Kosovo Serb leaders condemn UNMIK idea of setting up protectorate in north

Text of report by Serbia-Montenegrin radio Kontakt Plus on 2 August

[Announcer] Representatives of the Serb National Council [SNV] for Northern Kosmet [Kosovo-Metohija] and the Association of Serb Municipalities and Communities of Kosovo-Metohija today sharply criticized the work of deputy UNMIK [UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo] chief Steven Schook, especially his position that northern Kosovo should be placed under international protectorate. The chairman of the Serb National Council, Milan Ivanovic, told a news conference in Kosovska Mitrovica that UNMIK's initiative to place northern Kosovo under an international protectorate would not be implemented, because neither Kosovo Serb political representatives nor officials in Belgrade would accept it.

[Ivanovic] In this way they are trying to define institutions elected in a legitimate manner as institutions of minor importance, and they are trying to give those institutions their tutors, [make them] a protectorate, and annul the will of the people expressed in local municipal elections three years ago. This is an attempt to create a protectorate within a protectorate or in a figurative sense, this is an attempt to place the Serbs from northern Kosovo-Metohija into the solitary cell of a prison.

[Announcer] At the same news conference, the chairman of the Association of Serb Municipalities and Communities of Kosovo-Metohija, Marko Jaksic, said that the announcement that northern Kosovo should be placed under a protectorate was an attempt to forcibly integrate Serbs into Kosovo institutions.

Source: Kontakt Plus, Kosovska Mitrovica, in Serbian 1400 gmt 2 Aug 06