By David Lawder
BALTIMORE, March 23 (Reuters) - Controversies involving Kosovo's prime minister and president will not deter investment interest in the newest Balkan country, deputy prime minister Mimoza Kusari-Lila said on Wednesday.
Businesses will look at whether Kosovo's institutions and legislative operations are functioning well and working towards improving economic growth, Kusari-Lila told Reuters on the sidelines of a Balkan investment summit in Baltimore.
She contends investors will not focus on a December report by the Council of Europe's Human Rights watchdog that said Prime Minister Hashim Thaci headed a mafia-style crime organization in 1999-2000.
"We need to make sure that we present facts and figures and not story tales about what happened 11 years ago or 12 years ago," Kusari-Lila said. "The entire nation cannot be kept hostage by a history from when they were a victim."
Thaci, elected in December, has rejected Council of Europe rapporteur Dick Marty's report, now the subject of a European Union probe, as untrue. It accused members of the former Kosovo Liberation Army loyal to Thaci of abductions, gun- and drug-running and trafficking in organs from some ethnic Serbs in 1999-2000.
Kusari-Lila said there is no evidence to support Marty's report. She also said Kosovo's new president Behgjet Pacolli's controversial business ties to the Kremlin are part of the past.
These are not Kosovo's biggest public relations problem, she insisted. Kosovo's biggest concern is showing that it can sustain economic growth and create jobs.
"If someone wants to bring up prejudice and bring up more obstacles to Kosovo's integration and Kosovo's development, then yes, they can find excuses, but I don't think that's a real problem. I think the main issue for Kosovo is to show that policies, legislation and institutions function," she said.
A bigger barrier to investment is the lack of movement of goods, people and money between Kosovo and Serbia, Kusari-Lila said, adding that she was hopeful that technical talks now underway between the two states could alleviate such pressures.
Ultimately, private businesses will base their decisions on the country's economic performance, the opportunities they see and the quality of their business partner, said Kusari-Lila, who also serves as trade and industry minister.
None of the American firms speaking with her at the Baltimore conference asked about the prime minister or the president, she said.
"They want to know more about legislation, they want to know more about business opportunities and they want to know more about what the government can do to assist them so they can come and locate in Kosovo."
The deputy prime minister also said that talks with the International Monetary Fund over Thaci's decision to raise public sector wages by up to 50 percent were continuing. The decision earlier this month violates terms of a 108 million-euro IMF stand-by loan arrangement.
She said the talks were not expected to be concluded before the IMF spring meetings in Washington in April. (Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Miral Fahmy)