KOSOVO: ASSEMBLY PASSES AHTISAARI LAWS,

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 PRISTINA 000154

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EUR, EUR/SCE, DRL, INL, AND S/WCI, NSC FOR BRAUN,
USUN FOR DREW SCHUFLETOWSKI, USOSCE FOR STEVE STEGER

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/17/2018
TAGS: PGOV PREL KDEM KV
SUBJECT: KOSOVO: ASSEMBLY PASSES AHTISAARI LAWS,
CONSTITUTION COMMISSION WRAPS UP WORK

Classified By: COM Tina Kaidanow for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (C) SUMMARY: In the four weeks since the February 17
declaration of independence, the Government of Kosovo and the
Kosovo Assembly continue to demonstrate their commitment to
the Ahtisaari Plan. The Assembly has passed 19
Ahtisaari-related laws and the Constitutional Commission has
wrapped up the public comment and review period on the draft
constitution. Of those 19 laws, four directly concern the
status of minorities in Kosovo, and nearly all contain
specific protections for the Kosovo Serb community. During
the early and final drafting sessions of these laws,
opposition political parties, Kosovo Serbs, and other
minority communities took part in the discussions. The next
goal, by the first week of April, is to pull together a third
package of around 10 laws and to finalize the draft
constitution and send it to the Assembly for approval.
Keeping Kosovar lawmakers focused on their overarching
commitment to an open, democratic, multi-ethnic Kosovo will
be a challenge in light of continuing violent provocations in
the north. END SUMMARY.

Ahtisaari Legislation
--------------


2. (SBU) On March 13, less than four weeks since
independence, the Kosovo Assembly passed 10 additional laws
directly related to the Ahtisaari Plan, bringing the total of
such laws to 19. Included in this package were several
pieces of legislation key to the protection of Kosovo Serb
interests: Rights of Communities and their Members, Local
Government Finance, and Public Financial Management and
Accountability. These three laws complement another three
previously passed: Establishment of Special Protective Zones
(which mainly deals with Serbian Orthodox Church sites),
Local Self-Government, and Municipal Boundaries, to form a
core of decentralization legislation designed to protect and
guarantee the rights of the Kosovo Serb community and other
minority communities. In the next tranche, we should see
three more decentralization laws that deal with elections,
health, and education at the local level.


3. (C) The March 13 package of laws passed by a wide margin
with 83 "yes" votes out of 95 MPs present. There were seven
"no" votes and five abstentions. While this is an
improvement over the first package passed February 20 with 77
"yes" votes, it required significant effort by USOP and ICO
during the drafting and approval process to bring along the
political opposition and some of the minority communities.
Five of the seven "no" votes in the recent package came from
MPs representing the Turkish and Bosniak communities who seek
official status for their languages throughout Kosovo, and
opposed the package when the Law on Rights of Communities and
their Members did not contain this provision. (Note: The
Ahtisaari Plan provides for Albanian and Serbian as national,
official languages, while other minority languages have
status as official languages in municipalities where they
make up at least 10 percent of the population. End Note.)
There were also some strong comments from opposition AKR
caucus leader Ibrahim Makolli in a final drafting session for
the law on Local Government Finance on March 5 wondering why
Kosovo was giving so many special rights and privileges to a
community (Serb) which did not care to participate in Kosovo
institutions and, in fact, was actively working to undermine
them, in his view. During all of the final working group
sessions on this package of laws, political opposition
parties, the Serb caucus in the Assembly, and other minority
communities were represented. Ultimately, Makolli voted in
favor of the package of laws, as he had committed to doing in
his meetings with USOP.

Constitution Next Steps
--------------


4. (SBU) Much of the public anxiety over the contents of the
draft constitution and perceived secrecy of the document that
built up prior to its public release on February 17 has

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dissipated. The two-week public outreach and comment period,
which closed on March 2, has been a resounding success with
58% of visitors to the website expressing the general sense
that Kosovo citizens have had their say. As of March 19,
there have been over 2,500,000 hits on the website; 116,983
downloads, or attempted downloads of the draft constitution
in Albanian, 41,187 in English, 7,365 in Serbian, 2,980 in
Turkish, 1,478 in Roma and 1,205 in Bosnian. About 650
comments were submitted through the website. There has also
been very good attendance at public fora on the constitution
and over 5000 hits on the minutes from those meetings posted
on the website.


5. (C) The Constitutional Commission has spent more than a
week considering comments from the public collected over this
period. In an effort to underscore the collaborative nature
of the document and reinforce the authentic sense of
ownership among Kosovars, if language suggested by a member
of the public is incorporated into the constitution, that
person will be identified as an "honorary member of the
Constitutional Commission."


6. (C) The Commission wants to wrap up its work and have a
formal signing ceremony of the draft constitution by the end
of March. The procedure envisioned for getting the
constitution passed through the Assembly is similar to what
was done for the declaration of independence: The President
would send a letter to request an urgent session of the
Assembly to pass the constitution, the Speaker of the
Assembly would then convene the Assembly Presidency which
would approve the session with one agenda item, and the
Assembly would vote up or down on the constitution. Ideally,
this will happen sometime in the first week of April. The
constitution will not come into effect, however, until June

15.


7. (C) Comment: Work on drafting and passing the Ahtisaari
laws progresses at a steady clip, despite wariness on the
part of some lawmakers related to provocations in the north.
The Assembly's tolerance for passing laws in expedited
procedure is limited, however, and the urge to use the bully
pulpit of the Assembly to discuss events in the north is
strong. To help minimize the potential for fireworks in the
Assembly, the push is on to get as many new laws for the
third package, which will likely extend the process into
April. The constitutional process is on track, and the
public outreach has had the desired effect of creating a
strong, authentic feeling of ownership for the constitution
among Kosovars from all communities and especially among the
Commission members.
KAIDANOW