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Tag: Kosovo

  • 30 gunmen surrounded in monastery by Kosovo police

    30 gunmen surrounded in monastery by Kosovo police

    Security forces have gathered around 30 armed men after a police officer was killed in Kosovo, according to the country’s prime minister.

    Albin Kurti told the group to give up because they were hiding in a monastery in the village of Banjska.

    Mr Kurti accused Serbia of supporting a “terrorist attack” that also hurt another officer.

    The peacekeeping force from Nato in Kosovo has soldiers in the region and is ready to act if needed.

    People in Kosovo have been very upset and angry after there were fights and arguments following a local election that people disagreed about.

    Talks arranged by the European Union to calm down the situation have stopped progressing.

    Kosovo became independent in 2008, but Serbia, along with China and Russia, doesn’t accept it.

    Many people from Serbia believe that this place is where their nation originated. Out of the 1. 8 million people in Kosovo, 92% are Albanian and only 6% are Serb.

    The shooting on Sunday happened around 3:00 am (1:00 am in the morning for the rest of the world). The police went to Banjska, which is close to the border with Serbia, where people had set up a blockade.

    The police officers were assaulted by people firing many different guns, along with throwing hand grenades and shooting missiles, according to what they said in a message.

    “We can see people with weapons wearing uniforms. they are shooting at us and we are shooting back,” said Veton Elshan, a Kosovo police official, speaking to AFP news agency on the phone from Banjska.

    The Serbia Orthodox Church reported that armed individuals attacked a monastery in a village called Leposavic. Many people from a Serbian city called Novi Sad were visiting the monastery at the time.

    The Diocese of Raska-Prizren stated that priests and pilgrims went inside the temple of the monastery to keep themselves safe. They also mentioned that they sometimes heard gunfire.

    The prime minister blamed organized criminals for attacking our country, with political, financial, and logistical help from Belgrade.

    Mr Kurti said that the people who committed the crime and the people who told them to do it would be punished.

    Kosovo’s President Vjosa Osmani said that Serbian criminal gangs planned the incident. This incident attacked the law and order and went against Kosovo’s sovereignty.

    She strongly criticized Serbia for attacking Kosovo, and asked its allies to help Kosovo in creating peace and stability.

    Ms Osmani said that it is important for everyone to stay together and she believes in the police in Kosovo.

    Serbia hasn’t said anything about what happened.

    NATO peacekeepers in north Kosovo are prepared to help if needed and are actively trying to find a solution to the protests, according to KFOR.

    The European Union’s head of foreign policy, Josep Borrell, strongly criticized a terrible attack and stated that those who are responsible for it should be punished by law.

    This happened after the most recent discussions led by the EU fell apart last week. Borrell blamed Mr. Kurti for not establishing the association of municipalities with a majority of Serbs, which would give them more independence.

    There was trouble in northern Kosovo in May because Kosovo Albanian mayors were put in charge of areas where most people are Serb. This happened because Serb residents chose not to participate in the local elections.

    NATO sent 700 more soldiers to Kosovo to handle problems in the town of Zvecan after the elections.

    About 30 peacekeepers from Nato and over 50 protesters from Serbia were injured during the resulting fights.

  • Kosovo shooting claims life of police officer

    Kosovo shooting claims life of police officer

    A police officer was shot and killed, and another officer was injured in an incident that happened in Kosovo, a place near Serbia.

    Kosovo’s Prime Minister, Albin Kurti, said that the attack in the village of Banjska in Leposavic was carried out by skilled individuals using powerful weapons. The situation is still happening, Mr.

    There has been a lot of anger and fighting in Kosovo, especially after a local election in May that many people are arguing about.

    The talks led by the European Union to bring stability to the situation are not making progress.

    Kosovo said they were their own country in 2008, but Serbia, China, and Russia don’t agree with this.

    A lot of Serbs think it is where their nation started. Out of the 1. 8 million people living in Kosovo, 92% are Albanian and only 6% are Serbian.

    The shooting on Sunday occurred at around 3:00 am. The police had gone to Banjska, a place near the border with Serbia, in response to a reported blockade.

    Police officers were violently assaulted by people using many different weapons, such as guns, grenades, and missiles that are fired from the shoulder, as mentioned in an official statement.

    Why is there a lot of fighting happening in Kosovo.

    The Prime Minister Kurti said that our country is being attacked by organized crime groups that are getting help from Belgrade. He also said that the people who committed the crimes and the ones who told them what to do will be punished.

    Kosovo’s President Vjosa Osmani said that the event, which she believes was planned by Serbian criminals, was an assault on the enforcement of laws and the independence of the Republic of Kosovo.

    She strongly criticized Serbia for being aggressively towards Kosovo and asked its allies to help Kosovo establish law and order.

    Ms Osmani asked people to stay together and showed that she believes in Kosovo’s police.

    Serbia has not said anything about the event.

    There was trouble in northern Kosovo in May because ethnic Albanian mayors were put in charge of mainly Serbian areas. This happened because the Serbian residents chose not to participate in the local elections.

    NATO sent 700 more soldiers to Kosovo to handle the trouble in the town of Zvecan after the elections.

    About 30 Nato peacekeepers and over 50 Serb protesters were injured during the clashes that followed.

    The most recent discussions led by the EU ended last week without reaching an agreement. The EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, blamed Mr. Kurti for not establishing the association of municipalities where Serbs are the majority, which would have given them more control over their own affairs.

  • Kosovo’s president denounces fight that broke out in parliament

    Kosovo’s president denounces fight that broke out in parliament

    As reported by CNN station N1, Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani denounced the altercation that broke out between lawmakers from the opposition and the ruling party on Thursday in the legislature.

    Prime Minister Albin Kurti was interrupted by opposition lawmakers during a live video feed of the Kosovan parliament, and water was thrown at him after some pushing and fighting between members of the opposition and the ruling Vetevendosje party.

    Kurti was talking about calming down tensions in northern Kosovo, which had been the scene of deadly riots in May when ethnic Serbs objected to the appointment of ethnic Albanian mayors.

    There was a scuffle among the MPs who came to Kurti’s defense and those who came to the other side.

    Glass was also heard breaking and the President of the Kosovo Assembly, Gljauk Konjufca, was also heard calling the police in the video.

    The live broadcast from this session was then interrupted.

    Osmani said in a Facebook such violence had “no place.”

    “Using physical violence as a tool to address political discontent, differences or disagreements is the greatest harm that can be done to institutions that were built with so much can sacrifice,” she wrote, adding that “violence has no place in the temple of democracy and cannot become a political tool.”

    “We must reaffirm our commitment to democracy, different thinking, as well as mutual respect, based on rule and law-abiding,” she said.

    Albania’s Prime Minister Edi Rama also condemned the brawl.

    “Imagine how the irreplaceable allies and friends of Kosovo and the Albanians feel, when they see how Albanians grabbed each other by the throat instead of fighting with ideas and words, not insults and fists,” he said and called the opposition to distance itself from what he said was shameful behavior.

    Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, nearly a decade after a war in which Kosovan Albanians attempted to break from what was then the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, made up of today’s Serbia and Montenegro. Serbia views Kosovo as a breakaway state and does not recognize its independence.

    The bulk of Kosovo’s population is ethnically Albanian but in the restive north ethnic Serbs are the majority in some areas and have increasingly demanded greater autonomy.

  • NATO peacekeepers injured in Kosovo clashes

    NATO peacekeepers injured in Kosovo clashes

    The Italian defence ministry reports that amid clashes with demonstrators in the northern part of the nation on Monday, at least 34 soldiers of NATO’s peacekeeping force in Kosovo were hurt.

    Following elections in April that the Kosovo Serbs had boycotted, ethnically Albanian mayors were elected in northern Kosovo, a region with a majority of Kosovo Serbs, which has caused tensions to increase over the past week.

    NATO’s Kosovo Force (KFOR) claimed that on Monday morning, they increased their presence in northern Kosovo as a result of previous events, which they later claimed turned violent.

    The Italian defense ministry said 14 of its KFOR peacekeeping soldiers were injured when protesters threw “Molotov cocktails, with nails, firecrackers and stones inside.”

    Hungarian and Moldovan soldiers were also among the injured peacekeeping troops, according to the Italian defense ministry.

    “Italian and Hungarian KFOR contingent were the subject of unprovoked attacks and sustained trauma wounds with fractures and burns due to the explosion of incendiary devices,” it said, adding that KFOR medical units treated the soldiers.

    Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni expressed her sympathy for the Italian KFOR soldiers injured in the clashes, adding in a statement, “What is happening is absolutely unacceptable and irresponsible. We will not tolerate further attacks on KFOR.”

    Meanwhile, Nemanja Starović, Serbian State Secretary in the Ministry of Defence, offered a different version of events than what was outlined by NATO countries. He said “many” protesters were injured in the clashes and accused KFOR of using flash grenades when the “peaceful” protesters had “decided to disperse and continue the protest tomorrow morning.”

    Kosovo, which is mainly ethnically Albanian, won independence from Serbia in 2008. But Serbia still considers Kosovo to be an integral part of its territory as do the Serbs living in northern Kosovo.

    NATO has troops stationed in Kosovo to maintain peace, with tensions often flaring between Serbia and Kosovo.

    The NATO-led multi-national contingents had been deployed to four municipalities in the region to contain “violent demonstrations” as “newly elected mayors in recent days tried to take office,” KFOR said in a statement.

    On Friday, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić put the armed forces on the highest level of combat readiness. That decision followed Kosovo police clashing with protesters who tried to block a newly elected ethnic Albanian mayor from entering their office.

    On Monday, barbed wire had been put around a municipal administration building in the municipality of Leposavić, with KFOR troops reported to be wearing anti-riot gear, CNN affiliate N1 reported. It added that Kosovo police special units erected a fence near the municipal administration building in the town of Zvecan.

    Kosovo police say protesters had shown violence on Monday as they gathered in the municipalities of “Leposaviq, Zubin Potok and Zveqan.” Police added that in front of a facility in Zvecan, protesters had thrown tear gas and “tried to cross the security cordons to enter into the municipality facility by force.”

    Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabić described KFOR’s increased presence in northern Kosovo on Monday as “belated” and said “the task of this international mission was to protect the interests and peace of the people in Kosovo and Metohija, not the usurpers.”

    Brnabić said the situation in Kosovo and Metohija is “tense and difficult” and said, “It has never been more difficult.” Brnabić also expressed her “gratitude to Serbs in the province for remaining calm and refraining from violence.”

    Meanwhile, the United States ambassador to Kosovo, Jeff Hovenier, condemned “violent actions” by protesters, citing the use of explosives.

    The European Union Ambassador to Kosovo, Tomáš Szunyog, also condemned actions by protesters, citing damage to media vehicles.

    Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, also spoke about the situation on Monday, describing it as a “large eruption is brewing up in the center of Europe.”

    Correction: An earlier version of this story gave the wrong title for Nemanja Starović. He is the state secretary in Serbia’s Ministry of Defence.

  • World Cup 2022: Fifa opens disciplinary proceedings against Serbia over controversial Kosovo flag

    Fifa has opened disciplinary proceedings against Serbia’s football association after its team hung a controversial flag depicting Kosovo in their dressing room prior to their World Cup defeat by Brazil.

    The flag showed an outline of Kosovo filled with the Serbia flag, with the words ‘no surrender’.

    Tensions are running high between ethnic Serbs and the Albanian-led government in Kosovo, amid fears violence could flare up again, 23 years after the Kosovo war.

    Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 but Serbia – an ally of Russia – does not recognise it as an independent country.

    On Friday, the Football Federation of Kosovo (FFK) submitted a complaint to Fifa, football’s world governing body, over Serbia’s “chauvinistic rhetoric”.

    In a statement, it said: “Such acts of chauvinism have no place in a sports event, and even less inside the facilities where the biggest event of world football takes place, therefore FFK, as an equal member with all other members of Fifa, demands from this institution to undertake sanctioning measures against actions that incite hatred between peoples and are against human values.”

    It added: “It is unacceptable for this act to pass in silence, therefore we strongly request that Fifa strictly implement its rules and punish the football federation of Serbia for this aggressive action and against the values ​​that football conveys.”

    Kosovo’s sports minister, Hajrulla Ceku, said it expected “concrete actions” from Fifa against Serbia’s “hateful, xenophobic and genocidal messages”.

    Fifa’s proceedings were opened on the basis of article 11 of the Fifa disciplinary code, which is “offensive behaviour and violation of the principles of fair play” and includes “using a sports event for demonstrations of a non-sporting nature”, as well as article four of the regulations for the 2022 World Cup which refers to team’s responsibilities at the tournament.

    Kosovo was accepted into Uefa and Fifa in 2016 but under Uefa rules, Serbia and Kosovo can not play each other in World Cup qualifying because of the tensions between the two countries.

    Serbia were beaten 2-0 by Brazil in their World Cup opener in Qatar on Thursday, and play Cameroon in their next Group G fixture on Monday.

    Kosovo did not qualify for the World Cup.

    Source: BBC