By DPA
New York : The sovereignty issue of the runaway Serb province Kosovo appeared to have reached a dead end Wednesday in the UN Security Council (UNSC) as members split in two camps, with the Europeans and the US on one side describing the differences as “irreconcilable”.
The European Union (EU) members in the 15-nation council and the US said the decisive political body is not in the position anymore to play a mediating role and should let the EU and NATO continue to provide security and order in Kosovo.
Russia and other council members, on the other hand, called for continued negotiations and compliance with international law.
Russian UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin called his group the optimists who believe that negotiations can produce outcome. He even offered a ‘road map’ for negotiations.
But the EU and the US declared the council deadlocked.
“We endorsed the views of the EU, the Troika and the US that the potential for a negotiated solution is exhausted,” Belgium Ambassador Johan Verbeke said in a statement.
He was flanked by ambassadors from France, Britain, Italy, Germany and the US.
France, Britain and Germany, which make up the so-called European troika, plus the US and Russia, led unsuccessful negotiations between Serbia and Kosovo to settle the dispute.
“We would have liked the UNSC to play its role, but in today’s discussion, the council is not in a position to agree on the way ahead,” Verbeke said. He said the EU should take on its responsibility to deal with Kosovo because the current situation is “unsustainable”.
US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters following the council meeting that positions on both sides of the sovereignty dispute are “irreconcilable”.
“It’s time to move forward and we called on Russia to embrace the Ahtisaari plan,” Khalilzad said. “But, if not, the US, the EU and others are determined to move forward to implement that plan.”
Martti Ahtisaari, the former Finnish president, worked out a plan in early 2007 that would grant internationally supervised independence to Kosovo. The UNSC in July 2007 had said if negotiations conducted by the Troika, the US and Russia failed to resolve differences between Belgrade and Pristina by Dec 10, the Ahtisaari plan would be enforced.
Churkin and Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, who attended the council meeting, said any move to give independence to Kosovo without UN authorisation would be against international law.
Kostunica threatened a serious crisis, if Pristina were to unilaterally declare independence and if the EU sends a mission to Pristina without the council’s permission.
Russia, like other permanent members of the UNSC – the US, China, France and Britain – has veto power over UN resolutions.
Even before the council ended its closed-door meeting, several ambassadors came out to inform reporters of the deadlock inside.
Britain’s UN Ambassador John Sawers indicated that the leaders of Serbia and Kosovo made clear how deep the rift was between their two positions. He said he did not believe that the two sides could be brought together.
The lack of agreement came as no surprise.
The majority Kosovo Albanians – backed by the US, Balkan neighbours and leading European countries – want nothing less than independence.
Serbia, backed by Russia, wants nothing less than to retain sovereignty over the province that has been administered by the UN since NATO ousted Belgrade’s security forces to end a war there in mid-1999.
The most widely anticipated scenario envisages failure to reach a compromise in the UN, a declaration of independence by Kosovo’s authorities early next year and its recognition by individual countries, including the US and Balkan neighbours.
As a consensus on Kosovo’s independence remains elusive within the EU, the 27-nation bloc is expected to formally acknowledge the fact and leave recognition to individual member-states. On Friday, EU leaders agreed to dispatch a European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) mission of about 1,800 civilians to Kosovo in 2008, tasked with building up the province’s judiciary.