Serbia mobilizes troops to the border with Kosovo after the riots over the blockade of mayors

For Serbia, the Kosovo Serb community is the victim of acts of “terror” by Kosovo. For Pristina, “illegal and criminal structures” in Belgrade are causing deliberate violence.

Once again, the two parties engage in mutual accusations, this time following the protests by the Serb community in northern Kosovo, in rejection of the ethnic Albanian mayors who won the elections in four municipalities on April 23.

Those elections were held under the boycott of the Kosovar Serbs – a minority in Kosovo, but a majority in the north of the territory – in protest because their demands for greater autonomy were not met, which meant another setback to the March peace agreement between Serbia and Kosovo. .

Since the elections had only a 3% turnout, the Serbs of northern Kosovo do not recognize the authority of these mayors and, therefore, tried to block access to the town halls in the towns of Zvecan and Zubin Potok, while a group of truckers cut off a road near the municipal building in Leposavic.

Kosovo Police fired tear gas at protesters in Zvecan, a situation that escalated into riots and clashes. At least ten people were treated with minor injuries from gas inhalation or bruises, while the Police stated that five officers suffered injuries from the impact of stones and other objects. In addition, at least one police vehicle was set on fire.

In this scenario, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic ordered the Army to raise the alert level to the maximum and move to the border areas with Kosovo.

The Serbian Defense Minister, Milos Vucevic, indicated that the transfer of the soldiers is “urgent” and considered that “it is clear that terror against the Serb community in Kosovo is occurring.”

In return, the chief of staff of the Kosovo presidency, Blerim Vela, accused the “illegal and criminal structures of Serbia” of fueling tensions and attacks against the security forces. “Violence will not prevail. Serbia bears full responsibility for the escalation,” he asserted.

US urges Kosovo to stop ‘violent measures’

Knowing the rejection by the Serb majority of the mayors of four towns in northern Kosovo, Pristina pledged to ensure that elected local chiefs have access to their offices, something it successfully achieved in the case of Zvecan.

This move was widely condemned by the United States. The Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, assured that the Kosovar authorities disregarded the advice of Washington and the European Union.

These acts “have sharply and unnecessarily increased tensions, undermining our efforts to help normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia and will have consequences for our bilateral relations with Kosovo,” Blinken warned.

Earlier, the US ambassador to Pristina, Jeffrey Hovenier, condemned the police action and warned the Kosovar authorities that “today’s violent measures must end immediately.”

Along the same lines, Chris Murphy, a Democratic senator and member of the Foreign Relations Committee who recently visited Kosovo, said he was taken “by surprise” by the incidents and, “as a friend of Kosovo,” called on Prime Minister Albin Kurti to put end “to this provocation”.

The frequent tensions renew the obstacles in the already complicated process of normalization of relations between Kosovo and Serbia, under a road map drawn up by the European Union and supported by the United States.

Kosovo is a former Serbian province populated by a large majority of Albanians, which declared its independence in 2008, a move that Serbia does not recognize. Serbs in the Kosovar north still see Belgrade as their capital.

Vucic faces his own “explosion of protests” in Serbia

While this is happening in Kosovo, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic is facing a series of citizen mobilizations, unleashed after the mass shootings that at the beginning of May caused the death of 18 people, half of them children.

The fourth massive protest in Belgrade is scheduled for this Saturday, in less than three weeks. These demonstrations are called by the opposition under the slogan “Serbia against violence” and serve to channel the general discontent against the populist leader.

Dusan Milenkovic, an analyst at the NGO Center for Social Dialogue and Regional Initiatives, told the EFE news agency that this is a true “explosion of protests” against Vucic. “There is an environment of great commotion, with a feeling of insecurity, collective trauma and uncertainty,” he explained.

In a show of force, Vucic called on his supporters to stage “the biggest march in Serbian history” this Friday in Belgrade.

For this reason, tens of thousands of his followers, many of them wearing T-shirts with the president’s face, traveled by bus from different parts of the Balkan country, as well as from Kosovo and Bosnia, to support the questioned head of state.

With Reuters and EFE