Long lasting friendship

Russia will help Serbs in Kosovo do without refrigerators

Russia, categorically rejecting the independence of Kosovo , nevertheless decided to provide assistance to the population of the region. President Vladimir Putin announced this yesterday at a traditional meeting with members of the Russian government. The topic of Kosovo arose in the speech of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. He said that in two weeks “the humanitarian situation in the Serbian enclaves inside Kosovo has become somewhat tense” and the Serbian government has turned to Moscow with a request to provide them with humanitarian assistance: “First of all, they are interested in medicines, medical equipment, non-perishable food, and hygiene products. We considered it important to respond to this request.”

President Putin called for avoiding politicization of this issue: “If humanitarian assistance is needed, let’s do it, but without political overtones.” He instructed Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov to “work through this issue.”

Deputy Foreign Minister Vladimir Titov said yesterday that “it is necessary to develop a delivery route and clarify the final recipients of assistance”: “These include the Mitrovica military hospital, the hospital in Gracanica, and other facilities.”

The humanitarian situation in northern Kosovo has worsened after mass clashes between local Serbs and international peacekeepers took place on March 17 in the city of Kosovska Mitrovica . The question is generally much more serious, because the continued coexistence of Serbs and Albanians in this part of the region is under threat.

Recently, the Serbian government sent a document to the UN Mission in Kosovo proposing to “functionally delimit” Serbian and Albanian areas. According to Belgrade, in those areas where the majority is Serbian population (and this is primarily the north of Kosovo with the center in the city of Mitrovica), control over the police, customs and judicial system should be exercised by Serbs, not Albanians.

“The city of Kosovska Mitrovica has remained divided into Serbian and Albanian parts since 1999. According to various estimates, from 80 to 100 thousand Serbs live compactly in the north,” Alexander Karasev, an expert at the Institute of Slavic Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Vremya Novostey. (In total, the region has more than 2 million inhabitants.) “In addition to the Serbs, several thousand Albanians and representatives of other ethnic groups live in this part of the city. In the southern part of the city across the Ibar River there are Albanians. They are integrated into the political and economic life of the rest of Kosovo. But the Serbs remain isolated and experience serious problems, especially in the field of healthcare and energy,” our interlocutor noted. He said that “long-term power outages are a very acute problem in the Serbian enclaves.” Since refrigerators are malfunctioning due to power outages, the Serbs really need non-perishable food. “Russian help is in great demand,” Serbian Ambassador to Moscow Stanimir Vukicevic thanked the Russians yesterday.

Petr ISKENDEROV