Kosovo’s future: After Haradinaj

Tense moments before final-status talks can begin

THE face of Ramush Haradinaj stares down from billboards and posters across Kosovo's dusty capital. But alongside the images of the former prime minister, now in custody in The Hague, where he faces charges before the Yugoslav war-crimes tribunal, is a clumsily written message: “our Prime has a job to do here”. The point is to suggest that Mr Haradinaj, once a rebel commander in the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), may still have a role to play in the province, which has been run as a UN protectorate since 1999.

Mr Haradinaj's supporters, as well as Kosovo's Danish UN proconsul, Soren Jessen Petersen, insist that, during his 100-day tenure of office, the ex-guerrilla fighter was shaping up to be quite a good prime minister. Yet last week, his post was taken by Bajram Kosumi, a former student leader who was not a guerrilla fighter and was previously environment minister. For the first time since Kosovo elected a government of its own in 2001, there are no known former KLA men in power.

Kosovo's (still provisional) government is assuming ever-increasing responsibility as the UN-led administration devolves power in the run-up to talks due to start later this year on the province's final status. Before such talks can begin, according to the longstanding UN mantra, Kosovo must show progress towards a number of internationally imposed standards, in such areas as good democratic governance and respect for minorities (code for the 100,000 Serbs and other non-Albanians still clinging on in Kosovo).

The provisional government declared last week that it hoped to meet most of these standards by June. More hopeful UN representatives agree that progress is being made. Indeed, it may prove to be just enough - so long as there is no relapse in security - to permit the final talks on Kosovo's status to begin this autumn. Among the more vociferous of Kosovo's estimated 1.8m ethnic Albanians, however, patience may be running out. A recent poll taken by the UN itself showed that as many as 75% of Kosovo's Albanians were dissatisfied, one way or another, with the UN mission's progress.

But might hardliners, including ex-KLA men, pick up their guns and stones again, as they did a year ago in a sudden, savage outbreak of violence? It is quite possible. A roadside bomb narrowly failed to kill Kosovo's president, Ibrahim Rugova, two weeks ago. Occasional hand grenades and gunfire are being directed against UN soldiers. Who is behind this violence? A shadowy Albanian rebel group claimed responsibility for the attack on Mr Rugova, though NATO and UN intelligence suggests that Albanian extremists on the political fringes are at work. But the hand of Serbs, keen to disrupt any progress towards independence for their former fief, cannot be discounted either.

Feature looks at the future status of Kosovo.