A Settlement for Kosovo, 2007, www.seetv-exchanges.com

Full Transcript of interviews made at the EPC Policy Dialogue 'A Settlement for Kosovo', organised on 1 March 2007 by the European Policy Center and the King Baudouin Foundation.

00 :00 Cutaways Pristina city views

01 :31 Interview with Gerald Knaus from the European Stability Initiative (ESI)

The fact that Kosovo has a very weak economy and its prospects do not look so promising should not be used as an argument that Kosovo should not see its status resolved. I think the economic development will depend on things the UN has not been able to resolve and that at the moment it is looking likely that the Kosovo government will also struggle. But the sooner the Kosovo government focuses on economic and social issues and the EU focuses on these issues, the better. So having a resolution status quickly to focus on these problems I think is a good strategy.

02:04 Cutaways from the panel discussion in Brusselson Kosovo – Knaus speaking

02:12 Knaus

Since status is supposed to be resolved in a few months time, I don’t think we are far enough at all, there has been a process in Kosovo, the Kosovo development strategy plan which has thought about these issues, which has some good analysis and the analysis shows us that current trends are very worrying. Current trends are that for the next seven years you will not have large creation of jobs in Kosovo. Given the current situation on Kosovo that’s a disaster, so the Kosovo government need to provide answers very quickly. What it will do about unemployment in Kosovo?

And there really are 2 or 3 things that can be done, one is to work with European countries to facilitate continued migration. This will require hard work because the image of Kosovo is not very positive and the EU countries are very close to any new migration.

But it is possible and we’ve seen it with Bulgarians, Romanians, Baltic states, it’s possible to do it in a way that benefits both the countries where people come from and the EU countries to which they go. And this needs to be presented.

The second challenge is to find sectors, create a framework by the government for sectors like textile and clothing that are booming all around the region but where Kosovo has no production at all. Sectors which are labour intensive, where you need a lot of labour and which are export oriented, so you can create export revenues. How you can do that? Look at what Bulgarians, Romanians have done. How do you get the jobs which now go to Moldova, to come instead from Romaniato Kosovo.

How do you get the Italian companies to come and look at Kosovo? If you do these things and if you have answers on the issues of unemployment, I thinkthe post status Kosovo will be a much happier place.

03:57 Cutaways of the panelists

04:45 Interview with Tim Judah, independent journalist

After the so-called talks which are happening in Vienna, which are already just more monologues I think, that Mr Ahtisaari will maybe make a few adjustments to his plan that he will give it to the Security Council (SC), and then it will be up to the SC to decide and I think that the man with the key is Mr Putin and it’s really going to be what Mr Putin decides to do. The Russians have been saying that they are only in favour of something that is agreed between Serbs and Albanians, obviously that is not going to happen. Does he really mean it? Is he looking for a bargain elsewhere? Or will there be no resolution in SC? In which case we turn to a completely differnet scenario.

05:26 Cutaways of Tim Judah

05:32 Judah

I suspect that if there is no resolution in the SCand if it looks as though there is really never going to be one, then I suppose that Kosovo will declare independence and that the US, Britain and other countries will start to reocgnize it, yes but at that point obviously the Ahtisaari plan will be history, there will be no protection for Serbs and minorities in Kosovo, there will be no EU mission in Kosovo, there will be no so-called International Civilian Office like the High Representative in Bosnia. So, we’re into a completely different scenario.

06:06 Judah

I think that if anybody told you that they knew the answer about Mr Putin, they would be lying, because all my sources, diplomats I know, are saying they really don’t know what Mr Putin’s gonna do in the end, they don’t know if it’s part of a bargaining process or whether the signals coming from the Russians are very serious and that it means that they are not going to agree on a resolution.

It’s quite possible there will be a veto but it also is possible that if it looks like the Russians wouldn’t agree there will be no resolution presented to veto. But other people are convinced that sooner or later there will be a resolution.

06:44 Ivan Vejvoda - Balkan Trust for Democracy

Mislim da je ispravno da se zaista radi na tome da se nadje jedan kompromis, da ce sve strane biti donekle zadovoljne, nijedna strana nece biti potpuno zadovoljna jer to je u prirodi, definiciji kompromisa da svako mora od svojih maksimalistickih stavova da odustane, a ako sad proces odnosno papir Ahtisarijev posle Beca ode u Nju Jork da ce tamo jos biti prostora I za pregovoranje I za dopune, za poboljsanja tog dokumenta, za strane da koriste sva raspoloziva diplomatska institucionalna I pravna sredstva kako bi mogla svoje stavove da odbrane I onda na kraju naravno da se postigne I taj kompromis koji ce zadovoljiti I stalne clanice a I aktere na terenu jer u sustini ovde se radi o buducnosti regiona, sto znaci njegova stabilnost, njegovi integracioni procesi ka Evroopskoj Uniji, bezbednosni integracioni, dinamika, mislim da je jako vazno sto smo s Bosnom, Crnom Gorom, da je Srbija usla u Partnerstvo za Mir, to je jos jedan kolektivni bezbednosni okvir koji prosto definise ta pravila I procedure u okviru kojih mi mozemo da se krecemo, znaci ono sto cesto ponavljaju nasi lideri u Beogradu, da prosto rata nece biti oko toga, ma kakvo recenje bude bilo, naravno (inaudible) da ono bude sto bolje.

08:16 Vejvoda

Ukoliko prihvatamo pravila evropska demokratska racionalna onda to znaci da smo za stolom I da pregovaramo I da ne moze biti ljutnje ukoliko se nesto oduzi – dve nedelje, dva meseca mozda I tri meseca I sest meseci, jer mnogo je vaznije da dobijemo dobro resenje statusa koje ce biti koliko toliko prihavtljivo za sve strane nego da brzopleto sa nekim nametnutim resenjem dobijemo nesto sto ce izazvati nestabilnost u regionu. Mislim da je to smisao ovog strpljenja u situaciji kad smo svi nestrpljivi da krenemo dalje da resavamo da kazem ono sto je najvaznije u nasim zemljama.

09:04 Cutaways Pristina city and cultural heritage views

09:32 END OF TRANSMISSION