We welcome Ambassador Ungaro to the Permanent Council, and thank him for his report and for the work of the mission.

As Ambassador Ungaro has pointed out, the "spillover" context of the mission’s mandate continues to be important. His comments this morning regarding the situation there were of great interest, and warrant our continued closest attention. We support the mission's monitoring of developments in southern Serbia.

We are pleased to hear that momentum is gaining towards a solution for the question of higher education in minority languages. The United States is looking at ways to assist this process.

We are concerned that incidents such as the recent one in Aracinovo could further heighten ethnic tensions. We are particularly concerned about reports that one of the ethnic-Albanian suspects died in police custody. We urge Macedonian authorities to ensure that this case is fully and transparently investigated, and that any misdeeds are punished.