A senior Bush administration official Wednesday expressed satisfactionwith Kosovo's progress since its independence in February. ButAssistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Dan Fried sayschallenges remain for the former Serbian province, includingethnic-Serb thuggery. VOA's David Gollust reports from the StateDepartment.

The State Department's top European affairs expertsays the relative quiet and political success of Kosovo since Februaryhas silenced critics who forecast dire scenarios for the region,including ethnic violence and refugee flows.

Daniel Fried (file photo)

But AssistantSecretary Fried acknowledges continued challenges for the fledglingstate, including a still-lagging economy, a restive Serb minority inthe north, and political thuggery he says may be inspired by someofficials in Belgrade.

The majority-ethnic Albanian former Serbprovince, which had been administered by the United Nations since 1999,declared its independence in February over the strong objections ofSerbia and its main diplomatic ally Russia.

In a talk withreporters, Fried said an independent Kosovo has now been recognized by43 countries including along with the United States most of Europe anda majority of U.N. Security Council members.

Under questioninghe rejected the notion that Russia's refusal to recognize Kosovo, andby extension its refusal to allow recognition by the Security Council,dooms Kosovo to semi-statehood.

"It is a completely-independentcountry, whether or not there is a U.N. resolution that says so. It isindependent," Fried said. "It's been recognized as independent bytwo-thirds, of Europe, Japan, Australia. It is an independent country.I regret very much that Russia chose to make this harder rather thaneasier, and thereby making it harder risks stability, and making itharder put as risk Serbia's European future. It was not helpful."

Friedsaid he hopes that with time, Moscow will become less strident andobstructionist over Kosovo and will not try to prevent the new moderategovernment in Belgrade from pursuing what he called a European future.

Hedismissed, as having no legal status, the separate parliament declaredby ethnic-Serbs in northern Kosovo late last month. He said manyKosovar Serbs are prepared to accept the new political reality but areafraid to say so - intimidated by what he said is rampant thuggery bySerb extremists, some of whom cross into Kosovo from Serbia.

"Youhave Serbs coming over, and it is sometimes hard to tell whetherthey're sort of private nationalists, semi-connected with thegovernment, or official," Fried said. "There seem to be some of all ofthem, and the Serbs should not be sending over, or supporting thuggery.That's not responsible. And we hope the new government will act in aresponsible way."

Fried said the United States will commit $400million in aid over the next four years at a donors' conference forKosovo being convened by the European Union late next week.

Hesaid he expects the conference to raise more than one billion dollarsoverall to help boost the economy of the new state, which is one of thepoorest parts of Europe with an unemployment rate about 40 percent.