BADEN, Austria --Leaders of the breakaway Serbian province of Kosovo will not negotiate the future status of the province after a December 10 UN deadline, its representatives said Tuesday after talks with Serbian officials.
"Kosovo is not ready to continue any sort of engagement after December 10," Skender Hyseni, a spokesman for the Kosovo delegation, told journalists on the second day of talks with Serbia on the province's future. The ethnic Albanian dominated province, which has been ruled by the U.N. since an international campaign to end a Serbian crackdown in 1999, wants self-government but Serbia is refusing to let Kosovo go.
European Union, Russian and U.S. mediators are leading the latest talks and are to submit a report on Kosovo to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on December 10, effectively ending negotiations between the two sides. Serbia, backed by its ally Russia, has said it is prepared to continue talks after the deadline. Hyseni noted, however, "until December 10, Kosovo will continue to be open, constructive." Belgrade and Pristina have so far failed to reach any agreement on the future of the province.
Hyseni said that Serbia refused to face up to the fact that there already existed "a de facto independent Kosovo which is awaiting international formal recognition." "I'm afraid that nothing spectacular will happen" and no agreement will be reached during the gathering in Baden, seen as a last-ditch attempt to solve the Kosovo issue, he added. "Kosovo continues to present a vision for the future, a vision of partnership...which will help both countries build up a brighter future for both their peoples," Hyseni said.
Serbia's proposals on the other hand "are a recipe for frozen conflicts... for half-solutions, which do not take neither Kosovo nor Serbia anywhere." Serbian President Boris Tadic on Tuesday detailed a proposal for self-governance for Kosovo but this was rejected by the Kosovo delegation, Belgrade sources said.
UNITED NATIONS - Al-Qaida remains determined to mount major attacks and has extended its base of support and become more adept at communicating its message and operational plans, a U.N. report said Tuesday.
At the same time, Taliban rebels fighting to regain control of Afghanistan have increased their influence not only in Afghanistan but in northwestern Pakistan and have money from the drug trade to hire foot soldiers and buy sophisticated weapons, the report said.
The report by terrorism experts working for the Security Council committee monitoring U.N. sanctions against the Taliban and al-Qaida painted a grim picture of the "persistent and real" threat from both groups whose relationship "appears close."
Since its last report a year ago, the committee said "there may have been fewer major operations than al-Qaida leaders would have liked, but the arrest or death of suspected al-Qaida-related terrorists in more than 40 countries around the world ... suggests a high volume of terrorist planning." "The frequent and widespread warnings by world leaders and counter-terrorist professionals that more attacks could occur at any time, acknowledge al-Qaida's spread, its patience and its determination," the report said.
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http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071127/ap_on_re_us/un_terrorist_sanctions
Somali immigrant gets 10 years for plotting with al-Qaida terrorist to bomb Ohio shopping mall
Nov 27, 2007
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- A Somali immigrant was sentenced to 10 years in prison Tuesday for plotting to blow up an Ohio shopping mall with a man later convicted of being an al-Qaida terrorist.
Nuradin Abdi, a cell phone salesman before his arrest, pleaded guilty in July to conspiring to provide material support for terrorists. He will be deported to Somalia after serving the federal sentence. In a 20-minute statement to the court, Abdi's attorney Mahir Sherif said his client apologized to the people of the United States, the people of Ohio and the Muslim community. He said Abdi regretted that his conviction might lead to problems for other Muslims.
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