22/9/2006
Kosovo: Attacks on Serbs Continue as Final Status is Debated

A senior United Nations official expressed his outrage this week at an attack on a Kosovo Serb family in which four people were wounded in an explosion at their home in the Albanian-majority Serbian province administered by the world body ever since Western forces drove out Yugoslav troops in 1999 amid grave rights abuses in ethnic fighting.

“We condemn this act of violence directed at innocent people,” Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s Principal Deputy Special Representative Steven Schook said of last night’s blast in the town of Klina, which followed a recent spate of grenade and bomb attacks at a time when talks are underway to decide the province’s final status.

Last month assailants hurled a grenade at a café in mainly Serb north Mitrovica, injuring nine people and there have been several bomb attacks in recent days on cars, including that of Interior Minister Fatmir Rexhepi.

 “Violence cannot be a means to achieve an end. It serves no purpose and it certainly is not in the interests of Kosovo,” Mr. Schook added. He asked Police Commissioner Stephen Curtis to vigorously pursue the investigation into the attack, and called on anyone with knowledge of the incident to come forward and assist the police.

Meanwhile at the UN in New York the Security Council held a closed meeting on Kosovo in an attempt to drive forward the preparation of a comprehensive proposal for a settlement on the province's final status.  and for all possible efforts to be made to achieve a negotiated settlement this year.

In his latest report earlier this month, Mr. Annan called for more flexibility from all sides in deciding the final status of Kosovo, where Albanians outnumber Serbs and others by 9 to 1. Independence and autonomy are among options mentioned. Serbia rejects independence.