Serbia’s army has no intention of going over the administrative line with Kosovo as an escalation of the conflict would be counterproductive to Serbia’s desire to join the EU, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić told Financial Times, despite amassing troops at the border over the weekend.
On Sunday, 24 September, a group of heavily armed Serbs, led by former vice-head of the Serbian List political party and including Serbian defence chief Aleksander Vulin’s bodyguard, carried out a terrorist attack in north Kosovo.
One Kosovo police officer was killed before the group barricaded themselves inside a monastery, and a shootout with authorities followed. At least three Serbs were killed as Kosovo police sought to bring the situation back under control.
Serbia declared a day of mourning for the three dead Kosovo Serbs, and Vučić falsely claimed Kosovo forces were conducting a campaign of “brutal ethnic cleansing” against ethnic Serbs.
Vučić has had meetings with international community representatives, and Belgrade has requested that KFOR secure the north of Kosovo. The White House, the EU, journalists, citizens on the ground and significant video and photographic evidence have shown that Serbia sent troops to the border and then withdrew them.
“An escalation of conflict would counter Serbia’s desire to join the EU. Why would this be of any use to Belgrade? Why would we destroy a position we have been building for a year in a single day? Serbia does not want war”, Vučić told the Financial Times.
“It is a lie that Serbia is sending its army to the administrative line. We had 14,000 people near it last year; now we have 7,000, and we will cut that down to 4,000”, he said.
Speaking about the shooting in an Instagram video, Vučić repeated that an independent Kosovo is “just a dream”.
“We will not be silent about Serbs being murdered because our lives are not less valuable. I do not care about the pressure nor lies about our country”, Vučić said.
“You can only dream about Kosovo’s independence. Serbia will uphold the UN Charter, the 1244 Resolution, and its territorial wholesomeness”, he concluded.
Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dačić told Prva TV that Kosovo’s Prime Minister, Albin Kurti, is the only person to blame and is trying to shift the blame to Serbia. Kurti does not want to uphold the Brussels agreement, and Serbia is in a very difficult position and needs to be ready for any type of intervention.
“We have a need to go back to the 1244 Resolution, for KFOR to be the force to guarantee peace. It cannot be the police of Kosovo because it is Albanian, and the point of the Brussels agreement was to have Serbian policemen where Serbs are”, he said.
(Bojana Zimonjić Jelisavac | Euractiv.rs)
Read more with EURACTIV
Slovak elections: Hungary celebrates, EU switches to alert mode
Source: euractiv.com
