Local media reports that on Friday, large numbers of ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo battled with police as they tried to block the entry to municipal offices and keep newly elected politicians out. Several cars were burned and police used tear gas to disperse the crowd. As a result of the fighting, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic issued a written statement that was broadcast on RTS, the country’s official television station. Vucic also claimed that he had sent “urgent” Serbian troop deployment to the Kosovo border.
After two horrific shootings earlier this month left 18 dead and 20 more wounded, Vucic will join a gathering in Belgrade in his support. The media also reported that Vucic urged that NATO-led forces in Kosovo protect Kosovo Serbs from Kosovo police due to “violence” against Kosovo Serbs. Ethnic Serbs mostly abstained from the sudden election on April 23; as a result, only members of the ethnic Albanian or other smaller minority groups were elected to mayoral seats and legislatures.
After Serb representatives resigned last year in protest of the association’s foundation to coordinate efforts on education, health care, land planning, and economic development at the local level, local elections were held in four Serb-dominated communes in northern Kosovo. Kosovar Albanians are worried that the association may transform into a new ministate like Srpska Republika in Bosnia because ethnic Serbs in Kosovo are demanding autonomy.The Constitutional Court of Kosovo determined in 2014 that a Pristina-Belgrade agreement on the plan was illegal since it excluded some ethnic groups and may require the deployment of executive powers to impose laws. Tensions remain high despite a preliminary agreement to support a European Union blueprint for moving forward. Kosovo is under pressure from the United States and the European Union, in particular on the subject of association.
Fearing greater instability in Europe as the war in Ukraine rages on, the United States and the European Union have increased their efforts to help resolve the disagreement between Kosovo and Serbia. In order to move forward with their plans to join the EU, the EU has made it clear that Serbia and Kosovo must normalise relations.
In 1998, ethnic Albanian separatists rose up against Serbia’s administration in Kosovo, sparking a conflict that was brutally repressed by Belgrade. More than a thousand individuals, predominantly ethnic Albanians, were killed. Serbia withdrew from the area after NATO’s engagement in 1999. Kosovo has been recognised as an independent state by the United States and most of the European Union, but not by Serbia, Russia, or China.
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