- Title: YUGOSLAVIA: VOTE-COUNTING GETS UNDERWAY IN KOSOVO'S LANDMARK MUNICIPLE ELECTIONS
- Date: 29th October 2000
- Summary: PRISTINA, KOSOVO, YUGOSLAVIA (OCTOBER 29, 2000) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 1. WIDE OF PRISTINA SKYLINE 0.05 2. SV: MAN APPROACHING A NEWSPAPER KIOSK AND CHOOSING A NEWSPAPER 0.09 3. SV: MAN READING NEWSPAPER 0.13 4. SCU: ELECTION POSTERS ON BOARD 0.17 5. WIDE OF CAFE WITH PEOPLE SITTING OUTSIDE 0.20 6. SV: TWO MEN READING NEWSPAPER OUTSIDE CAFE 0.23 7. SLV: STREET SCENE WITH PEOPLE WALKING ALONG PAVEMENT 0.27 8. WIDE OF NEWS CONFERENCE GIVEN BY JEFF FISCHER, ELECTION DIRECTOR AT THE ORGANISATION FOR SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE (OSCE) 0.30 9. WIDE OF WOMAN OFFICIAL TALKING ON SCREEN/ PRESS LISTENING (2 SHOTS) 0.36 10. SV: (SOUNDBITE) (English) FISCHER: "We did, indeed, have balloting activities and counting activities go well into the night. (SOUND OF TRANSLATOR) When I posed the question to the field: 'when was the last voter processed?' (SOUND OF TRANSLATOR) In the Prizren region, it was at nine p.m. (SOUND OF TRANSLATOR) In Mitrovica, it was at ten twenty." (SOUND OF TRANSLATOR) 1.19 11. WIDE OF JOURNALISTS AT NEWS CONFERENCE 1.23 12. SLV: EXTERIOR RUGOVA'S HOUSE 1.28 13. WIDE OF NEWS CONFERENCE, RUGOVA SEATED WITH OFFICIALS 1.32 14. SCU: (SOUNDBITE) (Albanian with English Translation) DEMOCRATIC LEAGUE OF KOSOVO (LDK) PARTY LEADER, IBRAHIM RUGOVA: "Based on preliminary data, LDK has won over 60 per cent throughout the country. This is yet another reconfirmation in support of LDK and the recognition of the decade-long war of LDK on areas of the front of resistance." 2.11 15. WIDE RUGOVA AND OFFICIALS 2.14 16. SCU: (SOUNDBITE) (Albanian with English Translation) RUGOVA: "The LDK will continue to engage and to commit itself to cooperation, tolerance among political groupings in Kosovo and also our citizens." 2.35 17. SV: JOURNALISTS 2.37 18. CU: LIST ON COMPUTER SCREEN SHOWING FIGURES FROM VOTE-COUNT SO FAR INDICATING TREND FAVOURING RUGOVA 2.42 19. SV/CU: LDK PARTY WORKER AT DESK LOOKING DOWN LIST ON PAPER (2 SHOTS) 2.51 20. CU: LDK POSTERS ON WALLS (RUGOVA PORTRAIT) 2.54 21. VARIOUS: MEETING OF SENIOR RUGOVA SUPPORTERS/ LDK OFFICIALS (3 SHOTS) 3.08 22. VARIOUS OF RUGOVA SUPPORTERS HUGGING EACH OTHER AND SMILING 3.19 23. WS: EXTERIOR DEMOCRATIC PARTY OF KOSOVO (PDK) HEADQUARTERS (PARTY LEADER: HASHIM THACI) 3.24 24. MV: MAN WALKING PAST CLOSED MAIN DOOR 3.30 25. SV: POSTERS ON WALL NEXT TO MAIN DOOR 3.37 26. MV/CU: EXTERIOR OF PDK HEADQUARTERS/ PDK PLAQUE ON WALL (2 SHOTS) 3.44 27. SV: MAN TRYING TO GET INSIDE HEADQUARTERS, BUT DOOR LOCKED 3.49 KOSOVO POLJE, KOSOVO (OCTOBER 29, 2000) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 28. PAN: TRUCKS CARRYING BALLOT BOXES FROM ALL OVER KOSOVO ARRIVING AT CENTRAL COUNTING STATION 3.59 29. SV/MV: NORWEGIAN AND DANISH K-FOR GUARDING CENTRAL COUNTING STATION (2 SHOTS) 4.10 30. SV: PEOPLE CARRYING BOXES INTO CENTRAL COUNTING STATION 4.15 31. SV: BALLOTS BEING COUNTED 4.23 32. WIDE OF COUNTING HALL 4.26 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 13th November 2000 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: PRISTINA AND KOSOVO POLJE, KOSOVO, YUGOSLAVIA
- City:
- Country: Yugoslavia
- Reuters ID: LVA27M0J3B2IJ51H66OTRXN8R5QG
- Story Text: Vote-counting was under way in Kosovo on Sunday after a
landmark election which the ethnic Albanian majority see as
stepping stone to independence.
Kosovo Albanian moderate leader Ibrahim Rugova said that
his party had won, but the first results were due from the
Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on
Monday.
Rugova told journalists on Sunday (October 29) that his
party had won the municpal elections.
"Based on preliminary results, the LDK has won 60 per cent
of the vote throughout Kosovo," Rugova said, adding, "the LDK
will continue to engage and to commit itself to cooperation,
tolerance among political groupings in Kosovo and also our
citizens."
The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE), which organised and ran the poll, is due to issue the
first official results, based on 90 per cent of votes cast, on
Monday (October 30).
The municipal poll is seen as the first free and
democratic election in Kosovo.
Rugova, who led passive resistance to former Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milosevic for a decade, heads the
Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK).
LDK supporters working at the party's headquarters in
Pristina on Sunday said that, according to information they
had received from observers from 20 out of 30 municipalities,
the LDK was ahead in most, including the capital Pristina and
its suburbs where it had 68 per cent of the vote.
The LDK said its worst defeat was in the Srbica area,
where the KLA emerged in 1998, saying Rugova's passive
resistance was yielding no results and it was time to fight
Serbs with guns.
There was no word on Sunday from LDK's main rival, the
more militant Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK), headed by the
former commander of the KLA guerrilla army, Hashim Thaci.
All seemed quiet at the PDK headquarters in Pristina and
the building appeared to be closed.
The NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping force, whose 40,000 troops
had been put on duty for Saturday's (October 28) municipal
poll, said it was one of the quietest days since the Serbian
province became an international protectorate in mid-1999.
Kosovo's United Nations governor said on Saturday night
the poll proved democracy was taking hold in the province,
despite a boycott by minority Serbs.
Jeff Fischer, election director at the Organisation for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) which organised and
ran the poll, said the turnout was so high that the last
ballot had been cast at 1 a.m. (2300 GMT), instead of the
earlier planned deadline of 7 p.m. (1700 GMT) on Saturday.
He could not give exact turnout figures, or preliminary
results, confirming they would be announced on Monday (October
30).
Trucks with ballot boxes from all over Kosovo arrived at
the central counting station in Kosovo Polje just outside
Pristina at lunchtime on Sunday (October 29). They were
brought inside for counting by electoral workers and OSCE
monitors.
Kosovo came under U.N. administration, known as UNMIK,
after 11 weeks of NATO air strikes ousted Serbian security
forces who had killed, or expelled, more than half the ethnic
Albanian population in what the West described as an ethnic
cleansing campaign.
Ethnic Albanians on Saturday swarmed to the polls, queuing
for hours without complaint to cast their ballots.
They saw the vote as hugely important, a final departure
from 10 years of suffering under Slobodan Milosevic,
Belgrade's hardline nationalist leader, who was ousted this
month.
The mood was totally different among local Serbs.
Some 100,000 of them had fled Kosovo as NATO troops moved
in and returning ethnic Albanians took their revenge. Out of
the remaining 100,000 Serbs, only 1,000 had registered to
vote.
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