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TEHRAN, December 14 - Kosovo on Friday passed laws to build an army, asserting its statehood in a move that has inflamed tensions with Serbia, which does not recognize the former province's independence.
TEHRAN, Young Journalists Club (YJC) - Kosovo has been guarded by NATO-led peacekeeping troops since it broke away from Belgrade in a bloody separatist war in 1998-99.
The new laws will double the size of a small crisis-response outfit, the Kosovo Security Force (KSF), and set out a national defense mandate for a professional army of 5,000 troops.
"Kosovo's parliament has adopted the law on the Kosovo Security Force! Congratulations!" parliamentary speaker Kadri Veseli said.
The assembly still needs to approve one final law that lays out the KSF's new organizational structure. The first two laws were passed unanimously as minority Serb MPs boycotted the session.
The vote will delight many Kosovo Albanians, who are ready to celebrate the army as a new pillar of their independence, which was declared in 2008.
"Now we can say that we are a state, there is no a state without an army," Skender Arifi, a 37-year-old hairdresser in Pristina, told AFP ahead of the vote.
Hamze Mehmeti, a 67-year-old pensioner, added: "It is a great joy for the citizens of Kosovo".
Source: AFP
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