The man who led the Kosovo Liberation Army (kla) against the Serbs in 1998-1999 is likely to become Kosovo’s next prime minister. Former guerrilla leader Hashim Thaci’s Democratic Party of Kosovo (pdk) won the Kosovo parliamentary elections with approximately 34 percent of the vote Sunday. The pdk is expected to form a grand coalition with the once-dominant Democratic League of Kosovo (ldk) with Thaci as the new prime minister.

Thaci has stated that he will declare unilateral independence for Kosovo immediately after December 10, when international mediators are due to issue their reports on Kosovo’s final status to the United Nations. Thaci triumphantly announced, “The citizens of Kosovo sent the world a message …. The strongest message was that Kosovo is ready (for) independence.”

“There is no longer any question that Kosovo will unilaterally declare independence from Serbia, with or without international support,” reports Stratfor (November 19).

Even though Washington and the majority of EU countries have announced they will recognize Kosovo as an independent nation, European foreign ministers are cautioning Kosovo against unilaterally declaring independence in one fell swoop. With both Serbia and Russia adamantly against such a declaration, such a move could plunge the Balkans into crisis and end a peace that was never really more than a ceasefire.

The international trio of the European Union, Russia and the United States that is currently overseeing Serbian-Kosovar independence talks has set December 10 as the deadline for a final-status deal. The chance of a Serbian-Kosovar compromise being reached by this time is almost nil, however.

Since Kosovo is set to declare independence at any point after December 10, regardless of how the talks go, the EU is preparing to deal with whatever is unleashed by this action.

European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana has already declared that the EU must be ready to take over the governance of Kosovo from the United Nations once independence talks end. The 27-nation EU bloc has prepared a 1,800-man force and set aside €150 million (us$200 million) in order to construct the largest EU civilian mission to date. The purpose of this mission would be to boost Kosovo’s police and customs forces in order to secure the province.

German newspaper Die Tageszeitung reports, “They [the U.S. and EU] want to play for time—to find a formula that will be acceptable to the [UN] Security Council and that would allow the European Union to replace the UN mission in Kosovo with an EU one.”

If Kosovo declares independence next month, the timetable could be much shorter. The election of Hashim Thaci has already escalated tensions in an already volatile region. However events unfold, Europe will likely act to stabilize the situation.

Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry has predicted since the 1999 Kosovo war that it would be the German-led EU that would end up controlling Kosovo. Watch for Germany and the EU to take a much more aggressive role in the Balkans, even against Russian opposition. The crisis now in the making could provide just the opportunity for Europe to do this.

For more information on the role of the Balkans in world events, read The Rising Beast—Germany’s Conquest of the Balkans by Gerald Flurry.