Kosovo Tense but Getting More Stable, U.N. Reports

Issuing his first report card on conditions in Kosovo since the United Nations assumed its role of chief civilian authority there, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday that the province remains tense but is becoming more stable.

Annan warned, however, that many crimes and injustices still cannot be properly pursued.

“The security problem in Kosovo is largely a result of the absence of law-and-order institutions and agencies,” Annan told the Security Council. “The absence of a legitimate police force, both international and local, is deeply felt, and therefore will have to be addressed as a matter of priority.”

Countries have pledged 2,853 police officers out of 3,110 requested by the U.N. But the number of officers ready for duty in the province is far fewer.

“We don’t send figures. We send people,” a U.N. official said with a note of exasperation in his voice.

In the 25-page report sent to the council, Annan said, “The general situation in Kosovo has been tense but is stabilizing.”

The secretary-general said that killings, lootings, arsons and forced expropriation of apartments have prompted departures but that “this process has now slowed down.”

He said the level of damage in the province varies widely, with much of northern Kosovo remaining virtually untouched by hostilities.

But he warned that Kosovo’s economic outlook is dim. The remaining civil servants haven’t been paid since March. Schools need to be reopened, public transport restored and telephone service repaired.

“The public service structures of Kosovo are largely inoperative due to a combination of neglect, war damage and the departure of trained staff,” Annan wrote. “The municipalities are functioning inadequately or not at all.”

The report said the judiciary still is not functioning because many of its Serbian staff fled and ethnic Albanians or other personnel have not yet returned or been recruited.

By the beginning of July, more than 150 crime scenes had been discovered--and more are being found almost daily, the report said.

In London, meanwhile, British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook said Tuesday that forensic experts in Kosovo have uncovered the bodies of 11 children, ages 2 to 16. The bodies were discovered among 20 corpses found in the southwestern village of Celine. Sources at the British Foreign Office who requested anonymity said the corpses were believed to have come from one family and to have been shot by Yugoslav forces March 25 or 26.

In Kosovo on Tuesday, U.N. war crimes prosecutor Louise Arbour told a news conference that it is “absolutely critical” that evidence be preserved because she expected more indictments.

“There has been homicide committed in this territory of a magnitude that the international community is hard pressed to respond to,” Arbour said. “There’s every reason to believe that we will be in a position to expand on the charges that we have brought to date.”

The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia brought indictments in May against Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic and four associates for alleged atrocities in Kosovo, which is a province of Serbia, the dominant Yugoslav republic. In a reign of terror by Serbian forces, much of the ethnic Albanian population of Kosovo was forced out of the province.

Annan’s report to the Security Council said that of 756 judges who had worked in Kosovo previously, only 30 were ethnic Albanians. The secretary-general said newly appointed judges will have to receive continuous training, particularly in the area of human rights.

As an initial step, the U.N. will reestablish the Supreme Court of Kosovo, which was abolished in 1991. The court will hear appeals from decisions of five district courts.

The U.N. also is planning to set up a system of legal aid to allow equal access to the court system and ensure the presence of lawyers, when required.

“Serious violations of property rights in Kosovo have occurred before, during and after the military conflict,” the report to the council said. “There are indications that irregular property transactions were conducted in the years prior to the conflict, discriminating against Kosovo Albanians.”

A U.N. official familiar with the secretary-general’s report stressed that the world organization’s mandate in Kosovo is far more difficult than previous missions such as Cambodia, where there was an existing administration.

“We still have to fully assess how many people will be available to us,” the official said, “and how [to] reorganize the administrations in education, culture, civil service, tax collections and many others. . . . We have to rebuild everything.”

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Associated Press contributed to this report.