HAEKKERUP GOES TO BELGRADE FRIDAY FOR TALKS WITH KOSTUNICA

PRISTINA, Nov 1 (Hina) - The UN civil administrator in Kosovo, Hans Haekkerup, is travelling to Belgrade on Friday to discuss the participation of Kosovo Serbs in upcoming elections in the province with Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica, a UN spokesperson said on Thursday. Haekkerup wants to find out if Belgrade has reached a decision as to the participation of Kosovo Serbs in the Nov. 17 general ballot, spokeswoman Susan Manuel said in Pristina. She declined to say if the UN administrator would give Kostunica additional assurances for the Serb community in the southern Yugoslav province. Manuel condemned an incident which occurred at a session of the Pristina Municipal Assembly on Wednesday, when a representative of the Kosovo Democratic Party, Nusret Plana, said he did not want to sit in the assembly with Serb representative Trajko Slavkovic, whom he accused of war crimes over Albanians in villages around Pristina during the Kosovo conflict. The UN spokeswoman said such an incident ran against democratic principles and the rights of minorities, and represented a bad signal to Kosovo's Serb population as well as the world. (hina) ha