Vol. 8 Issue 7 - Public International Law & Policy Group

Friends and families took photos in front of national monuments honoring ethnic Albanian
fighters killed during the 1998-99 war. Other people climbed on top of cars adorned with
American flags while patriotic music blared from the speakers.
Mustachioed men wearing traditional white hats donned black leather jackets and blood red
shirts the colors of the Albanian flag as they drank free beer.
"It's getting better by the minute," said Abaz Meha, 70. "Serbia will not let us be, and their
leaders can make all the statements they want, but there is no turning back."
Tensions were high, however, in the ethnically divided north, home to most of Kosovo's
minority Serbs.
Nationalist lawmakers from Serbia which, backed by Russia, refuses to recognize Kosovo's
statehood joined Kosovo Serbs in a declaration rejecting the country's independence and its
new constitution.
"That is no state," said Nikola Blagojevic, a 22-year-old Serb resident of Mitrovica. "It is a
fake state."
But many nations, including the United States, sent congratulations on the anniversary.
British Foreign Secretary David Miliband hailed the "huge progress" in Kosovo over the past
year comments echoed by U.S. State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid.
"If you look back at where we were 10 years ago, I think there's no doubt that Kosovo now is
much more stable and is on the road to creating that multiethnic democracy," Duguid told
reporters in Washington. "However, problems remain. One cannot paper over the problems
that do remain."
Since the declaration, Kosovo's authorities have set up an intelligence agency and are
working with NATO to train a lightly armed security force. Kosovo's parliament enacted a
new constitution, and U.N. administrators handed over supervision of the fledgling country
to a 2,000-member EU mission of police officers, judges and advisers.
The EU force is yet to fully deploy in northern Kosovo, where Serb leaders have called for
the torching of EU-run customs points between Kosovo and Serbia.
Leaders on both sides have ruled out carving the territory in two, a point Thaci underlined
Tuesday when he addressed Kosovo's lawmakers in a solemn ceremony.