NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced Tuesday that the organization has sent an additional 700 troops to Kosovo to help quell violent protests and has deployed another battalion on standby in case unrest spreads.
“We have decided to deploy an additional 700 soldiers from the operational reserve force to the Western Balkans and put an additional battalion of reserve forces on high alert so that it can be deployed if necessary. These are prudent measures,” Stoltenberg told reporters in Oslo. after a meeting with Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store.
The composition of a battalion usually varies between 300 and a few thousand soldiers. The leader of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Western defense bloc) condemned the violence in northern Kosovo, unleashed three days ago by Kosovar Serb protesters demanding the resignation of majority Albanian mayors whose legitimacy is the Kosovar Serbs, a minority in the country but the majority there do not recognize it, and that it has already caused more than 50 injuries, including Kosovar policemen and members of the NATO mission in the country, KFOR.
Serbs boycotted April municipal elections in four northern cities where they constitute the majority of the population, resulting in Albanian candidates being elected with less than 3.5% voter turnout.
These mayors took office last week, under the regime of the government of Albin Kurti, prime minister of this country with an Albanian majority, ignoring the calls for appeasement launched by the European Union (EU) and the United States.
Serbia – which enjoys the support of its Russian and Chinese allies – has never recognized the independence proclaimed in 2008 by its former province, a decade after a violent conflict between Serb forces and Albanian separatists.
Stoltenberg also urged both sides to take steps to de-escalate tensions, refrain from “further irresponsible behavior” and return to the EU-sponsored negotiating table to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia.
Source: TSF
