KOSOVO’S NEW CONSTITUTION WENT INTO FORCE

PanARMENIAN.Net
16.06.2008 18:13 GMT+04:00

Kosovo’s new Constitution went into force Sunday, an important
milestone on its path toward full-fledged statehood. But a simmering
dispute over who has authority over this land threatens to destabilize
the newborn country and plunge the Balkans into crisis.

The Constitution envisions handing over executive power to the
majority ethnic Albanian government from the United Nations, which
has administered the province for the past nine years after NATO
intervened in 1999 to halt Slobodan Milosevic’s repression of ethnic
Albanians. It comes four months after Kosovo declared its independence
from Serbia, the culmination of a long and bloody struggle for national
self-determination, the IHT reports.

But even as Kosovo’s president, Fatmir Sejdiu, on Sunday lauded the
"historic" launching of the document ahead of what was expected to be
a low-key ceremony in Pristina, the introduction of the Constitution
threatened to unleash tensions in a territory where the international
community is already struggling to maintain a fragile peace between
the country’s 2-million-strong ethnic Albanian majority and its more
than 100,000 minority Serbs.

The two communities lead parallel but separate lives, with Serbs living
in segregated enclaves surrounded by ethnic Albanians, creating an
atmosphere of mutual suspicion, if not resentment.

Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia on Feb.

17, with the backing of the United States and the European Union,
and has since been recognized by some 40 countries. But Belgrade
and its ally Moscow are vehemently opposed to Kosovo’s independence,
which they regard as a reckless breach of international law.

For now, Kosovo remains the poor adopted orphan of the West, its
security guaranteed by 16,000 NATO troops.