These were the words of the NATO Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen during last week’s two-day meeting of NATO Defence Ministers in Istanbul, Turkey, focusing on reviewing operations in Afghanistan and the security situation in Kosovo. ”Kosovo is facing challenges that are not of a military nature. NATO is looking into the possibility to increase its troops in Afghanistan, by reducing its troops in Kosovo”. Afghanistan, despite its improvement after a difficuelt year, is in the need of increased deployment of army and police instructors to help Afghan government forces assume responsibility for security.
Although an official decision has not been taken yet, NATO’s plans to downsize their troops in Kosovo once again to less than 4000 during 2011 does not come as a surprise. Regarding security, Kosovo has marked a significant progress, which is why the KFOR troops reduction happened recently in the first place. Werner Almhofer, Head of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe said that the OSCE Mission in Kosovo should monitor the effect of KFOR reductions on Kosovo. Despite recognizing the improved security situation in the country in general, he stressed that there are still tentions in the north of Kosovo, the situation being relatively stable, but fragile.
Meanwhile in Belgrade, Serbian media reported on a rather interesting statement made by Russias ambassador to Serbia, Aleksandr Konuzin. “By joining NATO Serbia would recognize Kosovo, because the alliance regards Kosovo as an independent state. Joining NATO would mean sharing this point of view. Serbia can’t have both NATO and Kosovo”. Furthermore, Konuzin supports the decision to whether Serbia should join NATO to be made through a referendum and stated that Russia’s relationship with other countries depend on those countries ties with NATO. “Naive people trust NATO”, Konuzin said.
NATO planning another KFOR reduction
Portugese KFOR soldier
“Kosovo is a success story”.
These were the words of the NATO Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen during last week’s two-day meeting of NATO Defence Ministers in Istanbul, Turkey, focusing on reviewing operations in Afghanistan and the security situation in Kosovo. ”Kosovo is facing challenges that are not of a military nature. NATO is looking into the possibility to increase its troops in Afghanistan, by reducing its troops in Kosovo”. Afghanistan, despite its improvement after a difficuelt year, is in the need of increased deployment of army and police instructors to help Afghan government forces assume responsibility for security.
Although an official decision has not been taken yet, NATO’s plans to downsize their troops in Kosovo once again to less than 4000 during 2011 does not come as a surprise. Regarding security, Kosovo has marked a significant progress, which is why the KFOR troops reduction happened recently in the first place. Werner Almhofer, Head of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe said that the OSCE Mission in Kosovo should monitor the effect of KFOR reductions on Kosovo. Despite recognizing the improved security situation in the country in general, he stressed that there are still tentions in the north of Kosovo, the situation being relatively stable, but fragile.
Meanwhile in Belgrade, Serbian media reported on a rather interesting statement made by Russias ambassador to Serbia, Aleksandr Konuzin. “By joining NATO Serbia would recognize Kosovo, because the alliance regards Kosovo as an independent state. Joining NATO would mean sharing this point of view. Serbia can’t have both NATO and Kosovo”. Furthermore, Konuzin supports the decision to whether Serbia should join NATO to be made through a referendum and stated that Russia’s relationship with other countries depend on those countries ties with NATO. “Naive people trust NATO”, Konuzin said.
Photo courtesy: NATO.