Annan urges all communities in Kosovo to vote in Saturday’s elections

With the people of Kosovo heading to the polls this weekend for legislative elections, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan called on all communities in the province to exercise their right to vote.

“I urge members of the Kosovo Serb community to participate in the election and in this way to ensure that their interests and concerns are represented and promoted within Kosovo’s provisional institutions,” said a statement issued by a spokesperson for Mr. Annan.

“Kosovo’s leaders should do their utmost to encourage Kosovo’s voters to engage in the democratic process.”

Balloting on Saturday will be for representatives to the Kosovo Assembly, part of the Provisional Institutions of Self-Government, and are the first largely organized and run by the people of Kosovo themselves.

Mr. Annan voiced confidence that the elections “will prove to be yet another significant step in the consolidation of Kosovo’s representative and democratic provisional institutions of self-government and a further demonstration of Kosovo’s progress on the path of normalization and stability,” the statement said.

Meanwhile, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Kosovo, Søren Jessen-Petersen, also urged the province’s Serb community to take part in Saturday’s elections.

Speaking during a visit this afternoon to Shtërpcë/Štrpce town, he said he understood that people were disappointed with progress so far but stressed that they had every reason to vote. “Elections are not about the past, they are about the future. The fact that there hasn’t been much progress is reason to participate, to look ahead and be part of the future,” he said.

Mr. Jessen-Petersen also praised town, with its integrated multi-ethnic assembly, as a model for other municipalities. “You represent in many ways the kind of municipality we want to see throughout Kosovo,” he said, congratulating Assembly President Sladjan Ilic for being a “wise and responsible political leader” who, by encouraging people to vote despite the unhappiness many Kosovo Serbs felt with their present condition, decided to give Kosovo a chance to move forward.

He pointed out that it was clear that if Kosovo wanted to move forward and become part of Europe there must be “significant, demonstrable” progress in the implementation of standards, especially in security, the rule of law, the protection of minorities, freedom of movement, the return of displaced persons and decentralization “with true and real local self-government.”

He was confident, he said, that Kosovo authorities understood that, and added that those who go out and vote would have every right to hold not only the international community but also those politicians that get elected accountable for results.