UNMIK/PR/89
PRSTINA—KFOR and UNMIK Police officials, addressing the regular meeting of the Kosovo Transitional Council, reported a decrease in the levels of violence and crime across Kosovo during the past week.
UN Special Representative for the Secretary General Bernard Kouchner told the KTC—the highest-level advisory board of Kosovars -- that this had been the most stable period since KFOR arrived in Kosovo on 12 June.
“It’s not enough, but it is better than before,” Kouchner told media after the meeting, as he was leaving his Pristina headquarters for a European Donors Conference on Kosovo in Brussels.
He said the continuing problem of violent crime in Kosovo would be an issue at the conference.
“The donors must understand that if they want us and the Kosovars to decrease the level of violence, we need money for salaries, money to re-establish the administration and money to re-establish industry,” Dr. Kouchner said.
The KTC meeting began with a moment of silence observed for the 24 victims of Friday’s crash of a UN World Food Programme aircraft over Kosovo.
“I want to invite you to consider their fate whenever you think about the weaknesses of UNMIK and its international partners in Kosovo,” he told the Council of local political leaders.
Kouchner went on to tell the Council that in Brussels he would be seeking some 200 million Deutsche Marks for the year 2000 Kosovo budget, to make up for an expected shortfall in domestic revenues.
The European Union representative told the Council that more than 390 million DMs will be needed for the year 2000 budget. Much of the expenditures will be for salaries for 64,500 people expected to be employed in public administration.
Seventy percent of the 1999 Kosovo Budget of 125 million DMs comes from international donor assistance. The rest is collected as customs revenues from border points with Albania and Macedonia, where the UNMIK Customs Service has now taken in more than 20 million DMs.
To finance salaries next year, tax collection will be expanded and made more efficient, with more border crossing points, more customs officers and new domestic taxes. Residents will also start paying electricity and telephone bills.
The EU told the KTC that now that Kosovo has a budget – which was approved by an UNMIK regulation last week-- a parallel system of taxes and wages should no longer be needed. The EU representative asked members to work with UNMIK on joint financing mechanisms, in order to avoid double taxation of the people, and a mixed message to the donors.
The Council was then briefed on the upcoming registration of Kosovo’s population, set to begin before the end of the year in Pristina. In January, the process will be expanded to the rest of Kosovo and will take four to five months.
In registering the population and providing them with identity cards, UNMIK will “re-establish the public order that was seriously disturbed by the systematic destruction of identity cards during the recent conflict.”
UNMIK will also prepare a voters registration list in order to hold elections as soon as possible.
So far, he said, 90 registration centres have been identified which will be managed by UN Volunteers and local staff. Thirty more centres will be mobile.
Finally, the KTC was briefed on Saturday’s decision by the UNMIK Joint Civilian Commission to sign an agreement with Alcatel as a GSM system provider for Kosovo. Tom Koenigs, Deputy SRSG for UNMIK’s Civil Administration, explained the tender process, saying criteria included a company with state-of-the-art technical equipment, a profitable financial plan and the option of “roaming agreements” for subscribers.
“The choice of Alcatel answered all the economic, technological and political requirements of the system we sought,” Koenigs said. “We think it represents a very good deal for Kosovo.”
