Things a rolling - kinda

We are beginning to see some repositioning from the UN negotiators after the failure of three meetings to draw the two parties together.

[Rohan] said again that he could not give any figure of new municipalities that will be formed. He only stressed that any new municipality should have at least 5 000 residents and 70% of them should belong to the same ethnicity.

Albanians have already responded by offering three more municipalities for a total of 6. Serbs want 14, still. Also, I don't know if this is pure manouvering or is it really going to take beyond this year for negotiations to close.

Ahtisaari pointed out that, if a solution for the status of Kosovo is not found by Dec. 31, 2006, "we will have to live with it."

Other [EU] ministers later spoke in similar fashion, against the setting of strict deadlines for solving the status of Kosovo, especially pointing out the need for the implementation of standards in the province.

Well, we've been waiting for only seven years, or 15, depending on who's counting, we'll survive another one. I remember back in the elementary school days when my parents started hoping that by the time I entered high school everything would settle. Guess what, we had to wait many more years. Wait! Wait! Wait! It's pathetic! That's what our president Rugova taught us. One more year? Sure, we don't mind. In the meantime whole generations of students grew up studying in private houses. What's the hurry, mate?!

_______________
Albanians have been selling their property in the "Mitrovica North" for a while now. Certain state agencies from Serbia are offering cash for it, which is then offered to the Serb students from across Serbia studying in the university there. There are about 11,000 Albanians that cannot live in their homes across the river. As a result, rents in the south are exorbitant from overcrowding. Prishtina, where the population has more than doubled after the war with migration from villages and internationals, is also very expensive.

UNMIK representative to Mitrovica Jerry Galluci said on Thursday that the people may chose where they want to live as long as there is not any threat, and stressed that it is ridicules why those who remained so far in "Mitrovica North" now are selling their properties.

Is he saying to the Serbs to keep up the threat level, in which case Albanians cannot go back to their homes?

_________________
Mr. Draskovic keeps on insisting on a "a compromise solution, which would envisage respect of all legitimate rights of the Albanians, the Serbs' right to be protected with international guarantees, and respect of the U.N. Charter." Hurray for the UN Charter. Serbs are one step behind the times. This offer might have worked well before the attempted genocide, but not anymore.