Disputes wreck Kosovo monuments

Published by the BBC News, May 13, 2005

Potential donors attending a conference in Paris on Friday are being asked for money to help restore the cultural heritage of Kosovo.

At the top of the list are Serbian Orthodox churches targeted by ethnic Albanian mobs during three days of bloody rioting in the province in 2004.

Except for raindrops falling from its ceiling, the Church of the Holy Virgin of Ljeviska in Prizren is silent.

The bell has not rung for more than a year; not since ethnic Albanian extremists arrived in March 2004 and set fire to the church.

The UN's global heritage organisation, Unesco, described it as "an unpardonable act of vandalism against one of the most important medieval monuments in the Balkans.''

It will cost $4m (£2.1m or 3.1m euros) to repair, and this is just one example of many. The Serbian Orthodox Church says more than 80 of its monuments have been damaged since the war in 1999, but the figures are disputed.

Unesco says that 75 monuments are in need of urgent restoration in Kosovo, 48 of them Serbian Orthodox. Another 14 are in fact Islamic, says Unesco, and they date back to the time when Kosovo was part of the Muslim Ottoman Empire.

Raising the money for the Orthodox heritage is one thing, but getting the Serbian clergy to co-operate with the Kosovo government in the reconstruction has been much more difficult.

The head of the Church in Kosovo, Bishop Artemije, has been the biggest obstacle, though in recent months his colleagues have tried discreetly to sideline him in an attempt to push things along.

To visit Decani Monastery in the west of Kosovo, you have to pass through a heavily armoured K-For checkpoint. Inside, French peacekeepers are buying bottles of the monks' home-made wine as souvenirs, while Father Sava tells me that relations with the Kosovo government have begun to improve.

But there is lingering distrust when he says that "unfortunately, the Kosovo institutions during the March riots last year did not play a very constructive role".

"On the contrary," he says, "some representatives of the Kosovo government incited the riots, and that is something which is very sad.''

In turn, senior sources in the Kosovo government have told the BBC that they believe the Serbian Orthodox Church has tried to keep the monuments in ruins for as long as possible - as a visual reminder to the international community of what Albanian extremists are capable of.

The province's environment minister, Ardian Gjini, says: "The Kosovo government allocated the money, the UN mission was ready to start the work, but the Orthodox Church wasn't ready for a deal with the government and the UN.''

In just a few months' time, negotiations are expected to begin on the final status of Kosovo. It may soon gain independence from Serbia.

The United Nations Mission in Kosovo has made no secret of its desire to withdraw as much as possible, as soon as possible.

But on one thing both the Church and the Kosovo government agree: these examples of cultural heritage will need the protection of foreign peacekeepers for many years to come.



Volume 7 Number 22 - Tuesday, May 31st, 2005	A Publication of the ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN LAITY