Migrations: Kosovo

09 December 2002

One of the most prominent issues in Kosovo � for its deeply political connotations � is that of refugees� returns. Generally precarious security conditions and reiterated attacks to non-Albanian communities since June 1999 pushed some 200,000 people - the great majority of which are Roma and Serbs - to leave Kosovo.
During the first part of the international administration, the issue of return had remained intractable both for the resistances of the Albanian community and because, by tackling it, the international community would have presumably had to face the difficult task of the definition of the international status of Kosovo.

Milosevic having left the stage in October 2000, and the relationships between the Yugoslav and Serb authorities and the international community having substantively improved since, the UNMIK (United Nations Mission in Kosovo) and Belgrade could start to confront themselves on the theme of returns.

This has initially concretised in ad hoc provisions, like the UNMIK prohibition to sell private properties without previous permission by the international community imposed on all members of the Serb community in order to prevent intimidations to minorities and to facilitate returns.
Subsequently the UNMIK and the Serb representation in Kosovo signed an agreement for the implementation of a UNHCR plan to allow returns to ten identified areas defined as non-problematic, where � according to the international administration � conditions for the integration of returnees would be more favourable.

Finally, the new Special Representative of the UN Secretary General, Michael Steiner, declared that minorities� return would constitute a top agenda item in its mandate. In May this year, the Head of UNMIK presented a programmatic document enouncing the principles upon which return will have to be based: returns will have to be voluntary and sustainable � i.e. returnees will have to be granted access to social services, freedom of movement and opportunities of employment. Another cornerstone principle is the right to return to the place of origin and not to a different area.
The document invited all international agencies present in the theatre to adopt a unitary approach to allow a first wave of returns between summer and autumn 2002, and to stimulate more meaningful waves during 2003 and 2004.

The UNHCR periodically produces a report on the state of minorities in Kosovo, a useful complement to the UNMIK document that tells of a general improvement in security conditions for minorities and of a diminution of cases of aggression. Yet for non-Albanian communities free circulation has remained extremely problematic and access to social services practically denied, so that parallel structures had to be set up in the areas inhabited by Serbs.

The UNHCR report recommends that access to public services and particularly education is granted to all inhabitants of Kosovo regardless of the costs for the international community. As regards returns, the report suggests that more importance should be given to quality and sustainability rather than numbers, working on interethnic dialogue and strengthening collaboration between civilian and military authorities on the issue.

Trafficking of human beings, especially of women for the purpose of prostitution, is a very urgent problem in Kosovo. The region, in fact, constitutes � on the one hand � a place of destination (Moldavian, Russian, Ukrainian, Romanian, Bulgarian and Albanian women are trafficked into Kosovo and forced to prostitute themselves) and � on the other - a place of origin, Kosovar women also being victims of trafficking.