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In response to the first three articles that appeared in the Agora on Kosovo, this paper argues that there is a right of unilateral secession based on the right of external self-determination. According to the authors, the latter right is applicable outside a colonial context, in limited circumstances resembling the colonial paradigm. Modern customary international law provides the legal basis for a right of “remedial secession”, an argument that is supported by relevant State and institutional practice. After having discussed the conditions of this right and its legal basis, the authors apply their findings to the Kosovo case, in order to answer the question whether the Kosovo Albanians had a right of unilateral secession under international law. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines the resilience of the farmers, which is defined as prudent. The adjective "prudent" stands here for virtue, for the actions that may not always be rational in an economic sense but are prudent from social and cultural sustainability and risk-management points of view. By relying on ethnographic research findings from rural Serbia and Kosovo, the paper argues that prudent resilience is almost always multisectoral, which enables farmers to manage parallel threats, amortize their negative consequences, ensure forward-looking, and at the same time maintain their ethical threshold. Prudent resilience as a virtuous practice cannot be measured, which is a trend imposed by global sustainability agendas. By measuring resilience, there is a danger of perpetuating the image of farmers as victims and not as competent and self-confident managers of risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper women's leadership will be reviewed through the professional biographies of two women who, in the role of director, managed the stage presentation of folk dance and music in Serbia. One of them is Olga Skovran, who laid the foundation of folklore professionalism in Serbia and the region and established the Ensemble "Kolo". She was the Ensemble's general manager from 1948 to 1965. The other woman is Snežana Jovanović, who has been the head of the Folk Dance and Song Ensemble of Kosovo and Metohija "Venac" from Gračanica since 2013. This paper will reflect on the professional positions of these two female figures who worked in historically different times. In addition, special attention will be given to defining leadership within two temporal and spatial dimensions, as well as the competences required for leading a professional ensemble in specific political, economic, artistic, and other conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to present a chemical composition and quantities of mining and processing waste landfills material developed during historical mining and smelting. After detailed inspection, it was found that approximately 2.6 gigatons of the waste had been deposited at 1650 sites, covering almost 65 km2. More than half of this material, 55%, is characterized as conventional mining waste, 37% belongs to the processing tailings, and 8% to metallurgical waste. Most of these tailing sites are unclaimed, presenting a source of contamination for nearby communities. According to the literature data collected and additional chemical analyses, in accordance with zero-waste philosophy, about 42 promising locations (c. 270 million tons) could be selected, where various advanced eco-innovative methods of recovery could possibly apply. The areas with the highest prospective recovery are Serbia and Kosovo. In accordance with the metal prices achieved in March 2022, it is estimated that the recovery of tailings could bring up to 18,100 million USD, which is much more compared to the prices of March 2020—10,600 million USD—when the commodity market was governed by the COVID-19 restrictions. In addition to the commercial value of the metals, the environmental aspect should not be forgotten after the application of reuse and recycling concepts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change has acquired a status of a global issue in the second half of the 20th century, nowadays becoming more and more prominent. The negative effects of climate change as manifested through natural disasters are noticeable the most in forest stands and forest ecosystems. This study covers the period from 2008 to 2017, and the data included was collected from official statistical reports. The data on the following categories was collected: average annual air temperature, average annual precipitation, average annual relative air humidity, the number of disaster events, such as insect activity, plant diseases, wildfires, or climate and geological disasters, causing damage in state forests, and the scope of such damage. The aim of this paper is to analyze the said data and to use the results to determine the influence of observed climatic elements on the incidence of damage, the scope of damage, and the damage per one disaster event in Serbian state forests. This paper is significant because it represents a pioneering attempt to synthesize the influence of temperature, precipitation, and humidity on the incidence and scope of damage in state forests resulting from insect activity, plant diseases, geophysical events, and wildfires in Serbia (excluding the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija). A non-linear dependence of the influence of climate factors on damage incidence and scope has been determined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The problem of the existence of illegal drug production laboratories in the world was recorded as early as in the mid-twentieth century. At the beginning of the twentieth century, this global problem affected Serbia, too, when the first clandestine drug production laboratories, whose production capacities exceeded the demands of the Serbian drug market, were uncovered. The aim of this paper is to determine the characteristics of illegal laboratories for the production of narcotics in the Republic of Serbia and how widespread they are. On the basis of the data provided by the Department of Analytics at the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Serbia, data relating to all illegal laboratories uncovered in Serbia (excluding Kosovo and Metohija) in the period from 2003 to 2019 was used. An exploratory research has been conducted analyzing 147 uncovered laboratories in which 245 illegal manufacturers were imprisoned. The production of marijuana took place in 92.5% of the laboratories, in 6.8% of cases synthetic drugs were produced, while hallucinogenic mushrooms were grown in one laboratory. A cartographic representation of how widespread the laboratories are and their basic characteristics in terms of location, production capacity and the type of installed equipment has also been provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the work is to assess vulnerability degree of reproductive health in adolescent population in Serbia by analyzing their sexual behavior. The paper is based on data from a National health survey of the population in Serbia in 2013 (without Kosovo and Metohija region), conducted by the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Serbia. For the purposes of this study, the data used are referred to households and population of age 15 and over, so that the final number for analysis is a sample of 1722 respondents aged 15-24. The study included demographic characteristics of respondents (age, gender, settlement type, region) and the characteristics of reproductive health: sexual behavior, use of contraceptive protection, knowledge and attitudes towards HIV, protection of reproductive health. χ2 test was applied for testing differences in frequency of categorical variables. All results with a probability that equals to or is less than 5% (p≤0.05) are considered statistically significant. Among the respondents, there were more than half (53.5%) of sexually active adolescents. The highest percentage of them- 16.6% responded that they had first sexual intercourse at the age of 17. 53.4% of adolescents had sexual intercourse with one partner, 26.4% of respondents had sexual intercourse with two or more partners. The most commonly used contraceptive method was interrupted intercourse (coitus interruptus) with 34.7% of respondents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exposure to wartime and post-war traumatic childhood events is a potent risk factor for developing depression symptoms during youth. Using the sample of student population from Serbia and Kosovo and Metohija, this paper attempts to determine if there are gender differences in the occurrence of depression and to determine the frequency of depression symptoms in relation to war-related experiences (WRE), peace-time experiences (PTE), cumulative traumatic experiences (WRE+PTE), or without traumatic experiences (TE). We used the following tools in the paper: general questionnaire for demographic data and type of traumatic event exposure; Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) for depression level and symptoms; for statistics, ANOVA test and chi-square test; and for post-hoc analysis, Tukey's Honestly Significant Difference (HSD) test. The value of p<0.05 is taken as statistically significant. The females had a slightly higher level of depression compared to males ((9.04±8.13:6.42±6.93); the group with WRE+PTE had a statistically higher level of depression compared to all other groups. In females, depression was higher in the group with cumulated trauma experiences, compared to the group with PT (p=0.033) and to the group without TE (p=0.002). Those females had more depression symptoms: crying, agitation, changes in sleep pattern, concentration difficulty, and loss of interest in sex. Results indicate the need for psychological support for young people, especially for girls in war- and peace-time traumatic experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Throughout three issues of the Goettingen Journal of International Law we are trying and answering the same question: with the recognition of responsibility to protect, is humanitarian action at last guaranteed? Will this concept avoid some avoidable deaths and lack of rescue? Our first issue was devoted to the long quest for a legal regime in favor of humanitarian action effective delivery. After a step by step review of the many solutions which have been tried, the paper ended with the "discovery" of physical protection. After mentioning the Kosovo (and Serbia) air strikes and the 3rd millennium UN field missions, the paper ended with a worrying assessment: no device over the past 150 years has succeeded in guarantying neither assistance' provision nor protection. And we raised the issue of responsibility to protect (R to P) as a possible help to solution. Our today's paper goes down this way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kosovo's education system is divided along a Serb-Albanian line, with consequences for the non-Serb minorities. While Serb-Albanian relations have been researched and analyzed extensively, relations among non-Serb minority communities have typically been neglected. Although there are some studies addressing the treatment and rights of individual minority groups in Kosovo, there is very little written on the dynamics and relations those groups establish among themselves. This article uses education as the backdrop for analyzing the emerging inter-minority relations in Kosovo. The paper provides some background about minority education rights and the consequences of their partial implementation for those minority groups—i.e., the Kosovo Bosniaks and Turks—whose members opt to follow the Albanian (Kosovo) educational system. In addition, it offers insights into some of the economic and political considerations behind the decision of the Gorani community to endorse the Serbian educational system. Finally, I analyze the relations between the Goranis and Bosniaks that have been developing around education and language rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper was firstly to describe the ecological and geographical differentiation of the four maple species ( Acer spp.) in Serbia and Kosovo based on floristic and phytocoenological data, and secondly, to model their distributions in order to predict which areas the species can be expected in. The intention was also to compare the resulting prediction maps with the available field records and see whether there are any differences between the actual and the predicted ranges. The data set included 1979 species records and each record was accompanied by geographic coordinates. The geographi-cal analysis was performed on the chorological data (latitude, longitude, altitude), while the ecological was based on vegetation data relating to the association, alliance, order and class as well as on 19 bioclimatic parameters. The data set was georeferenced using GIS tools. The results demonstrated that the distribution patterns of all the analyzed species are mostly affected by the limiting effects of the variables related to precipitation and temperature of the dry and also the warm period. Their synergic limiting effects are the most important force shaping distribution patterns within a territory. These findings highlight the importance of defining bioclimatic profiles of species using different techniques of distribution modelling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contrary to the normative part of the constitution whose basic function is of legal character, the preamble of the constitution is characterized primarily by sociological Junctions. There are many of them, however they are intertwined, hence one sociological Junction, as a rule is tied to the majority of other sociological Junctions. However, it is possible for ceiiain Junctions of the preamble to be in collision. Based on a comparative analysis of modem constitutions we can diSRuss thefollowing sociological Junctions of the preamble of the constitution: symbolic, legitimacy-, integrative, ideological, educational and programmatic. Asidefi-om sociologicalJunctions, the preamble can also have, although more rarely, a legal Junction. With respect to the preamble of the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia, its content is directed at establishing the territorial identity• ofthe country. In that sense, it can be concluded that the symbolic Junction of the preamble of the Constitution is more dominant. Although in its content it does not offer anything new in relation to the normative part of the constitution, it announces in a celebratory tone, that Kosovo and Metohija are an integral part of the Republic of Serbia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines whether violence in contemporary Albania is a structured phenomenon linked to Albanian customary laws, such as the Kanun of Lek Dukagjini, or whether it is a product of social confusion and `culture conflict'. It argues that the expansion of Western legal norms in the Albanian territories has caused a `culture conflict' within the society, which has subsequently led to an increase in crime. The conclusions drawn are based on a cross-national survey with ethnic Albanian respondents from Albania, Kosovo and Macedonia, carried out during 2006. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports the results of a study using lichens as biomonitors to investigate the environmental distribution of uranium and other trace elements at selected Kosovo sites. The results suggested that the use of depleted uranium (DU) ammunitions in Kosovo did not cause a diffuse environmental contamination in such a way to have caused a detectable U enrichment in lichens. Also isotopic 235U/238U measurements did not indicate the presence of DU particles in lichens. The present results also provided no indication of intense environmental contamination by the other trace elements analyzed, with the exception of Kosovska Mitrovica, where a diffuse environmental contamination by several heavy elements such as Pb, Zn, As and Cd was found. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper reports the results of a study using lichens as biomonitors to investigate the small-scale environmental distribution of uranium and other trace elements in an area of Kosovo (Djakovica) heavily shelled with depleted uranium (DU) anti-tank ammunition. The results of total uranium concentrations showed great variability and species-specific differences, mainly due to differences in the exposed surface area of the lichens. The uranium concentrations in lichen samples were rather similar at a site heavily shelled with DU ammunition and at a control site. Unexpectedly, the highest uranium concentrations were found at the control site. The observed U distribution can be explained by contamination of lichen thalli by soil particles. The soil geochemistry was similar at the two sampling sites. The 235U/238U ratios in the soil samples suggested a modest DU contribution only at the heavily shelled site. Measurements of U isotopes in lichens did not reveal DU pollution at the control site. The U isotopic ratios in lichens at the shelled site showed variable figures; only two samples were clearly contaminated by DU. There were no signs of contamination by other trace elements. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]