Will party intelligence services be dissolved? (Zëri)

Zëri reports on the front page that UNMIK and Western diplomatic circles in Pristina believe that party intelligence services in Kosovo (at least two structures are being mentioned – LDK’s and PDK’s) must be dissolved. ‘The question that arises is: how should this be done?’ asks the paper.

Unnamed Western diplomatic sources told Zëri that these services should be dissolved without too much political and media noise in order to enable local political authorities to focus on key issues related to the resolution of Kosovo’s political status. In the meantime, international and local police and justice would handle the accusations that surfaced after the PDK submitted the document.

The same sources claim that high diplomatic circles in Pristina have told the two main political leaders Ibrahim Rugova (LDK) and Hashim Thaçi (PDK) to launch immediate steps toward dissolving the party intelligence services.

Zëri says that at the same time, the International Administration, at least in its public statements is pretending that it knows nothing of these sensitive issues by constantly repeating that the only address for such topics should be the police and justice. In reality, UNMIK could react immediately as far as the intelligence services are concerned because they enter the domain of his reserved competences.

‘The public opinion in Kosovo doesn’t know if there is an agreement for co-existence between UNMIK and these services, which could have been used by party intelligence services as a license to operate in the last couple of years,’ the paper added.

Is it possible, the paper asks, that UNMIK knows nothing of their existence, when even the ordinary citizen knows about this after the surfacing of stories about the document of these services?

The sources claim that UNMIK could initiate the dissolution of the structures in two ways. According to the first option, the issue of security would be addressed at the Kosovo Forum. In such case, within talks for security in Kosovo a join conclusion would be reached for the necessity to dismantle the party intelligence services. The other way would be to strengthen the process of transfer of competencies in security and justice to create the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Order in September.

Adding to the issue, Zëri notes that without a prior agreement between the leaders of the four main political leaders it will be very difficult to move ahead on issues of security and justice. ‘In fact it seems that one of the reasons for the latest tensions between the government and opposition is related to the possibility that in September the government will have two very important ministries,’ the paper concluded.