By Aleksandar Mitic
Belgrade - Five years after the United Nations and Nato intervened to end the war in Kosovo, Belgrade insists the international mission has been a "stinging failure" and is demanding a change of strategy.
Serbia's frustration with the international community's role in the southern ethnic-Albanian dominated province peaked after a wave of mob violence against Serbs in March which left 19 people dead.
"It is evident that after the recent violence the international community must count the costs of the stinging failure of its policies in Kosovo," said Dragan Marsicanin, a senior figure in the ruling coalition.
'If the international community gives up, what would it be?' As well as the 19 people killed, over 900 were injured during the March riots that lasted for two days and forced 4 000 people - mostly Serbs - from their homes.
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Over 800 houses were torched along with 19 Serb Orthodox churches and monasteries. It was the worst ethnic violence in Kosovo since the end of the 1998-99 war, when Serb forces were accused of trying to drive out Albanians.
Kosovo's outgoing UN mission chief, Harri Holkeri, warned Thursday the security situation there was "very fragile" and the province could turn into a hotbed for terrorism if it was abandoned by the international community.
"If the international community gives up, what would it be? That would be a carte blanche for terrorism, for violence... all kinds of actions against humanity," Holkeri said.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, who visited the breakaway province last Monday for the second time since the anti-Serb riots, said a society plagued by such ethnic violence "does not belong to Europe".
The role of the UN and Nato peacekeepers in Kosovo once divided nationalists and moderates in Serbian politics but now there is unanimous agreement across the political spectrum that the intervention has failed.
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