NATO and Belgrade To Cooperate on Kosovo Stability

NATO’s commander for southeastern Europe and Serbia’s president agreed on Dec. 18 to work together to maintain stability in the troubled UN-run Serbian province of Kosovo during talks on its future status, the Tanjug news agency reported.

”We will do everything to prevent violence and our telephone lines will be open 24 hours a day,” Serbian President Boris Tadic said after meeting Admiral Harry Ulrich.

Direct talks between Belgrade and Pristina are expected to begin in January.

Kosovo has been administered by a United Nations mission since June 1999 when a 78-day NATO bombing campaign drove out Serbian forces in response to their crackdown against separatist ethnic Albanian rebels.

Some 17,000 NATO-led peacekeeping forces (KFOR) have been deployed throughout the disputed province.

Tensions remain high as ethnic Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the population of Kosovo, want to break away from Belgrade which considers the province to be the cradle of Serbian culture and history.

KFOR was severely criticized after it failed to halt a three-day outburst of anti-Serb rioting in the province in March 2004, that left 19 dead and 900 wounded.

More than 4,000 Serbs fled the province at the time while hundreds of their houses were burned or otherwise destroyed as well as dozens of Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries.