23 years from the Rambouillet Conference

23 years ago, on February 6, 1999. This meeting, which was held in the vicinity of Paris, France, aimed at resolving the Kosovo crisis.

The conference initiative, which lasted until February 23rd, was the Contact Group, while the mediator was Christopher Hill from the US, Boris Maiorsky, Russia and Wolfgang Petritsch from the EU.

The Kosovo delegation had basically accepted the proposal for resolving the Kosovo crisis, which the Contact Group had proposed. The Serbian delegation, however basically accepted this proposal-agreement, defended the position that NATO troops would not be allowed to pass through Serbia and international forces in Kosovo to be within the United Nations.

The second round of talks that began on March 15th in Paris ended without success. The Kosovo and Serbian delegations had signed various agreements on 18 March. The Kosovo delegation had signed the agreement offered by international co-ordinators, while the Serbian delegation had signed the political draft agreement on self-rule in Kosovo.

The last attempt, on March 22, 1999, by US special envoy Richard Holbrooke, was not successful. He failed to persuade then RSFJ President Slobodan Milosevic to accept the Kosovo agreement and the deployment of international troops.

On March 24, 1999, NATO began shelling Serbia's troops and paramilitary troops. The bombings ended on June 6, 1999, with the signing of the Kumanovo Agreement envisioning the withdrawal of Yugoslav troops from Kosovo and the deployment of peaceful international troops.

Later, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1244, with which the protectorate was established, the international presence in Kosovo, UNMIK as a civilian mission and KFOR military mission.

Meanwhile, on February 17, 2008, Kosovo declared independence. / K SP