Kurti delivering the speech

Citizens and participants in this demonstration,
 
We are gathered here today, to say NO to the partition of Kosovo. Kosovo should be sovereign, the people and only the people should decide about Kosovo. 

They are saying that EULEX is neutral. This neutrality means some kind of impartiality between two sides. Neutrality means two sides, two partners. The neutrality of EULEX means that the question of Kosovo has two sides and two partners. One partner is Kosovo whereas the other is Serbia. So, the neutrality of EULEX legitimates Serbia as a partner with Kosovo.

Just in the last war Serbia killed 12.000 people, raped about 20.000 women, deported about one million people from Kosovo, expelled over one million from their homes, there are 2.000 people still missing, the bodies of whom are in mass graves or burnt in furnaces. But, yet Serbia still wants to decide about Kosovo. 

EULEX wants to be neutral towards the status of Kosovo, but we the citizens of Kosovo are not neutral towards the status of Kosovo and we cannot be neutral towards EULEX. 

The international presence in Kosovo is acceptable, but it should be here by agreement with Kosovo and not with Serbia; and, it should be here to assist us and not to rule over us, it should advise us and not have executive power. 

The leaders of Kosovo’s institutions said that the Ahtisaari Plan was the price of independence; it was the unprincipled concession to satisfy Serbia enough to accept independence. But now when Serbia doesn’t accept us, when she is financing parallel structures, which control about a quarter of Kosovo’s territory in order to undermine our independence from inside, it is absurd, it is crazy, for us to implement the Ahtisaari Plan or for that to be the political position of our institutions.

The institutions of Kosovo before offering a plan to the international community, should offer a plan to the people of Kosovo. The Four Point Plan that they offered to Daniel Fried yesterday will end up as the position of the Kosovo side in the upcoming negotiations with Serbia. This means that ‘Serbia is asking for 6 points, you are asking for 4 points – come on then, meet somewhere in the middle!’ It is not enough to say NO to the six points of Ban Ki-moon, but we should say NO to any sort of negotiations or bargaining over our country. Instead of offering a plan to internationals, a plan should be offered to the people of Kosovo. The plan that should be offered to the people of Kosovo should be a strategy to mobilize all our intellectual and physical energies to make Kosovo sovereign and indivisible. If earlier the key word was independence, from now on, the key word should be sovereignty. 

The demand of Boris Tadic to divide Kosovo has meaning only if he is ready to make his request a universal principle. So, then he must also be ready to divide Serbia. It cannot be acceptable that Boris Tadic on the one hand wants Serbs in Kosovo to create a special Republic inside Kosovo, similar to Republika Srpska in Bosnia, whereas Albanians in the Valley of Presheva are not allowed to use the national flag or to have a university. Stability in the Balkans continues to be made at the expense of Albanians – it is not based on justice, it is not based on equality.
There is a danger that Sejdiu and Thaçi will misuse the opposition to the six points of Ban Ki-moon, in two ways. First, in the name of this opposition they will implement decentralization. And, second, they will sell off quickly and very cheaply KEK, PTK, the airport, Trepça and other businesses built with the sweat of this people throughout the 20th century. Kosovo needs sovereignty before decentralization and it needs decolonization before privatization. 

In this world there is no justice for passive peoples. So, commit yourself to political, but also social and economic issues. In demonstrations in Prishtina, but also in protests in your town, in your village. We want to be free like other peoples and equal to other peoples. We don’t want to dominate others, and we will not allow others to dominate us. We want a normal life, in a normal state, with normal development. For this, our common goal, see you in the next demonstration.   

Albin Kurti leads the Vetevendosje! Movement. This speech was delivered at the demonstration held on 19 November 2008.

Comments (3)

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Nikola qallakoviq said:

... Hola a todos .soy de Kosova ,La europa que estas asiendo esta todo mal mui mal es que los Albaneses lo han preotegido la europa desde ,1468 por los Otomanos que aora es Turquia si no eran los Albaneses con Gjergj Kastrioti Skdender Beu hoy nunka podia estar Europa en esta posicion , que verguenca para los españoles que no lo Reconosen Kosova como Republika Independiente esto es algo terible .Kosova tine que estar priemera en Comunidad Europea mas antes que Servia que son un pueblo llegando de Siberia que servia masacro mas de un milion de pueblo en europa ,andan todos a carrajo.

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December 09, 2008
Votes: +0

Enver said:

... Spineless EU strikes again deal with Serbian Terrorist, stabbing the Albanians all over again. As Albin Kurti stated: Stability in the Balkans continues to be made at the expense of Albanians! – Enough is enough. Albanians are treated as a newcomers in Europe and all of them (starting from Spain, Greece, Serbia, Russia…) immigrated 1000 of years later in Europe, well beyond Albanian culture was established and borrowed by the Greeks. It’s time for war again (we have no other choice) and this time we should go all the way and eradicate the aggressor. Serbians killed millions of people in the Balkans and EU is respected them more than the Albanians. Shame on you spineless EU. Selling Albanian lands so you can enjoy the company of the Serbian Terrorist. Europe - You did it 100 years ago and you are doing it again now. Shame! Shame! Shame!

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November 20, 2008
Votes: +1

Neighbour said:

	... Thanks to Albin Kurti there will be no Eulex in the north of Kosovo!!!!! We never wanted them and we are against Tadic's agreement to let them in. Thank you Mr. Kurti! Serb from Mitrovica
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November 20, 2008
Votes: +1