisis has unfolded, it has become fashionable -- and even a bit of a fetish -- to compare the Kremlin leader to the late Serbian dictator.
Writing recently in "The New Republic," Vera Mironova and Maria Snegovaya noted how Milosevic and Putin "fueled intense nationalism...against Croats and Ukrainians through mass media propaganda" and how each "empowered the uprising of ethnic minorities."
Both also used the pretext of protecting minorities to "engage the military" and "established self-proclaimed, semi-independent republics in both Croatia and Ukraine" that were under the de facto control of Belgrade and Moscow respectively.
"But the resemblance between Putin and Milosevic’s cases is more than just a similarity in tactics -- it embraces the fundamental myths and historical clashes between Serbs and Croats, and Russians and Ukrainians," they wrote.
And it isn't just Putin's critics who are dredging up the Milosevic comparisons. So are his erstwhile allies -- as a cautionary tale.
Angry about the Kremlin's apparent decision not to use overt military force in eastern Ukraine to support pro-Moscow militants, separatist leader Igor Girkin, aka Strelkov, recently warned Putin against "an irreversible step down 'Milosevic's path.'"
Writing on his VKontakte page, Girkin went on to explain that Putin's apparent abandonment of armed groups seeking to form "Novorossia," or "New Russia," in Ukraine, resembled Milosevic's "surrendering" of paramilitaries fighting for a "Greater Serbia" in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia in the 1990s.
Milosevic, Girkin wrote, "was later finished off in Kosovo, and finally 'expired' naturally, and tellingly, in The Hague."
The subtext, of course, was that if nationalists turned against Putin over his "betrayal" in Donbas, he would be dangerously vulnerable at home.
Likewise, the nationalist Mikhail Kalashnikov recently argued that “the Kremlin has lost control over the process” in eastern Ukraine and that as a result, “the uprising in the Donbas could turn into an uprising in Russia."
The meme of the potential for an angry backlash against the Kremlin from jilted nationalists has also been picked up by the mainstream Russian media.
"The Russian authorities have learned how to suppress liberal protests but they are far worse at coping with nationalist and left-wing protests when they are confronted by resolute, desperate people who are prepared for a strong-arm confrontation," the daily "Nezavisimaya gazeta" wrote in a July 11 editorial.
"The state has not resolved the migration question and this means that Kondopoga, Manezh Square, or Biryulevo could be repeated at any moment.... The Kremlin has absolutely no interest in a left-wing or nationalist protest in Russia being headed by experienced militants."
So how relevant is the Milosevic experience to Putin's fate?
A couple things here. First, the line between Milosevic's abandonment of the "Greater Serbia" project and his fall from power was not a direct one.
Nearly four years passed from the signing of the Dayton Accords, which ended hostilities in Bosnia in December 1995, until Milosevic's fall in October 1999 -- a period in which he weathered the loss of nationalist support, a series of noisy street protests in Belgrade, another war, in Kosovo, and a NATO bombing campaign.
And second, when Milosevic finally went down it was by no means preordained.
Pro-Western liberals and student activists were the most visible participants in the massive demonstrations that followed the flawed 1999 presidential election, and those demonstrations certainly played a role in the Serbian strongman's downfall.
But the death blow was actually dealt behind the scenes and away from the crowds, in the back seat of a Mercedes SUV cruising Belgrade's backstreets.
It was there, according to media reports, where Milorad Lukovic, one of Milosevic's most brutal henchmen, cut a deal with opposition leader Zoran Djindjic, the German-educated darling of the liberals who would later go on to serve as prime minister until his assassination in 2003.
Milosevic had ordered the paramilitary police unit Lukovic commanded, the Red Berets, to open fire on the demonstrators swarming Belgrade's streets and squares. Djindjic reportedly convinced him not to do so, persuading him that Milosevic was finished.
"The hidden power structures in Serbia understood that they could not go any further with Milosevic, so they gave him up, but they wanted certain payoffs," Bratislav Grubacic, a Belgrade-based political analyst, told me back in 2003.
So in the end, it was a combination of a liberal uprising, nationalist disillusionment, and security-service disloyalty that ended the Milosevic era.
Putin could go the same way sometime in the future. But it is just as easy to imagine him hanging on to power -- provided the elite and the security services remain loyal.
And provided he's willing to spill blood.
A 260-page report issued earlier this month  -- edited by Kirill Rogov and titled "The Crisis and Transformation of Russian Electoral Authoritarianism" -- argues that the Ukraine crisis was "beyond doubt" a turning point in Russian history. (A big h/t to Paul Goble for flagging it.)
The report's authors argue that “the level of political repressions will only grow,” become more intense, and increasingly become “an inseparable part” of “the political culture” of the Putin regime.
The true Milosevic scenario for Putin could, in fact, turn out to be one in which he managed to hang on to power -- and became even more brutal.