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KOSOVO-SERBIA-POLITICS-ARMY-DEFENCE
Kosovo asserts independence with vote to build an army
PRISTINA, Dec 14, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Kosovo lawmakers vote Friday on whether
to give the small Balkan country its own army, a US-backed symbolic show of
independence that has inflamed tensions with former wartime foe Serbia.
The former Serbian province is currently guarded by NATO-led peacekeeping
troops, who have been stationed there since Kosovo broke away from Belgrade
in a bloody separatist war in 1998-99.
The new law lays out a plan to double the size of a small crisis-response
outfit, the Kosovo Security Force (KSF), and gradually transform it into a
professional army of 5,000.
“Soldiers, congratulations on your new assignments!” Kosovar President
Hashim Thaci told KSF members on the eve of the vote, dressed in camouflage
fatigues.
“KSF is ready for a new role and mission,” he added, with the law expected
to pass without a hitch.
Many Kosovo Albanians are ready to celebrate the army as a new pillar of
their independence, which was declared in 2008 but has never been recognised
by Belgrade.
“Now we can say that we are a state, there is no a state without an army,”
Skender Arifi, a 37-year-old hairdresser in Pristina, told AFP.
“It is a great joy for the citizens of Kosovo,” said Hamze Mehmeti, a 67-
year-old pensioner.
– Serb Kosovars against plan –
While it is a mostly a symbolic flaunt of Kosovo’s declared statehood,
Serbia — which still considers the former province a renegade territory —
has castigated the move as a threat to regional stability.
In particular, Belgrade has sounded the alarm over the safety of 120,000
Serbs still living in Albanian-majority Kosovo, mainly in the north near
their contested border.
Those Serb communities are loyal to Belgrade and also broadly against the
army plan.
“We do not want a Kosovo army here,” said Marko Djusic, a Serb resident of
Dren village near the border, adding that he prefers the international
peacekeepers.
“I hope that even if Albanians make some moves (against) us, the state of
Serbia will do something to protect us,” he added.
NATO, which has four members that do not recognise Kosovo, has warned that
the army move is “ill-timed” amid already strained ties between Pristina and
Belgrade.
But Washington — Kosovo’s pre-eminent ally — has voiced public support,
as has the United Kingdom.
Roads across the country were adorned with American flags on Thursday in a
sign of gratitude for the US support.
Writing on Twitter Thursday, US ambassador Philip Kosnett hailed the vote
on KSF’s transition as “historic”.
But he added that the parliamentary session and “ceremony should be
occasions for solemn reflection” and “re-dedication to peace”.
Leaders should now “focus energy” on the dialogue with Serbia, he added.
– ‘Worst nightmare’ –
Kosovo and Serbia have struggled to make progress in faltering EU-led talks
to normalise their ties — a condition for either state to eventually join
the bloc.
Their relationship took a serious plunge last month after Kosovo slapped a
100 percent tariff on Serbian goods in revenge for Belgrade’s attempts to
undermine it on the world stage.
Serbia has blocked Kosovo from various international organisations,
including the UN, and also lobbied foreign governments to revoke their
recognition of its statehood.
On Thursday, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic described the Kosovo
problem as his “worst nightmare”.
“I go to bed with it, I wake up with it, and I do not sleep a lot.”
Analysts say the army move is also partly an attempt by Kosovo’s government
to make up for a slew of setbacks in recent months.
In November Kosovo was crushed when the global police organisation,
Interpol, rejected its application to become a member.
Pristina blamed the failure on Belgrade, whose Interpol representatives
openly celebrated when the vote failed to pass.
Another source of widespread public frustration in Kosovo is the lack of
visa-free travel status in the European Union, which other Balkan states
enjoy.
“After the failure to join Interpol and visa liberalisation, the
transformation of the KSF is their only card left, and this is why they are
trying to push forward this process by any means necessary,”said political
analyst Imer Mushkolaj.
BSS/AFP/GMR/0956 hrs