Bad news for Nagorny Karabakh

Don't yet discount the potential of Albanian and Serbs to live together. I told Wim what the problem is, and Petersen basically agrees with me. The only difference between Petersen and me is that I blog about it and he could be much more aggressive and make it happen.

In [Petersen's] words, the process of reconciliation has not yet begun in Kosovo and, in order for this to take place; the status of the province must be clearly defined. (KosovaKosovo)

We have to thank PM Buckovski for taking Macedonia away from a certain confrontational path with Kosova. Other political factors in Macedonia, including the president, seemed to welcome the potential conflict openhearted. Bravo PM!

Speaking about the problem regarding the demarcation of the border between Macedonia and Serbia-Montenegro, Buckovski said his country was in a specific situation, because the implementation of its agreement with Belgrade was not possible in Kosovo, while international agreements prevent Macedonia from settling this issue with representatives of Kosovo. (KosovaKosovo)

I read a while ago that Serb negotiatiors were studying Game Theory in preperation for the talks with Albanian and UN counterparts.

S&M (this is probably a Metallica trademark) President Svetozar Marovic:

"The great are great and the small are small. The small would have to accept the great, more or less, but the great have to say that a solution might not be just, but is realistic, because they have no more patience to deal with the problem," he added. (KosovaKosovo)

It is suicide to not let K-Serbs participate in the Prishtina institutions.

Marovic said he met in Thessaloniki with the U.N. special envoy for the status talks, Martti Ahtisaari, and UNMIK chief Soren Jessen-Petersen, and pointed out that international representatives were mainly interested in whether the Kosovo Serbs were prepared to participate in the work of temporary institutions in Kosovo. (KosovaKosovo)

Establishing a municipality 101:

Deputy UN envoy Albert Rohan, chairman of the talks, says there are two important criteria for establishing a new municipality. "Firstly, we cannot establish fictitious municipalities. They cannot be too small, otherwise they cannot run their affairs and they are not affordable. So there must be a minimum of people living in a municipality, which goes well into the thousands."

"Secondly, it must be fairly compact and people must live in an area which is contingent -- we can't have a couple of hundred here, a couple of hundred there. So functionality and sustainability are really the two criteria," Rohan said.

The Serb team's leader, Rangjel Nojkic, said on Sunday that his side stands ready to come up with a new plan, if the one put forward by Belgrade fails.

According to Rohan, the UN Security Council will decide what to do if the Kosovo Albanian and Serbian sides fail to agree. (SE Times)

America comes from behind to give Macedonia, Albania and Croatia hope for joining the EU. I agree with VP Cheney, young blood has something good to offer to "old Europe" after all.

"[Yee] who aspire to join these organisations [Nato and the EU] help rejuvenate them and help us re-dedicate ourselves to the basic and fundamental values of freedom and democracy," Mr Cheney told Ivo Sanader of Croatia, Sali Berisha of Albania and Vlado Buckovski of Macedonia. (BBC)

Bad news for Nagorny Karabakh: Kosova's independence will not set e precedent. Serb Minister of Justice Zoran Stojković on the Montenegrin referendum:

It is in Serbia's interest to discuss referendum, because the UN resolution 1244 talks about Kosovo as part of the S&M. When S&M disappears, our negotiating position weakens terribly. We lose that which we constantly talk about, that we want to keep Kosovo based on, first of all, international declarations that guarantee internationally recognized borders and 1244 resolution. (Beta in Serbian)