Serbia sends Army chief to Kosovo border

Dec. 26 () –

The chief of the General Staff of the Serbian Armed Forces, Milan Mojsilovic, reported on Sunday night that he is on his way to the border with Kosovo, where tensions have escalated in recent weeks.

The general, who had just finished a meeting with the Serbian president, Aleksandar Vucic, on the situation in Kosovo, said in statements to Pink TV that “the situation requires the presence of the Serbian Armed Forces throughout the administrative line”.

“I am currently on my way, traveling to Raska, the tasks assigned to the Serbian Army are precise and clear and they will be fully implemented and carried out as such,” he said.

Serbia asked NATO in mid-December to deploy 1,000 Serbian security forces in Kosovo, an unprecedented request, based on a United Nations resolution; however, Vucic stated that he expected a negative response from the North Atlantic Alliance.

The NATO mission in Kosovo, KFOR, on which these security powers fall, has already increased its presence in the area, especially at the Jarinje pass, on the border with Serbia.

The latest episode in this long conflict began in November, when the Kosovo-friendly Srpska Lista (Serbian List) party declared its total and complete resignation from local elections, where the election of mayors for four municipalities in Serb majority.

After several nights of violent incidents that have left at least one Kosovo police officer injured by alleged Serb shots, the situation ended up worsening with the arrest of a Kosovo Serb police officer, one of the resigned officers, which led to the lifting of the population of the area with barricades that paralyzed transit through the territory.

The Kosovar Police decided to temporarily assume control of the Jarinje and Brnjak border crossings while the EU mission in Kosovo, EULEX, denounced having been the victim of an attack with a stun grenade against one of its patrols, fortunately without victims to regret .

The last straw that broke the camel’s back was the presentation of Kosovo’s application to join the European Union. As of today, five EU member states, including Spain, do not recognize the independence of the former Serbian province, so it is unclear how Pristina’s request will be dealt with, a step that normally takes months in the Council and which in this case it could be a more complicated process.