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Useful information for this article Discussions on this page may escalate into heated debate. Please try to keep a cool head when commenting here. See also: Misplaced Pages:Etiquette. This is not a forum for general discussion of Kosovo, or whether it is a 'country', 'state' or 'province'. Any such messages will be deleted. Please limit discussion to improvement of this article. You may wish to ask factual questions about Kosovo at the Reference desk, discuss relevant Misplaced Pages policy at the Village pump, or ask for help at the Help desk. The opening paragraph to the article was decided upon, by consensus, following lengthy discussions. It is based on reliable sources, providing a neutral point of view. The first sentence, in particular, must call Kosovo a "country", reflecting the consensus found in the RfC held in the spring of 2023. This article is written in British English, which differs from American English in some ways. See American and British English differences. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus. Kosovo received a peer review by Misplaced Pages editors, which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article.

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Former article talkpages (archived) Republic of Kosovo

This page has archives. Sections older than 10 days may be automatically archived by Lowercase sigmabot III.

The Mongolian case

In the discussions in the topics here, we should remember the case of Mongolia.

What is today Mongolia is still de jure claimed by the Republic of China in Taipei as part of its territory. And there is not juts “one Mongolia” — there is also the Inner Mongolia, currently part of People’s Republic of China.

And despite all this, Mongolia points directly to the page of the country, which is not primarily described as a “disputed territory” or “region” but as an independent republic.--201.81.203.135 (talk) 10:17, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Not really comparable. Mongolia is only disputed due to a historical legal anomaly. These days, I'm sure no-one in Taiwan really considers that they are the legitimate rulers of Mongolia. And Mongolia the nation and Inner Mongolia are different places, unlike the two claims over Kosovo. Inner Mongolia is adequately covered by the disambiguation hatnote. Bazonka (talk) 12:40, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

There is nothing like “historical legal anomaly” between texts of serious historians and scholars as far as we know. Mongolia had its way because of historical contexts (the fall and disintegration of the Qing and Russian Empires), but even in this case nobody protests the use of “Mongolia” to describe just the country called Mongolia. Today the Republic of China de facto doesn’t want to conquest Mongolia anymore, and somehow it doesn’t want to “retake the mainland” which includes Inner Mongolia, too, even tough the de jure claims were never officially repealed by Taipei’s government. We could even compare this situation to today’s Serbia, where there are lots of politicians and common people who acknowledge Serbia would not govern Kosovo again and don’t care anymore about this fact, and many people, clergymen, soldiers, policemen and politicians who want to stick to the current Serbian constitution and never renounce Kosovo because of that lost battle of 1389.

Anyway, my conclusion is that in the same way that the “Mongolia” title does not redirect to “Mongolia (region)” nor the article about Mongolia does not describe it primarily as a “disputed territory”, the same should apply to this article about Kosovo.--201.81.207.240 (talk) 09:18, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

PS: “the two claims over Kosovo” is not a reliable description of the situation on the ground, since Hashim Thaci’s government is not a mere “claimant” like some kind of government-in-exile; it resides in Pristina and rules completely more than 90% of the Kosovar people and territory, and partially in the are north of the Ibar river trough the Kosovar police and custom officers — a quite different situation from Goran Bogdanović’s.--201.81.207.240 (talk) 09:31, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Simple answer is that Mongolia is not primarily a disputed region - it is primarily an independent nation, secondly there's a Chinese province with a similar name, and lagging a long way behind is its disputed status. Kosovo is very much still in dispute, and this is of primary importance. Bazonka (talk) 10:00, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

"Kosovo is very much still in dispute" - there's a lot of opinion in that - on the ground (the so called de facto position) Kosovo is clearly independent and I don't think an yone would seriously dispute it. The de jure position is not as complicated as some make out - the people of Kosovo have a right to self determination and accordingly their declaration of independence was judged lawful by the International Court of Justice.2007apm (talk) 17:02, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

If Misplaced Pages had been around in 1950, the Mongolia title would have been subject to all sorts of disputes. This is 2010. Perhaps you want to come back in 2060, I am sure all the Kosovo issues will have been sorted out by then, and will be seen as a "historical anomaly". While the anomaly is "in progress", it cannot be shrugged off as "just an anomaly", under WP:CRYSTAL. --dab (𒁳) 12:44, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

(I wouldn't be so sure about 50 years being enough. Consider Israel and Palestine for a case in point.—Emil J. 13:15, 8 September 2010 (UTC))

Ottoman Kosovo, Cirkovic is a biased source

Frederick F. Anscombe in a recent study published, where he gained new information from Ottoman records cast light to many issues concerning that period. It also shows that current history shown by Serbian historians is a basic myth for Serbian nationalism. The study shows that there was no major migration by Serbs (any small migration was done by both Albanians and Serbs), population and ethnicity was not very significant, also the Albanian population was present during the whole period... More info here. The part should be rewritten on a more objective discourse. —Anna Comnena (talk) 21:59, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

We have 6 references from Cirkovic: which alternative sources would you suggest? --Sulmues 22:11, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Wickers, Anscombe, Malcolm... —Anna Comnena (talk) 11:28, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Anna, thank you so much for this find, I enjoyed reading every page. Best 30+ pages I've read this entire year. It's a great analysis

of the Kosovo Story/Myth we hear spewed from Serbs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.114.198.186 (talk) 03:43, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

I have used that material before in Great Serb Migrations article, but website references overflood what was supposed to be a serious topic. Aigest (talk) 06:52, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Histroy - Second world war

The second paragraph is clearly biased and had dubious sources, I hope someone can verify source 49 and 52, as for Dimitrije Bogdanovic, how on earth can nationalist be a reliable source, it should at least be written in the form "according to...", personaly I have never heard of such a declaration being made by Mustafa Kruja --Cradel (talk) 01:19, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

There is Kosovar police in the north

Assailants throw hand grenade at police station in Kosovo's tense north — So how long Kosovo will still be treated in the article as a mere "disputed territory, partially-controlled…" instead of a country?--201.81.201.75 (talk) 03:45, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

True -- LONTECH  Talk  22:45, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

• I agree, this article is lacking in neutrality and fairness, and it is a shame on the Arbitration Committee which does nothing but preventing editors from making the just edits. The introduction must say that Kosovo is a state that is partially recognized and that Serbia refuses to recognize it. THAT'S IT. it's very simple, if there is a dispute, then the introduction MUST be inclusive, and the dispute itself shall be represented in the article in terms of information, not in terms of one-sided truth. shame! Maysara (talk) 01:49, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

• So true, this article is overly pro serbian. And this is due to a biased admin with an agenda who calls everyone an albanian nationalist when people try to change this. Look in the history and you will find his name. As long as this admin is not blocked from this article nothing will change. --188.99.179.90 (talk) 12:51, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

• Please tell me his name and I shall (Personal attack removed) Maysara (talk) 17:46, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Meeso, perhaps instead of throwing around death threats, you make a suggestion of how to improve balance? The article already says Kosovo is partially-recognized, so I don't really see what you are complaining about. Obviously the article will keep saying the status of Kosovo is disputed for as long as it is disputed in real life. In concrete terms, this means that as soon as the Russians say they accept Kosovo's independence, all other obstacles will go away as well. So please whine to the Russians instead of trolling Misplaced Pages. --dab (𒁳) 12:40, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that the bar is being raised much more higher for the Kosovo and article case than in other countries. Why just Kosovo needs to enter the United Nations as a member to be called “a country” in this article when in other Misplaced Pages articles about countries outside the UN don’t get the same treatment?--201.81.193.190 (talk) 10:21, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

This is simply not true. All articles on partially recognized states are carefully balanced to meet WP:DUE. Obviously each case needs to be looked-at separately, but in each case, a proper balance needs to be found between secessionist and anti-secessionist editors. The only people who can mediate this are people with no opinion of their own, who are also aware of Misplaced Pages policies, such as myself. I literally have no vested interest in any secession debate on the planet.

If you look through the contributions on this talkpage, you will see clearly pro-Serbian, clearly pro-independence and neutral editors. But in the case of Kosovo, the pro-independence (Albanian) editors are clearly in the majority. If this article were left to slow edit warring between partisan accounts, the Albanian side would clearly win out, because it outnumbers the Serbian side. Intervention from uninvolved editors is necessary because articles on disputed topics are not to be dominated by numerical supremacy of partisan accounts. In an ideal world, partisan accounts would be banned from editing altogether.

We are very close to enforcing a "no partisan edits" policy on this article, see note at the top. Any account who so much as shows an intention to edit-war is to be blocked immediately. This is the only sensible approach, because clearly the ethnic disputes in the Balkans aren't just going to solve themselves if we ask people to please behave nicely. Ethnic hostility in the Balkans is probably more acute than anywhere else in Europe, and left to themselves people would probably just try to resolve any dispute with knives and clubs, as illustrated very eloquently by Meeso (talk · contribs) above. As long as this is the deal, Misplaced Pages will just have to stick to a policy of kicking out anyone who cannot behave in a civil and civilized way. --dab (𒁳) 13:27, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

dab I would like to block you as not once have you offered a balance view. Just reading your rant there any non-blind person can read your bias. Just out of curiosity do you have a WP Ethnic program to figure out that all pro-independence commenters are Albanians? It's people like you that enforce double standards between this page and other pages. Just introduction is a train wreck, if any decent person above you had any decency they would see that the intro should read "Kosovo is a state partially recognized by 70 UN members and vehemently disputed by Serbia." Then in the other paragraphs they would go deeper down about 5 minority EU states supporting Serbia, the Russian and Chinese veto influence, maybe even perhaps mention that Serbia has zero influence in Kosovo since A, B, C, ICJ verdict here, the UN resolution here...etc —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.114.198.186 (talk) 16:18, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

sorry, but if you have a vested interest, neutrality is bound to look like rooting for the opposition to you. If you cannot detach yourself from your opinions, please do not edit Misplaced Pages. Obviously many non-Albanians support Kosovar independence, including my own government and indeed most of Western Europe. But I think it is safe to say that only Albanian nationalists will claim that it is "biased" to state that the question is under dispute. Kosovo is not "partially recognized by 70 UN members". It is fully recognized by 71 UN members, and unrecognized by the remaining 121. Don't shoot the messenger, man. As soon as Kosovar independence is more widely recognized, I will be the first to happily change the article to reflect it. Personally I think Serbia cannot win this, they should cover their losses and cut a deal. But I recognize that the article is not about how I feel about the question but rather about the facts as they stand at the moment. --dab (𒁳) 11:23, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I am a neutral UK citizen with absolutely no vested interest in Kosovo, and I totally agree with Dab's comments. Bazonka (talk) 12:40, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• I think it is you, dab, who is truly acting in an uncivilized manner. You make a fuss about the little things (like what i said above), while you ignore the serious defects, some of which are thought to be caused by your excessive interference in this article, and being an admin, etc. You speak as though you have the moderation and sound judgment, while what you have been systematically doing, is dismissing the many complaints, and arguments that you oppose, and almost automatically attributing them all to bias and nationalism. The mere fact that repeated counter arguments and complaints are raised mean necessarily that they must find their way inside the article. Disputes shall be represented themselves as information in the article. And the fact that people keep talking about this means that you should give it more attention rather than dismiss it so arrogantly as though you are the one who possesses supremacy in wisdom and judgment, and obviously, being an admin, in action too. As admin You are responsible to mediate and facilitate the dialogue rather than come here and speak in the talk page like this: "We will do this, we will do that, Misplaced Pages will do this, Misplaced Pages will do that". Who is "we"? and what is "Misplaced Pages"? And who are you to speak in such authority to us. I think it becomes very harmful when one admin becomes too involved in an article the way admin dab is currently involved in this article, and i think it is better that as soon as an admin is being questioned over his or her positions and actions, to be immediately replaced by another one in monitoring the situation. you say: "As soon as Kosovar independence is more widely recognized, I will be the first to happily change the article to reflect it." which shows both your feeling of possession over the content of this article, and also, your failed judgment. For i can't see what is still required in order for Kosovar independence to be quite sufficiently recognized! Maysara (talk) 16:07, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Everyone knows Kosova is a state and a legal one, it newly declared independence in 2008. It was NOT unilateral. In two years, 70 COUNTRIES recognize Kosova and these include USA, Britain, Ireland, Australia, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Hungary, even Montenegro and FYROM, most of Europe, most of EU, most of NATO, most of UN, World Bank awaerds membership to Kosova. Even Serb cronie allies allow Kosovar passports to travel through the countries. Am I going to sit here and caryr on calling it a disputed territory just because Communist China and imperialist Russia don't recognize it? Or backward Serbia? Please, get real. Prince of Kosova (talk) 12:20, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Sit still

Patience does it. What will happen will happen and I have yet to learn of international activity influenced by Misplaced Pages editing. The recent false alarm concerning Qatar puts the number at 70 that recognise Kosovo at the time of writing this. The page is wholly neutral: for those pushing for "Albania is a state" that dispute the status quo, consider that any Serbs and their sympathisers would prefer to begin the article: Kosovo is a Serbian province currently held by rebels. Dab is not from the region and as is evident from Bazonka's observation, he is not biased in the least. Even though the number of recognising states is set to increase until we see the final few that hold Serbia's position, it is folly to blow the final whistle at this point with 122 countries all recognising Serbia's territorial integrity. There is no prerequisite stating that a country must be a U.N. member to be a state - the Vatican is a non-member; Switzerland was a non-member until the 2000s, but this is by choice. Kosovo's government does not qualify to join the U.N. just yet but we know it would like to, just as it would NATO, the EU and various other degenerate intergovernmental institutions. Biased or neutral, no editor can sensibly ignore these details. Evlekis (Евлекис) 23:45, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. I am frankly tired of all the personal attacks just for stating the obvious. Are there no admins watching this page willing to warn/ban the trolls? This page is under arbcom probation after all. --dab (𒁳) 15:32, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

• no in fact, i am preparing to bring this before the Administrators' noticeboard, and of course your threatening us above will be mentioned. Maysara (talk) 15:49, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Given that some of those 122 countries (specifically Qatar) have made statements that they are going to recognize Kosovo, it is misleading to state that all 122 of them support Serbia. Aside from those who are in the process of recognition, there are probably many others that really don't care one way or the other. --Khajidha (talk) 18:14, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Believe it or not, on the day Kosovo's institutions delcared independence, even the U.S. recognised Serbia's sovereignty, as did Afghanistan although that was to remedy within a few hours. The order of action is very simple: first the countries recognise Kosovo, then we update the information. We do not however rush into such sweeping conclusions before the events take place. We don't declare a certain horse the winner of a race when it is known that no other participant stands a chance, until it has happened. As at Saturday 11 September 2010, 122 UN members recognise Serbia's territorial integrity of Kosovo. State recognition passes in ones directory from Point A to Point B instantly, there is no intermediary holding account where cetain-to-recognise states place such regions as Kosovo or Abkhazia. Evlekis (Евлекис) 18:59, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

No we dont believe because it is false statement. U.S. recognised Serbia's sovereignty before 1999 not after 1999. And perhaps would have been good to contribute with your statistics at Montenegro article your state indicating that Montenegro is not recognized by 72 countries. This info is missing there. Montenegro entry must include this info -- LONTECH  Talk  22:40, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Montenegro is missing here http://en.wikipedia.org/Partially_recognized_state#Limited Would not be fair to other states to give Montenegro this privileged status (while more than 70 countries dont recognize as a state) -- LONTECH  Talk  22:54, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

The Kosovo history of 1400's cannot be biased if both perspectives are shown

The last changes by Hxseek on the history section Ottoman Kosovo (1455–1912) were made because of "revert clearly POV, unscource edit by A.C." are totally unacceptable. The text in the form it was had only one source, Cikovic, which is a Serbian source. In such delicate (not clear-cut) matters we need as much sources as we can get, and of course as much perspectives as we can get. I did not add the Albanian perspective, as I do not agree with it, although if we are going to leave the Serbian view of the history it is only fair to add the Albanian one as well. In the meantime information by international scholars such as Anscombe and Malcolm are more than welcome, considering they are both experts on the field (especially Malcolm). Please do not revert the edit, you can discuss about points where you have more information and we can together make a better and clearer picture of that part of history. —Anna Comnena (talk) 17:30, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

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