Saturday, December 17, 2005

Albanians of Preseva Valley seek rights similar to Kosovo Serbs

Excerpt from report by Kosovo Albanian television KohaVision TV on 16 December

[Announcer] Albanians of the Presheva [Preseva] Valley seek similar position as the Serbs in Kosova [Kosovo] and they are trying to achieve this through work and consultation with the Kosova Negotiating Team, said participants of a meeting between the Advisory Council for Communities and the representatives of the Presheva Valley. The head of the Council Veton Surroi met also representatives of Ashkali [Roma] community in Kosova.

[Reporter Blerta Dalloshi] Presheva Valley has set up a working group for the establishment of a political platform which would be handed over to the Kosova Negotiating Team. This platform would be completed and passed on soon, said participants of the meeting of Presheva Valley representatives and the head of the Advisory Council for Communities Veton Surroi. This platform would include the problems Albanians of Presheva Valley are faced with. Meanwhile, Veton Surroi said after the meeting that next year Kosova is expected to decide about the judicial status of communities. It would be good if Serbia did this as well, said Surroi.

[Veton Surroi] In Kosova talks on decentralisation are ongoing and there is realistic need for decentralisation in order to place the authority closer to the citizens, but this is also a needed to take place in Presheva, Bujanovc [Bujanovac] and Medvegja [Mendvedje]. In Presheva as well as Bujanovc decentralisation is badly needed. If these are a good will on the Belgrade side - and Belgrade's persistent to see decentralisation take place in Kosova - it would be good, very good if this process took place in Presheva and Bujanovc municipalities.

[Reporter] According to the head of the Advisory Council for Communities the return of displaced persons in the Medvegja municipality is necessary. Not long ago there were 5 thousand inhabitants in this municipality, whereas today there are only 750. This comes as a result of fear from massive presence of police and security forces.

[Veton Surroi] Future resolutions will be of positive discriminatory nature. If we in Kosova manage to establish high standards of positive discrimination there is no justification why these high standards cannot be put in place by Belgrade regime and be implemented to meet the needs of the population.

[Reporter] The contacts of the Advisory Council for Communities with the municipal authorities of Presheva will continue in the future.

[Ragmi Mustafa, Presheva Mayor] Naturally during this process, as Mr Veton Surroi promised, we will have other meetings in order to stay in permanent contact, to draw a parallelisms between Serb requests for more rights in Kosova with our demands, we want to be on the same level.

[Reporter] Representatives of the Advisory Council for Communities met also with the representatives of Ashkali community, headed by Sabit Rrahmani. They [Ashkali representatives] sought to have a municipality which would involve a number of villages inhabited mainly by Ashkali. [Passage Omitted]

Source: KohaVision TV, Pristina, in Albanian 1800 gmt 16 Dec 05

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Reading at the few comments at the top, it just shows how Serbians really think. People like Ivan have no human dignity. I lived in Preshevo wally during the Tito era. Even then when Jugoslavia was known to have treated minorities fairly, Serbians always hated somebody. I studied in Belgrade, I could still hear the echoes of the word "shiftar," even being spoken by professors at the University. I do feel sorry for the misstreatment of some Serbs in Kosovo, but compare all the crimes Serbia has done against Albanians, Croats, Bosnians, ....Serbians should be ashamed of themselves.
Maybe we victims may forget and forgive, but history will never.

Milloshevi;s Serbians will eternally be known as Ballkan nazies.