Kosovo botst met EU over EULEX-missie (en)
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The president and prime minister of Kosovo have walked out of talks with EU representatives in the first serious bilateral rift since Kosovo declared independence last year.
The talks in Pristina on Thursday (27 August) were designed to soothe ethnic Albanian fears over a new police co-operation agreement between the Serbian interior ministry and the EU's police mission to Kosovo, EULEX.
The co-operation protocol will help Serb and EU police share information on cross-border organised crime and is a pre-condition for Serbia to obtain visa free travel to the EU in 2010.
But Kosovo leaders said that EULEX' direct dealing with Serbia undermines its attempt to establish a sovereign state.
"The Kosovo leaders reiterated in the meeting their firm position against the protocol and emphasised that from today any debate and discussion on this issue is completely closed. Kosovo does not take any obligation and responsibility for issues which it has not decided in a sovereign way," the office of Kosovo president Fatmir Sejdiu said.
The statement came after Mr Sejdiu and Kosovo prime minister Hashim Thaci ended their meeting with EULEX chief Yves de Kermabon and the EU's civilian representative to Kosovo, Pieter Feith.
The police protocol has stoked wider anger in the majority ethnic Albanian population in Kosovo.
On Wednesday, the ethnic Albanian Vetevendosja ("self-determination") movement attacked EULEX vehicles in events leading to 21 arrests. The group is planning further, large-scale demonstrations.
"We want the Republic of Kosovo to join the EU. But what we need are economic experts, doctors, scientists to help us develop. Not EU policemen to rule over us in a completely unaccountable way," Vetevendosja leader Albin Kurti told EUobserver.
Mr Kurti said Serbian police were involved in the killings of ethnic Albanian civilians in the 1990s. "They are criminals. They killed 12,000 people and only a dozen or so of those responsible are in prison," he said.
Serbia's minister for Kosovo, Goran Bogdanovic, stoked tensions further in comments published in the Serbian Vecernje novosti newspaper on Thursday.
"With this document [the police protocol], the EU is confirming Serbia's integrity even on the areas that our country does not have full control over," he said.
Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in February 2008 with the backing of the EU institutions and the US administration. Twenty three out of 27 EU states have recognised its sovereignty. But Greece, Cyprus, Slovakia and Romania have not.