Bush, Putin Agree To Continue Talks On Kosovo’s Future

05/29/2007

By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, May 29, 2007


In a phone call yesterday initiated by Vladimir Putin, President Bush and the Russian leader agreed to continue discussing Moscow's concerns about independence for Kosovo, a sensitive subject expected to come up next month in the U.N. Security Council.

The United States and the European Union support a plan by U.N. special envoy Martti Ahtisaari, a former president of Finland, that would grant Kosovo independence from Serbia but keep it under international supervision until a new constitution is enacted and a multi-ethnic government is established.

Russia and Serbia have publicly opposed any Security Council resolution that would put the independence plan on track. A Russian veto of such a resolution could exacerbate growing tensions between Moscow and Washington, which, along with the E.U. nations, wants to move ahead in the next two months on this issue and others.

Adding to the new East-West tension, the Russian Foreign Ministry announced in Moscow yesterday that it has called for an emergency conference next month to discuss the post-Cold War Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty, an arms control pact that limits conventional troops and weaponry in Europe. The Russian statement said there are "serious problems related to the observance of the treaty by NATO nations as a result of the alliance's expansion and their foot-dragging on the ratification of the 1999 agreement to amend the CFE."

Unmentioned, but expected to be involved in the CFE conference, is the U.S. plan to put 10 anti-missile interceptors in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic by 2012 as part of a new American defense system against potential missile attacks from Iran or North Korea.

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