Hopes dashed

NATO and Serbian negotiators failed to conclude an agreement aimed at defusing ethnic tensions centered on two disputed border posts in northern Kosovo, leaving the region blockaded by ethnic Serb barricades.

Although Belgrade's top Kosovo negotiator Borislav Stefanovic had said the Serbian side "reached complete unity" with German Gen. Erhard Bühler, who is also the NATO force's commander, negotiations broke up late on Thursday without a finalized deal.

"Stefanovic was really optimistic, but there was no agreement," local Serb official Dragisa Milovic told reporters after the meeting.

Hopes dashed

Hopes had grown that negotiators would find a way out of the crisis after the head of Kosovo's ethnic Albanian government, Hashim Thaci, softened his initial opposition to an agreement and reached "an understanding for further steps" with Bühler.

The stalled deal would turn over the pair of disputed border crossings, Jarinje and Brnjak, to the NATO-led forces in the region (KFOR). Ethnic Serb and Albanian officials would staff the posts jointly, giving ethnic Serbs political cover to dismantle their barricades. In exchange, Pristina would ease its trade embargo against Serbia.

The crisis erupted last week after Thaci deployed special police units to take control of the border posts in order to enforce the trade embargo against Serbia. The embargo was a belated response to a ban by Serbia on goods exported from Kosovo.

An ethnic Albanian police officer was shot dead and a border post set on fire in the ensuing violence, forcing KFOR peacekeepers to intervene.

Frozen conflict

Kosovo officially declared independence from Belgrade in 2008 after breaking away from Serbia under the cover of a NATO bombing campaign in 1999. Serbia has not recognized Kosovo as a sovereign state.

Kosovo's government has recently sought to gain full political control of the Serb-dominated north, which continues to recognize Belgrade as its official capital.

Officials in Pristina accused Serbia of seeking to split Kosovo along ethnic lines.

"The core of the problem is that Serbia wants to partition Kosovo and take the north," Kosovo's Foreign Minister Enver Hoxhaj told Reuters news agency. "Partition will open a Pandora's box where insecurity, instability, and violence could spread within the region on an unimaginable scale."

Serbia, meanwhile, has accused Kosovo of escalating tensions through its unilateral police action.

"Any one-sided action in Kosovo is not good, the solution to the problem should be reached through the dialogue which has already begun," Serbian Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said.

Author: Spencer Kimball (AFP, Reuters, dpa)

Editor: Sean Sinico