Last Monday, in an unprecedented decision in recent years, the Serbian army was put on a heightened state of alert after the recent rise in tensions in Kosovo, with shots fired, stun grenades detonated and barricades wounded, provoking no provocation.
The order was issued late Sunday by the Serbian president, following an order of “high combat readiness” and sending chief of staff General Milan Mojsilovic to the Kosovo border.
Even today, Vucic described contacts with the international representatives as “difficult and dynamic” to try to promote a de-escalation, and as “hysterical” the pressure on Kosovo Serbs to lift the roadblock.
The Serbian president accused Pristina of limiting the rights of the Kosovo Serb population, violating the agreements reached and wanting the Serbian population to leave Kosovo permanently, an allegation that also justified the growing militarization of the region by the two armed forces present .
External actors, especially the US and the EU, were also accused by Vucic of condoning and supporting Pristina in this behavior, despite threats of violent action to end Serbian barricades that have been in place since December 10. set up.
But the recent deterioration of the situation has antecedents. In November last year, 600 Kosovo Serb members of the police and administration resigned in protest of Pristina’s plans to ban the circulation of Serbian license plates, creating a power vacuum in the region and Belgrade blaming Kosovo’s Albanian leadership for continued provocations .
In Belgrade, the National Security Council met and President Aleksandar Vucic demanded the release of all Serbs “arbitrarily” detained by Kosovo police, another reason for the protests. At the same time, he urged the population to avoid clashes with the NATO contingent stationed in Kosovo (Kfor, about 4,000 troops, or with the police forces that are part of the European Union mission (Eulex).
Thus, what appeared to be a license plate dispute — resolved or postponed for the time being — eventually escalated into an escalation, further evidence that Kosovo remains a potential source of conflict in the Balkans.
Belgrade has never recognized the unilateral secession of its former southern province, which it self-declared in 2008 after a war started in 1997 by an Albanian armed insurgency that claimed 13,000 lives, mostly Albanians, and led to military intervention by NATO against Serbia in 1999, against the UN.
Since then, the region has recorded sporadic conflicts between the two main local communities, in a country with a third of the area of the Alentejo and a population of about 1.8 million, the vast majority of ethnic Albanians and Muslims.
Independent Kosovo, whose government intends to impose its authority over the entire territory, has been recognized by about 100 countries, including the United States, which retains strong influence over the Kosovo leadership, and most EU member states, with except Spain, Romania, Greece, Slovakia and Cyprus.
On December 14, the Kosovar Albanian authorities announced that they had signed an official application to obtain EU candidate status, a laborious and complicated process, made even more complicated by deteriorating relations between Pristina and Belgrade.
But almost immediately, the Spanish government assured that the country will not support Kosovo’s candidacy to join the EU because it failed to legitimize the secession of the former Serbian province, further evidence of the major obstacles Pristina faces in this process.
Serbia continues to view Kosovo as an integral part of its territory and Belgrade benefits from the support of Russia and China, which, like dozens of other countries (including India, Brazil, South Africa or Indonesia), also did not recognize Kosovo’s independence.
Belgrade and Kosovo Serbs also accuse Pristina of systematically blocking the creation of the Association of Serbian Municipalities, as envisaged in the agreements between the two parties signed in 2013, a central claim that would provide this community with a remarkable degree of autonomy .
In turn, Kosovo’s nationalist Prime Minister Albin Kurti called on NATO to guarantee “freedom of movement” in the territory and accused “criminal gangs” of promoting protests and blockades.
His victory in the 2021 parliamentary elections at the head of his Vetëvendosje (VV, Self-determination) party has raised hopes among local Albanians. For the first time since self-proclaimed independence, the country would be led by a politician not from the sectors involved in the armed uprising against Belgrade in the late 1990s, many of whom were harassed on charges of corruption or suspected war crimes. .
In his government program, Kurti prioritized internal issues, especially the economic situation in a very poor country with high youth immigration.
Since 2011, dialogue with Serbia under the auspices of the EU has been a decisive issue for any government in Kosovo. A dialogue that takes place on two levels, technical and political, with the aim of addressing outstanding bilateral issues. More than 35 agreements were signed, but most of them were never implemented.
There has never been an internal consensus on dialogue in Kosovo and Albin Kurti’s VV has always been very critical of this dialogue with Belgrade. This sovereignist movement insisted that Kosovo be treated equally with Serbia, and that a separate dialogue with Kosovo Serbs be promoted. But when he came to power, the prime minister continued to stress that dialogue was not a priority in the face of promised internal reforms. Until tensions return.
From the perspective of several Western observers, particularly those associated with Washington, Serbia acts as Russia’s representative in the region, in a complex geopolitical context exacerbated by the war in Ukraine. Moscow would thus seek a new front in the confrontation with NATO and the divided region of Mitrovica (north, where a significant part of the local Serbs are concentrated) would be suitable for achieving this goal.
Other analysts believe that the strong influence of the United States over the Kosovar Albanian leadership is a destabilizing factor and an obstacle to a global agreement on the normalization of relations, an essential condition for the EU to accelerate the much-coveted integration process .
Negotiations brokered by the European Union started in 2013, but with little result. For Kosovo Serbs and their main party of the Serb list (SL, close to Belgrade), the central issue lies in Pristina’s refusal to accept the 2015 agreement brokered by Brussels on the association of Serb municipalities with a significant degree of autonomy to be carried out.
This issue, which will remain at the center of demands, despite Pristina’s new leadership claiming that this concession – approved by previous local Albanian leaders – violates the constitution. The prospect of an “ethnically pure” Kosovo seems to remain on Pristina’s agenda, but it would imply a negotiated solution involving territorial exchanges (in southern Serbia, the Presevo valley has a majority Albanian population) . But Kurti has indicated that he flatly rejects that perspective.
Source: DN
