Celic: Favorable winds are blowing, time to demand substantial autonomy for Serbs

Considering the changes in Washington and some new winds blowing from there, I believe the time has come for the political representatives of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija to put forward a political demand for substantial autonomy, without touching the status of Kosovo as defined by UN Resolution 1244. Some institutional guarantees must exist for the survival of the Serbian population in Kosovo and Metohija, Dr. Dusko Celic, assistant professor at the Faculty of Law in Kosovska Mitrovica, said in a podcast.

He assesses that such a demand might sound revolutionary to Brussels at this moment, but it is deeply in line with Resolution 1244 – if it envisions substantial autonomy for Albanians, then it is completely natural for Serbs to demand the same. Moreover, as he says, Kurti has provided countless arguments that new solutions must be sought because the existing ones are ineffective in protecting the rights of Serbs.

Interlocutor of Kosovo Online says that the solutions from the Brussels process were not in the interest of Serbs and that the choices were always between more or less bad options. He also reflected on the negotiations in Vienna in 2006 and 2007, in which he directly participated as a member of Serbia’s legal team.

"Lajcak, who was supposed to be a mediator, was practically a negotiator for Priština. Many negotiators from Brussels will tell you that. The Brussels process is accompanied by different international circumstances and conditions on the ground compared to the Vienna talks. Back then, we had a promise from Russian representatives that any solution not accepted by the Serbian side would not pass in the Security Council. Thanks to the Russian Federation, the Ahtisaari Plan was not adopted – it was a unilateral act. Even then, UNMIK's bias was evident. UNMIK openly and bluntly sided with Pristina during those negotiations. They provided them with logistics and advice, even formally sat on the same side of the table,” Celic said.

At the Brussels table, an agreement was reached on a Joint Commission on Missing Persons, from which our interlocutor does not have high expectations. Although around 1,600 people are missing in the territory of Kosovo, he argues that Albanians are monopolizing and abusing the issue.

"There will be no results due to Pristina’s obstruction. Belgrade has positively resolved several of Pristina’s requests, while not a single Serbian request has been resolved in return. They refuse to hand over the archive of the so-called KLA, even though it is well known they kept records. That archive contains information about the dead and missing – primarily Serbs, but not only Serbs,” Celic said.

He believes that Serbs are caught in a vicious circle when it comes to property and legal matters in Kosovo, both due to issues with notaries and the falsification of cadastral data, as well as Pristina’s attempts to impose property taxes.

"There are no notaries in Kosovo and Metohija who are not Albanian, making it an exclusive Albanian profession. That is just the tip of the iceberg. Pristina’s discriminatory actions are evident since no Serbian candidate has been able to obtain a license. On the other hand, when it comes to property rights, the foundation is the cadaster, which is not regulated. Our authorities evacuated a large portion of the cadastral records in 1999, and Pristina, with the help of UNMIK, created a sort of cadaster that lacks the presumption of absolute accuracy, thus opening the door to massive abuse,” he explained on the show KOntext.

He points out that powers of attorney are often forged in the names of deceased individuals or those who were expelled and live outside Kosovo, and such forgeries are used to transfer property rights from one person to another.

"Unfortunately, the numbers are almost unimaginable in Europe or anywhere else in the world. More than one million cadastral parcels in Kosovo and Metohija have been usurped by Albanians – these are properties belonging to Serbs. That is almost one-third of all parcels. Around 70,000 lawsuits are ongoing related to apartments, houses, and land owned by Serbs, who are being denied their right to a fair trial,” Celic stated.

He adds that the complex name of the University of Pristina with a temporary seat in Kosovska Mitrovica reflects the essence of its current status. He spoke about the period when the university was forced to leave Pristina and how it settled in its new location. He noted that the cancellation of payment systems significantly hampers faculty operations, but that the university is also endangered by other unilateral actions from Pristina.

"All of this has affected the number of students, but there is no drastic downward trend. In fact, the Faculty of Law had significantly more students last year than the year before. Across the entire university, the number dropped by 5 to 9 percent compared to previous years, but we still have around 9,000 active students,” Celic said.

You can check the video segment to learn how he sees the future of the University in Mitrovica, why he believes it should not be under the jurisdiction of the Community of Serb Municipalities, and other topics from Dusko Celic’s conversation with Dragana Biberovic.