Kosovo closes its main border post with Serbia and aggravates the crisis between the two territories

A road blocked by Kosovar Serb protesters this Wednesday in Rudare, near the Kosovar city of Mitrovica.FLORION GOGA (REUTERS)

Kosovo closed its main border post with Serbia on Wednesday after several months of tension between Belgrade and its former province.

The European Union and the United States have expressed their "concern" hours later and have urged the Serbian and Kosovar authorities to work "immediately" and "without conditions" to achieve a de-escalation, as well as to try to reach a "political agreement ” to put an end to the wave of confrontations experienced for more than a year due to the so-called enrollment crisis.

The NATO mission in Kosovo, KFOR, has also urged the two parties to continue complying with their agreements.

"Traffic at the Merdare border post is closed to entry and exit," the Kosovo Ministry of the Interior reported on Wednesday.

Pristina has argued that the decision responds to the barricades installed in Serbian territory, about two kilometers from the border crossing.

Since Tuesday night, a group of about 50 people have blocked the Serbian highway to Merdare with trucks and tractors, in support of the Kosovar Serbs who have maintained other barricades in various areas of northern Kosovar for 19 days.

The protesters accuse the Kosovar government of discriminating against them and restricting their rights.

Two other minor border posts, Jarinje and Brnjak, were already closed a few days ago.

There are still three open passes between the two territories.

"We call on all parties to exercise maximum containment, to act immediately to reduce the situation without conditions and to refrain from provocations, threats or intimidation," both spokespersons for the office of the High Representative for Foreign Policy of the EU, Josep Borrell, and the US State Department.

"We hope that Kosovo and Serbia once again promote an environment that allows reconciliation, regional stability and cooperation, for the good of their citizens," they add in the text released after the border closure.

Kosovo, which unilaterally declared its independence in 2008, and Serbia, which does not recognize its former province as an independent state, have been at odds for more than a year over the tuition crisis, the root of which is the refusal of the Serb minority in Kosovo to replace license plates issued by Belgrade by others from Pristina, as claimed by the Kosovar Government.

The crisis has forced Borrell himself to intervene, on several occasions, since the summer of 2021.

At the end of November, the Serbian and Kosovar negotiators reached an agreement

whereby Belgrade agreed to stop issuing new license plates with names of Kosovar cities and, in return, Pristina waived fines for Kosovar Serb vehicles not registered with its plate.

Unlike on other occasions, a new deadline was not set that could once again condition the negotiations to resolve the dispute once and for all.

However, the tension remained latent and rose again after the arrest, on December 10, of a former Kosovar Serb police officer —hundreds of officials from the Serb minority in Kosovo had resigned the previous month in the context of the license plate dispute— accused of having attacked other Kosovar officers during a protest.

His arrest triggered the roadblocks in northern Kosovo that last until today and have led to the latest escalation.

After an unresolved shooting took place last Sunday in one of the blocked areas, in the town of Zubin Potok, in the north of Kosovo, the Serbian president, Aleksandar Vucic, sent his chief of staff, Milan Mojsilovic, to the border strip.

A day later, he ordered the Serbian army to be placed on “high alert”.

For his part, the Kosovar Prime Minister, Albin Kurti, blamed alleged "Belgrade-supported criminals" for the barricades and this Wednesday he had reiterated his threat to resort to force to remove them if KFOR, the NATO mission in Kosovo , did not intervene quickly with the same objective, reports Efe.

This Wednesday,

In their statement, Brussels and Washington assure that they are working with Vucic and Kurti to "find a political solution" that can reduce tensions and allow "agreeing on a path forward in the interest of the stability, security and well-being of all local communities".

In this sense, they welcome the guarantees they say they have received from Pristina that "there are no lists of Kosovar Serb citizens to be arrested or prosecuted for peaceful protests or barricades."

At the same time, they stress the need to "respect the rule of law" and declare that "any form of violence is unacceptable and will not be tolerated."

In a gesture considered conciliatory, the lawyer of the former Kosovar Serb police officer arrested at the beginning of the month had announced this Wednesday to Radio Free Europe that his client will be placed under house arrest instead of continuing in preventive detention.

"I am interested in knowing who is the prosecutor who has requested it and who is the judge who made the decision," Kurti declared shortly after, according to the

portal .

For its part, KFOR has urged both parties to "continue to comply" with the agreed agreements.

These, as he recalled in another statement, imply that the Serbian military forces must inform the NATO command if they come within a thousand meters of the administrative border with Kosovo, while the Kosovars must receive permission from the KFOR commander. to deploy in the north of its territory.

"KFOR continues to closely monitor the situation on the ground and the activities along the border and supports the dialogue to find an agreement and defuse tensions in northern Kosovo," said the international force, which has almost 4,000 troops deployed in the former Serbian province.

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