This was an attempt to bring together the north Kosovo Serbian community with the Pristina diplomatic community to reengage on practical issues of local concern. Not all of the internationals felt comfortable doing this on their own. The Americans did not feel safe even going into the north. The meeting was held in our UNMIK Mitrovica HQ. (I did not draft these minutes.)
UNMIK Participants: Gerard Gallucci, RR Mitrovica; Andrei
Efimov, SPA Mitrovica; Detlef Beisiegel, MR Leposavic; Jean-Luc
Sintes, MR Zubin Potok; Alex Melbourne, OIC MR Zvecan, michail
Krasnoshchekov, PAO/SRSG, Svetlana Pencheva , PED, Mitrovica, LtCol.
Noel Joyce, Senior MLO Mitrovica, Lt.Col. LeMarec, KFOR.
Serbian participants: Momir Kaslovic, Head of regional CCK,
Srbrolujb Milenkovic, Chairperson of UAM Advisory Board, Dragisa
Milovic, MAP Zvecan, Slavisa Ristic, MAP Zubin Potok; Velimir
Bojovic, MAP Leposavic
Participants of International Liaison offices: Zoltan
Balazs, Deputy Head of Office, Hungary; Ruairi O’Connel, Deputy
Head of Mission, Bristish office; Ann-Sofie Nilsson, Head of office,
Sweden; Gloria Di Luca, Deputy head of office, Italy; Wim Peeters,
Head of Mission, Belgium; Margriet Struijf, Head of Office,
Netherland; Sergey Bazdnikin, Head of Chancery, Russuan Federation;
Yvana Enzler, Head of Mission, Swiss LO; Wolfgang Koeth, EC Office;
T. Kirk McBride, Chief Political and economic Affairs, USA; Heidi
Hakone L Barrachina, PO, US Office, Eugen Wollfarth, Head of German
LO, Pierri Johan Kuan, Norweegian LO, Rodolphe Richard, Deputy head
French LO, Christos Tzavaras, Head of Greek LO, Christian Siegl,
Deputy Head of Austrian LO.
The Regional Representative of Mitrovica Mr. Gerard Gallucci welcome
international participants at the first part (without locals) of the
meeting of the Mitrovica Focus Group (MFG). He said that the MFG is
seen as continuation of the initiative “Friends of Mitrovica”
that commenced in early 2004. The MFG is a group with focus on
Mitrovica region, the stickiest problem of Kosovo and it is good to
see international stakeholders with an interest what the
international community can do to keep the place calm and peaceful.
MFG is not focused specifically on the north. The next meeting
hopefully will embrace all six MAPs of the region. The CA in
Mitrovica has been developing relationship with the three northern
municipalities and UAM and keeping the relationship with Albanian
from the south part of the region. CA is seeking to develop
relationship of engaging them positively with the International
Community and even offer them some solutions related to the every day
problems of local communities. The population in the region has
problems with insufficient drinking water usage, and K-Serbs and
K-Albanians have found it possible to meet and talk to each other to
address this issue. We want your engagement and financial support and
we are particularly interested in dialogue between northerners and
the international community.Our concern is how to hold the north,
which we find to work with us. Serbia might advise them to cease
cooperation as it happened with Education. We find it important to
give the northerners opportunity to be heard, listening has had
positive effect, a focus helping them with a practical concern. They
have been advice to keep politics to a minimum when coming here. They
will be bringing with them a list of priority quick impact projects
of most immediate impact. (QIP). The international community is a
good listener and a positive partner.
At the second part of the meeting K-Serbs joined it. The RR gives the
floor to K-Serbian participants for brief presentations:
Miomir Kasalovic, Head of Regional CCK. He welcomes
participants in his name and on behalf of Sanda Raskovic-Ivic. He
presented issues in his opinion comprising the biggest burden for the
population in Northern Kosovo:
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Internally displaced persons ( IDPs). There is no adequate accommodation for them and we would like to provide such for everyone.
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Roma IDPs. It’s one of the huge burdens, for which we need to find solution.
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Employment. It is much needed for IDPs, to have jobs and provide incomes for their families. The CCK is doing as much as possible, but its recourses are rather limited.
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Infrastructure. The road network is in worse state than in 1999. Even what we had has been damaged by heavy KFOR vehicles. We want to improve the road network and to have investments in the road infrastructure
These problems are problems of all ethnicities. I am not going to
count everything else we miss and need, but let us start from the
basic issues.
Dragisa Milovic, MAP, Zvecan. He welcomes participants.
He is MAP of a municipality with 17,000 populations. All problems
which have been mentioned by Mr. Kasalovic are common for all
northern municipalities. For the first time we stay around the table
with people who are willing to help us. More attention has been paid
until now to the Albanian community.
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Infrastructure. If you have visited northern municipalities you should have seen the condition of roads there. The infrastructure needs to be improved. The municipality has put efforts but its resources are strongly insufficient.
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IDPs. There are 4,000 IDPs for which only the municipality takes care. Not much has been done for providing decent conditions for IDPs. We fully support new UNMIK approach that allows people to choose to live where they feel comfortable.
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Employment. There is 3,000 unemployed in the municipality, many of them former Trepca workers. We see the solution in opening mines and creation of small and medium size enterprises with 10-50 employees. There are good conditions in the municipality for stock breeding, fruit production, and tourism. Municipality Zvecan has prepared projects and can offer solutions for all these.
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Tourism. Favourable conditions for tourism stay with Banjska mineral spa, where 5,000 people were coming yearly for treatment and rehabilitation till 1999
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Sports facilities. There are not such facilities in the northern part of Kosovo and they are much needed especially for the young generations. To keep young people away from drugs we need to offer them employment, jobs and alternative activities.
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Available experts in all fields. We have experts in all fields who are currently unemployed. What is needed -- a little support and chance to do what they can. We have relevant projects and you may wish to look at them.
Salvias Rustic, MAP Cubin Pothook. He thanks for the
opportunity to talk to internationals on practical matters without
touching upon politics. If we succeed to solve problems of people for
their every day life we shall solve also the political problems. I am
MAP of North-West municipality, which had just 10,000 populations
till 1999, now the number is much bigger due to many Dips that
settled there from other places like Croatia and Bosnia. There is one
KA village in the municipality Qabra with 1,200 inhabitants. Zubin
Potok had its economic development till 1999. It has resources for
pure drinking water for half of Kosovo population. It has plans for
development of tourism: we have the lake and the mountain Mokra Gora.
There is a hydro station and electric energy is produced in the
municipality. The problems in Zubin Potok are:
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Unemployed young people-key problem of the municipality. We want Zubuin Potok to get help in opening new jobs.
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We need a Health House (polyclinic) to improve health care and for emergency cases of patients, because the hospital in North Mitrovica is very far.
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Problems with local road infrastructure. There 64 villages in Zubin Potok in the mountains. Their connection with roads is very bad. In past years some roads have been damaged by heavy KFOR vehicles. The state of streets within Zubin Potok is similar and we need to improve this.
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We need 100 accommodations for IDPs and vulnerable families and individuals.
Velimir Bojovic , MAP Leposavic. The problems in my
municipality are the same like mentioned by my colleagues. Leposavic
has 20,000 inhabitants. There are 3 Albanian villages, factory for
small metal parts in Lesak, “ Parva petiletka” factory in
Leposavic, and factory “ Hrast”. Trepca is operational only in
Leposavic, where there are two mines. In the past there were several
thousand workers in Trepca, but today only 520. Problems we are
facing in Leposavic:
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Some problems are related to Belgrade’s policy.Raw materials are imported from Serbia and final products are exported back to Serbia, so custom duties are paid twice.
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There are very good resources for cattle breeding, fruit and berry production, people are interested to work in this field. However, there is no equipment for storage and also credits with favourable conditions are needed.
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There are excellent conditions for tourism. Nothing has been yet constructed on the southern part of Kopaonik Mountain and there are 200 days of snow there, favourable for winter sports.
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There is a spa which waters are favourable for skin diseases near Socanica in the village Kievcice, Elernska reka.
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Other needs are new schools, kindergarten and sports facilities. Leposavic has very good achievements in sports and we would like to provide opportunities for our young generations.
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We have completed the Strategic development plan for Leposavic- (the Development Agenda under mitrovica Initiative project).
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Unemployment levels exceed 3,000. there are experts in all fields. We need minimum conditions and credits to generate income.
Srbroljub Milenkovic, UAM. He welcomes participants. What are
needed in the north are 200 accommodations and 1,000 jobs. Our share
of municipal capital investment is 10,000 only and we cannot do much
with it. The northern part of Mitrovica comprises 1/5 and there are
approximately 20,000 inhabitants of which 5,000 IDPs from all over
Kosovo. The northern part of Mitrovica is highly multiethnic with
Albanians, Turks, Bosnjaks and Gorani living there. However, all
economy after 1999 has remained in the south. All facilities such as
Cultural centre and sports facilities have been built in the south
and there is nothing in the north. In the same time we need these
strongly. We also need schools, especially secondary, a Trade centre,
green market and kiosk market in order to create favourable
conditions for trade and create new jobs. We cannot do much because
of very limited budget: for capital investments this year we have
only 10 000Euro. These all are important for creating working places.
We have very good experience with EAR which funded 2 million heating
plant located in the north bur providing heating for both parts of
Mitrovica. Under existing financial conditions we even cannot order
technical design of a project. Just imagine we will spend all our
money for design but afterwards fail to generate donors’ support
for its realization.
Representative of EU informed the meeting that the Union
committed for 2006 10,5 million Euro for Mitrovica and Zvecan and is
prepared to provide 7 million Euro for infrastructure projects in
Kosovo. He advised MAPs to consider best options to join these
projects. However, he reminded that in accordance with EU rules all
proposed projects should contribute to EU integration of Kosovo and
for multiethnic links.
MAP Zvecan assured that there will be full transparency and
control over donated money. He also stressed that infrastructure
definitely relates to all communities.
Momir Kasalovic, asked by RR to provide assessment of
political situation, said that there are a lot of concerns on
K-Serbian side. Regarding security (explosions during last four
days), regarding statements about independence of diplomats
representing important countries, regarding lack of returns,
regarding “double standards” applied by IC for different
communities. It is all unacceptable for K-Serbs. However, they are
trying their best to maintain contacts with IC in order to decrease
tension (the last meeting was with Frank Wisner). Especially good
understanding exists on regional level in Mitrovica.
