Independence celebrations start in Kosovo

updated 3:49 p.m. ET Feb. 16, 2008

PRISTINA, Serbia - Tiny Kosovo — poor, mostly Muslim but feverishly pro-Western — braced itself Saturday for a historic declaration of independence from Serbia, a decade after a war that killed 10,000 people and years of limbo under U.N. rule.

The province's bold bid for statehood, expected Sunday, and its quest for international recognition set up an ominous showdown with Serbia and Russia. Moscow contends the move will set a dangerous precedent for secessionist groups worldwide.

Revelers took to the streets in giddy anticipation. Prime Minister Hashim Thaci — a former leader of the guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army — marked the eve of the new nation's birth by visiting a village where Serbian troops massacred ethnic Albanians in 1998.

"Tomorrow is a historic day in our effort to create a state," Thaci said in Prekaze, southeast of the capital, Pristina.

Later, in a nationally televised address, he said: "We are getting our independence. Everything is a done deal. The world's map is changing."

Thaci, a former leader of the now-disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army, was expected to call a special session of parliament Sunday afternoon to declare an independent Republic of Kosovo and unveil a new flag and national crest.

In the provincial capital, Pristina, the icing was on celebratory cakes and bottles of "Independence" wine chilled as the new reality sank in.

"Independence is a dream for all the people of Kosovo, and I am very happy, like everybody," said Lumturije Bytyqi, 20.

'Ready to defend our territories'
But Kosovo's small Serb population greeted the secession as though it were an amputation. Many vowed never to accept the loss of a region they consider the heart of their ancestral homeland.

"I'm asking all the Serbs to reject the monster state of Kosovo, and to do everything to prevent its birth," said Marko Jaksic, a Kosovo Serb hard-line leader.

The dancing and drum-beating that pulsed through Pristina — awash in red and black Albanian flags with the distinctive double-headed eagle — contrasted sharply with the gloom gripping the ethnically divided northern town of Kosovska Mitrovica, a Serb stronghold and a flashpoint for violence.

"We are Serbs and this will always be Serbia," said a defiant Djordje Maric, 18. "We are ready to defend our territories at all costs, including with our lives."

Although it is formally part of Serbia, Kosovo has been administered by the U.N. since 1999, when NATO airstrikes ended the late Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic's brutal crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists.

Separation threatens to set off crisis, unrest
Ninety percent of Kosovo's 2 million people are ethnic Albanian — most moderate or non-practicing Muslims, the rest Roman Catholics — and they see no reason to stay joined to the rest of Christian Orthodox Serbia.

With Russia, a staunch Serbian ally, determined to block the bid, Kosovo looked to the U.S. and key European powers for swift recognition as the continent's newest nation. That recognition was likely to come Monday at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels, Belgium.

The EU gave its final go-ahead Saturday to send an 1,800-member mission to replace the current U.N. administration. The mission is designed to help build a police, justice and customs system for Kosovo.

Thaci announced the creation of a new Cabinet ministry to focus on minority rights.

But the imminent independence of the territory threatened to touch off a diplomatic crisis and possible unrest.

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