Time up for Kosovo status talks

PRISTINA – Kosovo will declare independence from Serbia well before May, a government spokesman said yesterday as the breakaway Serbian province pressed the European Union to swiftly sign off on statehood.

“It’s not an issue of if, but when,” spokesman Skender Hyseni told The Associated Press after a meeting of Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian leadership. “Kosovo will look at its own agenda, but it will certainly be much earlier than May.”Kosovo is widely expected to announce early in 2008 that it will formally break away from Serbia, but has vowed not to do so without EU and US approval.Officials said a declaration of independence is expected sometime in January or February.That would start a 120-day internationally supervised transition, during which the US and other countries would recognise the new state and the UN would hand off administration to the EU.It remained unclear whether the province’s leaders would wait until after Serbian presidential elections, which are tentatively set for January 20.Hyseni said Kosovo ‘is only going to follow its own roadmap’ and would not be pressured into putting off a declaration solely because of the Serbian ballot.Kosovo’s outgoing prime minister, meanwhile, urged the EU on Monday to bring the province’s eight-year quest for statehood to a quick conclusion.The EU must “recognise the need for immediate and permanent conclusion of this process,” Agim Ceku told the AP in an interview as foreign ministers of the 27-nation bloc discussed the crisis in Brussels, Belgium.Nampa-AP”Kosovo will look at its own agenda, but it will certainly be much earlier than May.”Kosovo is widely expected to announce early in 2008 that it will formally break away from Serbia, but has vowed not to do so without EU and US approval.Officials said a declaration of independence is expected sometime in January or February.That would start a 120-day internationally supervised transition, during which the US and other countries would recognise the new state and the UN would hand off administration to the EU.It remained unclear whether the province’s leaders would wait until after Serbian presidential elections, which are tentatively set for January 20.Hyseni said Kosovo ‘is only going to follow its own roadmap’ and would not be pressured into putting off a declaration solely because of the Serbian ballot.Kosovo’s outgoing prime minister, meanwhile, urged the EU on Monday to bring the province’s eight-year quest for statehood to a quick conclusion.The EU must “recognise the need for immediate and permanent conclusion of this process,” Agim Ceku told the AP in an interview as foreign ministers of the 27-nation bloc discussed the crisis in Brussels, Belgium.Nampa-AP