Putin Visits KosovoRussian President Vladimir Putin met at Pristina's Slatina Airport on Sunday with commanders of the Russian peacekeeping battalions in Kosovo and Bosnia.Putin was the first Russian president to visit Yugoslavia since the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union. Meeting with commanders of Russia's battalion in that U.N.-ruled Serbian (Yugoslav) province, Vladimir Putin sharply criticised what he called a rash adoption by the U.N. Kosovo Mission (UNMIK) of an interim constitutional framework for the province's self-government. Putin said the document was teeming with substantial shortfalls and made too many concessions to the extremists, and went on to list his objections one by one. Putin proposed in Pristina that the Balkan states sign a treaty on respect for each other's sovereignty and territorial integrity. This is the first of Russia's initiative for a global approach to the Balkan crisis, Putin said in a meeting with Viktor Kazantsev, who commands the Russian battalion serving on the international Kosovo force The international community must take steps to isolate armed ethnic Albanian extremists and terrorists in Kosovo-Metohija, as has been done in southern Serbia, according to the Russian president in Pristina, Kosovo-Metohija, on Sunday. Russian correspondents report that the purpose of the visit to Kosovo-Metohija is to demonstrate Russia's sincere interest in settling the situation in that U.N.-ruled Serbian (Yugoslav) province. It is also being stressed that Putin suddenly decided to fly to Pristina after meeting with Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica. Putin left Pristina, Kosovo-Metohija (Yugoslavia), for Moscow late on Sunday, after a two-day visit to Yugoslavia, described by both sides as highly successful and substantial. |
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