POLITICAL BLUFF: SERBIA PRESIDENT SENT NO LETTER TO UN, EU

New Kosova Report

11 January 2009

Although the media was notified with pomposity that Serbia President Boris Tadic would be sending a protesting letter to the UN and EU, such a move appears to have been merely a media bluff for Serbia's internal political purposes - indeed, the letter was never sent nor even written.

In this protesting letter, Tadic supposedly accused the Kosovar Albanians for allegedly causing the violence in the northern town of Mitrovica, criticizing the international community for the failure to protect Serbs. However, the letter seems to have disappeared into oblivion, perhaps intentionally by Serbian government officials. And the international community, the EU and the UN were puzzled this week about what happened to the letter, what made Tadic back off or had it been a mere bluff?

"We don't know anything about the existence of this letter," said the Czech Ambassador to the Republic of Kosovo, Janina Hrebickova.

Immediately after the urban incidents in the northern Kosovo town of Mitrovica, the President of Serbia, Boris Tadic notified on 5 January that he had sent a protesting letter to the Presidency of the EU, the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, and the members of UN Security Council. However, such a letter never arrived at those addresses.

Also, the United Nations officials say that they do not know anything about such a 'protesting' letter. They confirmed "no protesting letter has been received at the UN address."

Furthermore, the mystery around the protesting letter of Serbia President Boris Tadic does not end right there.

On Tuesday, on Serbia president's official webpage, information was published about the alleged letter and then removed without any explanation. An international official, who spoke under condition of anonymity said that Tadic has backed off from sending the 'protesting letter' to the EU and UN. He confirms that President Tadic has been contacted by the EU and the UN officials regarding the mysterious fate of the letter about which the media had been informed.

According to the same official, the response of the Serbian officials has been that Tadic had never planned to send such a letter to these institutions and was not fully informed with the true facts regarding the incidents in northern Mitrovica and the reaction of the international forces.

"They blamed the media for the exaggeration and misinterpretation of the position of President Tadic concerning the incidents," stressed the international official.

On the other side, on the same day when the media was informing about the Tadic's protesting letter being sent to the UN and the EU, the chairman of the Serbian National Council in Kosovo, Rada Trajkovic reacted accusing Serbia Government Minister Bogdanovic for using political demagogy and lack of interest to help his fellow serbs. "Kosovar Serbs are directly responsible for these incidents," was quoted Trajkovic.

Trajkovic pointed out that

"Serbs threw the handgrenade at the firemen, and Serbs attacked the team of TV Most, where they assaulted the journalist and attempted to destroy the TV camera to destroy the evidence of events during that Friday night."

Meanwhile, the Kosovar Government leadership dubbed Tadic's alleged "worthless", while the official Albanian Government has demanded an international investigation of the incidents in Mitrovica.