Author: Alan, 5B4AHJ.
Kosovo declared its independence form Serbia on 2008-02-17.
The ARRL Letter of 2008-02-22 gives a lot of detail on the subject of when/if Kosovo will be added to the DXCC List. The bottom line is that Kosovo will not be added to the DXCC List until a so-called Event Date is reached. The Event Date is either the date on which Kosovo becomes a UN member, or receives an official prefix from the ITU.
This same issue of the ARRL Letter also states that contacts made before the Event Date will be counted as Serbia for DXCC purposes. However, a subsequent email from Bill Moore, dated 2012-09-24, specifically states that QSOs with stations in Kosovo using the Z6 prefix do not count for any DXCC entity. This email is reproduced below:
24 September, 2012
Congratulations to the team which helped to reintroduce Amateur Radio
to Kosovo, and welcome back to the airwaves to the returning Hams.
As of this time Z60K, and/or any other Z6 station, will not count for
any entity for DXCC awards purposes as they do not qualify under the
DXCC rules. Any future change in Kosovo's DXCC status will be
announced by ARRL.
73 es DX!
Bill Moore NC1L
Update - October 2013
Although 103 UN member states now recognise Kosovo, Russia and Serbia, and some other countries, do not support full independence for Kosovo. Russia has the power of veto. The DXCC status of Kosovo is unchanged.
Between December 2013 and March 2014, Club Log allowed Z6 to be stored as "Republic Of Kosovo" with "invalid for DXCC" as the mapping. On 11 March 2014, in view of a lack of progress and the time needed to explain this situation, this was reversed and Z6 is now no longer mapped to any DXCC.
Update - January 2018
From the ARRL web site:
Amendment to ARRL DXCC Rules Will Expand DXCC List
01/23/2018
The ARRL Board of Directors approved a motion to amend the DXCC Rules, when it met January 19-20. Section II, Subsection 1 of the DXCC Rules now will include a new Subsection (d): The entity has a separate IARU member society and is included on the US State Department Independent States in the World.
“The discussion during the Board meeting and the rule change did not address any specific entity,” ARRL Radiosport Manager Norm Fusaro, W3IZ, said. “The amendment could allow some additions to the current DXCC List of entities. It’s a good thing not only for DXCC but for all active hams.”
In fact, the Republic of Kosovo (Z6) has been added to the DXCC List of current entities, increasing the total number of current DXCC entities to 340. The addition of Kosovo raises to 331 the required number of current entities confirmed to qualify for DXCC Honor Roll; Top of Honor Roll is 340. DXCC award accounts are being tabulated to reflect the change.
This change qualifies as an “event,” effective on January 21, 2018, at 0000 UTC. Nothing is retroactive.
Mapping of Z6 QSOs
In-line with the above information from ARRL, Club Log maps Z6 QSOs as "INVALID", for all dates up to and including 2018-01-20 and to Republic of Kosovo on and after 2018-01-21.
Note: The term INVALID in Club Log only means that the QSO is not valid for DXCC.
Credits