VZCZCXRO0963
OO RUEHDBU RUEHFL RUEHKW RUEHLA RUEHROV RUEHSR
DE RUEHPS #0598/01 1981736
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
O 171736Z JUL 06
FM USOFFICE PRISTINA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 6303
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 0762
RHMFISS/CDR USEUCOM VAIHINGEN GE
RUFOADA/JAC MOLESWORTH RAF MOLESWORTH UK
RHFMISS/AFSOUTH NAPLES IT
RHMFISS/CDR TF FALCON
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHDC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC
RUEPGEA/CDR650THMIGP SHAPE BE
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
RUEAWJA/DEPT OF JUSTICE WASHDC
RUFOANA/USNIC PRISTINA SR

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 PRISTINA 000598 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR DRL, INL, EUR/SCE 
NSC FOR BRAUN 
USUN FOR DREW SCHUFLETOWSKI 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/17/2016 
TAGS: PREL KCRM PGOV PINR KDEM UNMIK YI
SUBJECT: NORTHERN KOSOVO SERB MAYORS NOT MASTERS OF THEIR 
OWN DOMAINS 
 
REF: (A) PRISTINA 484 (B) PRISTINA 575 (C) PRISTINA 587 
 
Classified By: CDA T. KIRK MCBRIDE FOR REASONS 1.4 (B) AND (D). 
 
¶1. (C) SUMMARY.  The mayor of the Serb-majority northern 
Kosovo municipality of Zvecan insisted to USOP that his 
decision to cut ties with the Kosovo Government was a 
reasonable expression of frustration with the failure of the 
Kosovo police to solve crimes against Serbs.  The mayors of 
the other two northern Serb-majority municipalities -- 
Leposavic and Zubin Potok -- claimed no up-tick of violence 
in their communities and were hard-pressed to defend their 
companion declarations cutting ties with Pristina.  After 
talking separately with each of the three mayors, we are left 
with the impression that their declarations were not so much 
coordinated among themselves as orchestrated by a third 
party.  Circumstantial evidence suggests that Marco Jaksic 
and his Association of Serb Municipalities is more likely to 
have served as conductor than Sanda Raskovic-Ivic and 
Belgrade's Kosovo Coordination Center.  International 
community donors are actively coordinating assistance for the 
north to maximize efficiency and engagement rather than 
merely replacing Pristina funds now rejected by the 
municipalities.  END SUMMARY. 
 
¶2. (SBU) After five weeks of deflecting USOP requests for 
meetings, the mayors of Kosovo's three northern Serb-majority 
municipalities agreed to discuss their June declarations 
cutting ties with Kosovo's Provisional Institutions of 
Self-Government (PISG).  On July 13, A/DPO, PolOff and PolFSN 
met separately with each of the three mayors -- Velimir 
Bojovic of Leposavic, Dragisa Milovic of Zvecan, and Slavisa 
Ristic of Zubin Potok.  We suspect they agreed because we 
made clear the USG is considering an increase in assistance 
to the north and because we asked Marco Jaksic, the Executive 
Order-listed president of the Association of Serb 
Municipalities, to persuade them to talk to us. 
 
ZVECAN MAYOR: SINCERELY ANGRY ABOUT CRIME 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  (SBU) Most of a recent wave of violent crimes against 
ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo, culminating in the June 1 
murder of 23 year-old Miljan Veskovic, has occurred in the 
municipality of Zvecan (Ref A).  Mayor Milovic said he fully 
supported the June 2 declaration of the Zvecan Municipal 
Assembly cutting ties with the PISG, calling it a reasonable 
response to what he called wide spread panic among his 
constituents after the Veskovic murder.  In comments that 
tracked almost verbatim those of his Leposavic and Zubin 
Potok colleagues, Milovic said Kosovo Serbs in the north have 
no issue with local Kosovo Police Service (KPS) officers 
whose role in investigating crime, they said, is confined to 
securing crime scenes for the regional KPS.  Without being 
asked, all three advocated an increase in local KPS 
responsibilities and a strong local voice in selecting 
municipal-level police chiefs.  (NOTE. Local KPS officers in 
the north are virtually all ethnic Serbs, many of whom by 
several accounts also work as plainclothes officers for the 
Serbian ministry of the interior police (MUP).  Regional KPS 
units are much more ethnically integrated. END NOTE.) 
 
¶4. (SBU) Milovic agreed that noncooperation with regional KPS 
seems counter-intuitive as a means of fighting crime.  He 
said Zvecan Serbs have nothing to lose, however, since the 
crimes are not being solved anyway and even suggested that 
members of KPS regional units might themselves be responsible 
for crimes since Kosovo Albanians officers can drive freely 
in and out of the north in their police vehicles.  Milovic 
evaded our repeated questions about clandestine MUP 
activities in his jurisdiction and said he was putting his 
hope for solving the crimes in UNMIK's international police. 
(NOTE. Amcit Gary Smith, CIVPOL regional commander for 
Mitrovica, told CDA on July 16 that Milovic is not at all 
cooperative with CIVPOL's presence in Zvecan.  END NOTE.) 
 
PRISTINA 00000598  002 OF 003 
 
 
 
LEPOSAVIC AND ZUBIN POTOK MAYORS: SINCERELY INTERESTED IN USG 
MONEY 
--------------------------------  --------------------------- 
 
¶5. (SBU)    Mayor Bojovic of Leposavic and Mayor Ristic of 
Zubin Potok readily admitted that there has been no increase 
in crime in their municipalities.  He qualified language in 
their June declarations regarding a deteriorating security 
environment as intended to support the Zvecan declaration. 
Bojovic said that in Leposavic's only recent security 
incident, 99% of local Serbs "know" that a fellow Serb threw 
a hand grenade (that fortunately did not detonate) into a 
local coffee shop for "business reasons."  He claimed that 
MUP could solve this and any other crimes committed in 
Leposavic "within 24 hours" but said they were not allowed 
to.  Ristic could not allege even a single recent breach of 
the peace in Zubin Potok and rationalized his declaration as 
an effort to force compromise in the final status process. 
 
¶6. (SBU) Bojovic and Ristic agreed reluctantly to discuss 
security and changed the subject to possible USG financial 
assistance at every opportunity.  Sports facilities, roads, 
and tourism development topped both their wish lists. 
Bojovic handed us a CD detailing possible Leposavic targets 
for USG assistance. 
 
BIRD FLU CIVIL PROTECTION COMMITTEES? 
------------------------------------- 
 
¶7.  (SBU)  With what seemed like coordinated talking points, 
the mayors downplayed the call for "civilian protection 
committees" in the declarations, saying the committees have 
been widely misunderstood.  Milovic and Ristic said 
sheepishly that these committees were originally created in 
response to requests from Belgrade and the PISG to plan for 
bird flu outbreaks and said that their mandate has been 
expanded to include civil emergencies such as floods, 
earthquakes and fires.  He added that the committees will 
have a few employees to plan disaster response but for the 
most part they will have a civilian structure based on 
voluntary work. 
 
¶8.  (SBU)  Ristic said that since there are no natural 
disasters at present, the members of these committees will be 
used to assist local police in crime prevention.  Milovic 
said citizens will observe possible troublespots and assist 
the police by reporting suspicious activity.  (NOTE.  Nebojsa 
Jovic, a leader of the hard-line Mitrovica Serbian National 
Council (SNC) and close associate of E.O.-Listed SNC leader 
Marko Jaksic made similar comments to PolOff on July 3 (Ref 
B).  Jaksic is also a member of Belgrade's final status 
negotiating team and a member of the Zubin Potok assembly. 
END NOTE.).  Milovic insisted that these are not "defense" 
organizations, and he called the Reuters report which quoted 
him as saying that 385 former members of the Yugoslav army 
will come to Kosovo from Serbia to defend Kosovo Serbs from 
Albanians "nonsense."  Ristic said that there has been 
"false" information that these committees are a military or 
security force. 
 
DISSATISFIED WITH CCK CHIEF RASKOVIC-IVIC 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶9.  (SBU) On July 13, the head of the Serbian government's 
Kosovo Coordination Center (CCK) Sanda Raskovic-Ivic visited 
Kosovo to attend the groundbreaking for a new sports complex 
in Zubin Potok.  Bojovic complained bitterly that the CCK was 
building the complex in Zubin Potok and not Leposavic.  He 
said that Zubin Potok and Zvecan always get more funding, 
because they have Ristic, Jaksic and Mitrovica regional CCK 
head Momir Kasalovic. 
 
¶10.  (SBU) Zvecan's Milovic even more pointedly criticized 
Raskovic-Ivic, complaining that she had that day taken him to 
 
PRISTINA 00000598  003 OF 003 
 
 
task over living conditions for Kosovo Serb internally 
displaced persons (IDPs) from Svinjare living in Zvecan.  He 
said 35 of those families are living illegally in unfinished 
apartment buildings without sewage, electricity or water, 
creating a health hazard for themselves and the surrounding 
community.  He said the Zvecan assembly decided on July 12 to 
close the buildings to prevent a health epidemic.  (NOTE. 
Acting SRSG Steven Schook told A/DPO on July 14 that 
Raskovic-Ivic had that day told him one of her primary 
missions is to prevent more IDPs from leaving Kosovo and 
moving to Serbia.  Schook was encouraged in this regard by a 
Raskovic-Ivic statement to the press calling on Kosovo Serbs 
to stay in Kosovo and wait out the status negotiations 
process.  END NOTE.) 
 
DONORS COORDINATING INCREASED ASSISTANCE TO THE NORTH 
--------------------------------------------- -------- 
 
¶11.  (SBU) All three mayors readily admitted that the only 
practical effect of their anti-Pristina declarations is that 
PISG funds would no longer be accepted for municipal salaries 
and projects.  International Community representatives, 
including USOP/USAID, will meet jointly with them on July 18 
to discuss security and wade through competing lists of 
proposals for quick impact projects in the north. 
 
¶12.  (SBU) COMMENT.  Pressure is building in the north (ref 
C), and these adaptive mayors are determined to parlay that 
serious circumstance into short-term profit for their 
municipalities.  The challenge for the international 
community is to coordinate assistance projects that stimulate 
economic and social development rather than merely finance 
the decision of these municipalities to reject Pristina's 
outreach.  The limited insight of the Leposavic and Zubin 
Potok mayors into their own declarations against the PISG 
suggest that a third party put them up to making them.  The 
open disdain for CCK's Raskovic-Ivic displayed by Bojovic and 
Milovic suggests that CCK is not the primary actor in the 
north.  We believe that Executive Order-listed Marco Jaksic 
-- president of the Association of Serb Municipalities and 
the Serbian National Council, member of the Belgrade final 
status negotiating team, and willing facilitator of our trip 
to visit the mayors, -- is a more likely coordinator of 
events in the north. END COMMENT. 
 
¶13.  (U)  Post clears this message in its entirety for 
release to Special Envoy Martti Ahtisaari. 
MCBRIDE