Tensions between Serbia and Kosovo are not abating. Serbian soldiers arrested three Kosovo police officers on Wednesday. Both countries disagree on the exact location of the incident.
Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti said the officers were arrested 300 meters from the Serbian border on the Kosovo side. The head of the Serbian government office for Kosovo, Petar Petkovic, said the three men were captured a few kilometers from the border in Serbia.
The government in Pristina has ordered border controls to stop all vehicles with Serbian registration plates. Petkovic suggested an international inquiry into the incident. Observers fear the dispute could spark fresh unrest in areas of Kosovo’s Serb minority.
Only on Tuesday had Kurti shown willingness to compromise in response to European pressure in the dispute over local elections. Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008. This is not recognized by either Serbia or the Serbian population in Kosovo. NATO has stationed some 4,000 soldiers in the Balkan country to keep the peace. Austrians are also on site (see image below).
Kurti speaks of “revenge action”
Kurti suspects a “revenge” on the part of Belgrade behind the “kidnapping” because Kosovo police had arrested a suspected mastermind behind the bloody attacks on NATO soldiers in northern Kosovo the previous day in late May. “The incursion of Serbian forces into the territory of Kosovo is aggression aimed at escalation and destabilization,” Kurti wrote. The 48-year-old followed up on Twitter: “We demand the immediate release of the officials and call on the international community to denounce these acts.”
The Interior Ministry in Belgrade said the three arrested Kosovo policemen had plotted a “terrorist act”. They were equipped with automatic weapons, maps and GPS devices.
In late May, a Serb mob of soldiers from the NATO-led security force KFOR attacked with stun grenades and stones in the town of Zvecan in northern Kosovo. 30 KFOR soldiers and about 50 Serbs were injured in the clashes. The KFOR unit had guarded a mayor’s office.
Source: Krone
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