Complete failure of UNMIK and KFOR

Belgrade, June 7 (Tanjug) - The Yugoslav government assessed today that the U.N. mission (UNMIK) and peace force (KFOR) had failed completely to protect human rights in and the multiethnic, multireligious and multicultural character of Kosovo-Metohija.

A statement read out at a cabinet session by Prime Minister Momir Bulatovic said last year's U.S.-led aggression by 19 NATO states on Yugoslavia was in contravention of international law and a crime against peace and humanity.

The military aggression ended with the June 10, 1999 adoption of Resolution 1244 by the U.N. Security Council. The Resolution was preceded by adoption of Ahtissary-Chernomirdin document and conclusion of Kumanovo Military-technical agreement.

This way, the solution of the Kosovo-Metohija problem was returned to the world organization, that is, the Security Council, representing the only legitimate authority for preservation of the international peace and security.

The FR of Yugoslavia has expressed its confidence in the United Nations and has agreed with the Security Council Resolution, the most important provisions of which provide for full respecting of sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia and order cooperation with our authorities in implementation of the international military and civil presence.

The government noted that, a year later, KFOR and UNMIK, headed by Bernard Kouchner, are systematically violating the mandate given them under Resolution 1244 and obstructing its implementation in the Yugoslav republic of Serbia's Kosovo-Metohija province. They have shown they are both incapable and unwilling to put a stop to daily murders, restore law and order and guarantee safety of person and property, nor do they respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Yugoslavia. They have totally betrayed their trust.

Kosovo-Metohija has been turned into a base of international organized crime, drugs and arms smuggling, white slavery and money laundering, and remains a terrorist recruitment center.

According to the government statement, KFOR and UNMIK are open accessories to this and are directly responsible for ethnic cleansing and genocidal campaigns being waged against local Serbs, Muslims, ethnic Turks and other non-Albanians.

The Yugoslav Government takes the view that on the basis of the U.N. Charter, the U.N. Security Council must face the following facts:

During the U.N. military and civil presence in the province 5,000 terrorist attacks were carried out. More than 1,000 people have been murdered and more than 940 others abducted. Some 360,000 Serbs, Muslims, Romanies, ethnic Turks, Goranies, ethnic Egyptians and other non-Albanians have been driven out of their homes. Some 86 medieval churches and cultural and historical monuments of priceless value have been destroyed.

Meanwhile, more than 250,000 foreign nationals, mostly Albanians from Albania and Macedonia, have illegally crossed the Yugoslav border and settled in the U.N.-administered province of Kosovo-Metohija. The ethnic Albanian terrorist Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), as the armed wing of the Albanian drug mafia and allegedly transformed into a Kosovo Protection Corps, is continuing its terrorist and ethnic cleansing operations which proves it had not been neither demilitarized nor disarmed or disband, but that it keeps operating under the wing of UNMIK and KFOR and with direct help from them.

Complete failure of UNMIK and KFOR to protect human rights in and the multiethnic, multireligious and multicultural character of Kosovo-Metohija is more than evident.

The Yugoslav Government assessed that systematical violation of the Security Council Resolution 1244 obstructs the start of the political process for the solving of the province's status within the Republic of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia, in keeping with the Resolution 1244.

In line with Resolution 1244, Yugoslavia insists on an urgent re-deployment of the Yugoslav army and Serbian police in Kosovo- Metohija in order to secure Yugoslavia's internationally recognized state border and restore the legal provincial and local bodies of power and vital public services.

Restoration of peace, system, personal and property security for all the residents of the province would create the conditions for starting the process for the political solution of the problems in Kosovo-Metohija within the autonomy of this Serbian province as an inseparable part of constitutional, legal and economical system of the Republic of Serbia, which would guarantee multiethnic, multireligious and multicultural character of the province and full equality of all the citizens.

The arguments, evidence and facts confirming the above mentioned assessments by the Yugoslav Government, can be found in the Memorandum on Implementation of the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1244 which was forwarded by the Yugoslav Government to the U.N. Security Council, requesting that it be published as an official document.

Having this in mind, the Yugoslav government demands that the U.N. Security Council:

- annul all acts and decisions taken by UNMIK chief Bernard Kouchner in violation of Resolution 1244;

- condemn in the strongest terms and terminate Kouchner's operation and withdraw from Kosovo-Metohija KFOR and UNMIK which are directly responsible for systematic violations of Resolution 1244 and for immeasurable human suffering of the Serbian and other non-Albanian population and material damage caused by ethnic Albanian terrorists in the presence of tens of thousands of UNMIK and KFOR members;

-urgently take the necessary steps to secure full and consistent implementation of Resolution 1244;

-condemn in strongest terms the continuation of the NATO aggression against the FR of Yugoslavia through maintenance of the illegal system of sanctions and blockades by the NATO countries, consistent attempts of undermining the FR of Yugoslavia, materially-political and media support of ethnic Albanian separatists and terrorists in Kosovo-Metohija whose actions are in coupling with UNMIK and KFOR obstruction of the implementation of the Resolution 1244 aimed at destabilizing and breaking up territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia, changing internationally recognized borders and causing wider unstableness and conflicts in the region, with far-reaching consequences on peace and security in the Balkans;

-take all necessary measures to recover real and other injuries inflicted to the population, economy and cultural heritage of Kosovo-Metohija by UNMIK and KFOR and terrorist and criminal gangs supported by them.