UNMIK/PR/1413
PRISTINA – SRSG Søren Jessen-Petersen today visited Viti/Vitina municipality, which he praised as “a municipally that overall sets a good example” towards Standards implementation.
“Standards is not just a matter of gaining status,” the SRSG told the Municipal Assembly of Viti/Vitina, “Standards is a matter of building a society. Standards is not a matter of doing a favour to UNMIK or KFOR, it is about you, about the society you would like to live in and you would like to see your children grow up in.”
“There are good efforts made here in order to reach all communities: security, Freedom of Movement, well functioning of the democratic institutions”, the SRSG said. However, he asked the Municipal Assembly for “even greater efforts in promoting returns and in making sure that the security situation remains such that all displaced persons who want to come back will indeed come back”.
The SRSG also visited the village of Ziti/Žitinje, where a community project for the reconstruction of 33 houses is being implemented, including 29 houses for Kosovo Serbs and four for vulnerable Kosovo Albanian families. “Here we see what I would like to see throughout Kosovo,” the SRSG said, “We see a local Kosovo Albanian community wanting to help Kosovo Serb returnees to come back.”
The SRSG talked to some of the Kosovo Serb families currently displaced in neighbouring villages, who were visiting and monitoring the construction of their houses and expressed their concern at the lack of water and sewage systems. The SRSG stressed his “strong determination to do personally all what he can” to make sure that these facilities would be put in place. “I find it very sad that, while we have goodwill by the receiving community, goodwill by those coming back, we cannot help because we do not have the funding” the SRSG added. “We have a responsibility to make sure that we do not let down people like that.”