KOSOVO AND THE EU
Feb 21st, 2008 by admin
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said that the European Union’s police and justice mission to Kosovo is illegal. Responding to this is the European Union’s spokesperson for Janvier Solana the European Unions High Representative for Foreign Affairs, Christina Gallach.
Russia says that the unilateral decision of independence for Kosovo is in breach of the highest international law?
All EU member states agreed that it was essential to have Kosovo and Kosova in the new reality with an important precedent that that has one main objective to help them protect the minorities and to help them develop the rule of law which is solid in security, in particular the judiciary. So, based on the United Nations Security council resolution 1244 and on the reason of the Secretary General of the UN welcoming the enhanced rule of the EU, all the member states of the EU agreed to launch the mission. The mission is going to to be good and positive for Kosovo and for the whole region. And we think the generous contribution by member states will definitely make the Balkans more stable and not less stable.
All MEMBER STATES AGREED TO LAUNCH THE MISSION EVEN THOUGH SOME WILL NOT RECOGNIZE THE INDEPENDENCE OF KOSOVO?
This is true and we are pleased to note the unanimous position of all member states vis-a-vis these nations because everybody is interested in the territory becoming more stable. What individual member states do in relation to the recognition is up for each goverment which has to take sovereign decisions that the EU is not going to interfere with.
DOES THE EUROPEN UNION PLAN TO INVITE RUSSIA TO PARTICPATE IN THE POLICE AND JUSTICE MISSION?
We already did, in fact when we held the long process of preparation for the mission to deploy, consultations were held with five non EU contributors, the United States, Croatia,Turkey, Switzerland, Norway all very important partners of the EU. The invitation to Russia was sent to the various ministries, though there has been no response but i think all doors will be kept open.
Russia is a fundamental partner for the EU as such we want the difference of approach that we have on Kosovo be overcome and what we want in particular is that the differnce in approach now does not have an impact on other areas of relationship which are fundamental between the EU and Russia.
SEVERAL GOVERMENTS WITH BREAKAWAY MOVMENTS OF THEIR OWN ARE REFUSING TO RECOGNIZE KOSOVO’S INDEPENDENCE BECAUSE THAY ARE ANXIOUS ABOUT SETTING A PRECEDENT – DOES THIS SET A PRECEDENT FOR REGIONS WITH ASPIRATIONS OF INDEPENDENCE?
When the ministers met on monday, they had a very long and serious discussion on the issue, they came out with a clear unanimous qualification of the situation inKosovo which was a word in Latin sui generis meaning that there is no case like Kosovo, that Kosovo has no parallel and there cannot be a precedent. using the Latin word emphasized the importance of Kosovo. It is a special case therefore we are convinced that in the next coming days and weeks everyone will have to work to make the territory more stable and we can very well separate the question of recognition to making the territory a more stable place.
DO YOU BELIEVE THAT THE INDEPENDENCE OF KOSOVO WILL AFFECT THE REST OF THE REGION?
We hope that it will be for the better, having the region in an unclear situation for several years created instability. Now, that the EU is fully involved, an important presence K4. We are progressively advancing with the association process with other countries of the region. So, all together the region has a clear perspective, that sooner or later they will become part of the families of the countries of the EU, therefore we have just to work with individual countries, individual goverments with the public opinion and there is an important process of the Thessaloniki agenda and we have to help them ecconomically, politically and definitely Kosovo with the last decision of Kosovo, with all the support that is going to come from everybody. We think this is sending the right signal and we will see in the next month. But you should be convinced that this is the clear objective of the EU