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CELEBRATION: Kosovo's Albanians celebrating the state's newly declared independence, waving red-and-black Albanian flags in the capital, Pristina. -- PHOTO: REUTERS
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PRISTINA - KOSOVO declared itself a nation yesterday in a historic bid to move from being a province of Serbia to becoming an 'independent and democratic state'.
The move by the breakaway province's two million ethnic Albanians ends a long chapter in the bloody unravelling of Yugoslavia and is backed by American and European allies, but bitterly contested by Serbia and Russia.
To the applause of MPs, Parliament Speaker Jakup Krasniqi said: 'Kosovo is a republic - an independent, democratic and sovereign state.'
Across the capital, Pristina, revellers fired guns into the air, waved red-and-black Albanian flags and sounded car horns in jubilation at the birth of the world's newest country.
The declaration was carefully orchestrated with the United States and key European powers, and Kosovo is counting on swift international recognition. That could come as early as today, when European Union foreign ministers meet.
Prime Minister Hashim Thaci, a former leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army which battled Serbian troops in a 1998-1999 war that claimed 10,000 lives, said: 'From today onwards, Kosovo is proud, independent and free. We never lost faith in the dream that one day, we would stand among the free nations of the world, and today we do.'
Kosovo will be the sixth state carved from the former Serbian-dominated Yugoslav federation since 1991, after Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, Bosnia and Montenegro.
But Serbs have vowed never to give up a territory in which their history goes back 1,000 years. Serbian President Boris Tadic was quick to call Kosovo's declaration of independence 'unilateral and illegal'.
Russia also urged the United Nations to annul Kosovo's declaration of independence, and said it could cause an escalation in ethnic violence in the region.
Meanwhile, French peacekeepers stepped up security in the flashpoint town of Mitrovica, preparing concrete and razor-wire barriers to keep Serbs and Albanians apart.
US President George W. Bush said: 'The United States will continue to work with our allies to do the very best we can to make sure there is no violence.'
ASSOCIATED PRESS, REUTERS
BUMPY ROAD AHEAD FOR EUROPE'S NEWEST STATE, WORLD
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