Vice president gets warm welcome in Kosovo

[May 21, 2009]  PRISTINA, Kosovo (AP) -- Cheering and waving flags, thousands of ethnic Albanians lined the streets of Kosovo's capital on Thursday to welcome Vice President Joe Biden and applaud U.S. support for its declaration of independence.

Biden's visit was the first by a senior American official since Kosovo proclaimed its independence last year from Serbia -- a change Serbia has vowed never to accept.

"The US has made it clear: the recognition of independence of Kosovo is irreversible," Biden said flanked by Kosovo's leaders. "It will not change."

Pristina was decorated with flags, large posters and banners thanking Biden and U.S for their role in Kosovo. Many people waved Kosovo and U.S. flags.

Ethnic Albanians are staunch supporters of the U.S. because it led the 1999 NATO bombing of Serbia that stopped the war in Kosovo.

Biden was greeted at the airport by Kosovo's newly formed security force, and later by President Fatmir Sejdiu and Prime Minister Hashim Thaci. He was awarded the Gold Medal of Freedom, and he was to address the country's parliament and receive a copy of Kosovo's Independence Declaration.

Biden also plans to visit a 14-century Serbian Orthodox monastery, a U.N. world heritage site that he is often credited for saving from destruction by putting pressure on local officials when ethnic Albanians attacked Serbs and their religious sites in 2004 riots. He will then head to the largest U.S. military installation in the region, Camp Bondsteel, home to some 1,000 American peacekeepers.

Sixty countries have recognized Kosovo as an independent state, with Bahrain the latest. Serbia and Russia are firmly opposed to Kosovo's statehood.

Hundreds of Serbs were expected to protest Biden's visit to Kosovo's Serb-dominated north. Protesters are to lay wreaths at a monument commemorating Serbs killed during NATO's 78-day air war against Serb forces in 1999.

Kosovo is the last stop in a three-day tour that included Serbia and Bosnia. Biden's visit aims to show renewed U.S. interest in the Balkans, which was riven by bloody ethnic wars in the 1990s that the West blamed Serbia for fomenting, and encourage region's integration into European Union.

"This is a historic opportunity. Ever since WWII the US and most European countries have dreamed of a Europe that is whole, united and at peace," Biden said. "This is the first time in history for the Balkans to be totally incorporated within Europe."

In Serbia on Wednesday, Biden offered to reset relations between the two countries and help Serbia with its bid to join the European Union.

Biden had been an outspoken critic of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, whose policies led to a series of bloody wars that broke up the country.

The last top U.S. official to visit Kosovo was President George W. Bush, who met with American peacekeepers shortly before the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001.

[Associated Press; By NEBI QENA]

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