A dispute over license plates between the Balkan nations of Kosovo and Serbia, from which Kosovo broke away 14 years ago, sparked protests and gunfire on Sunday night, prompting fears that violence could escalate as the countries Westerners focus on the war in Ukraine.
Amid protesters building barricades, unknown gunmen opened fire on Kosovo police officers along the northern border with Serbia on the eve of a new law forcing Serbs living in Kosovo to change their Serbian license plates to Kosovars in the next two months. Many Serbs in Kosovo still use Serbian-issued plates, which the government considers illegal.
The Kosovo government had also said that starting Monday, all Serbian ID and passport holders will be required to obtain an additional document to enter Kosovo, just as Kosovars are required to enter Serbia.
No one was injured in the shooting, but in response to the violence, Kosovo police closed two northern border crossings.
“The next hours, days and weeks may be challenging and problematic,” Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti said in a video posted on his social media channels.
Similar protests for license plates broke out a year agobut observers say tensions are higher this time over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which is consuming the focus of Kosovo’s most important ally, the United States, as well as that of the European Union.
Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, nine years after a 78-day NATO bombing campaign drove Serbian forces from the former province. Serbia, as well as its key allies Russia and China, still refuses to recognize Kosovo’s independence and insists on protecting its ethnic Serb relatives, who make up about 5 percent of Kosovo’s population of 1, 8 million people.
Just under half of Kosovo’s Serb population lives in four northern municipalities bordering Serbia, and many have been reluctant to recognize authorities in Kosovo’s capital, Pristina, preferring to live as if they were still part of Serbia. .
The European Union has mediated negotiations between the two governments since 2011, and the police, courts and municipalities have gradually come under Pristina’s control. But encouraged by the political leadership in Serbia’s capital Belgrade, Serbian nationalists protest every further attempt at integration.
“We will pray for peace and seek peace, but there will be no surrender and Serbia will win,” Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic told a news conference on Sunday. “If they dare to persecute, mistreat and kill Serbs, Serbia will win,” he continued, adding later: “We have never been in a more difficult and complicated situation than today.”
Mr. Vucic, who convened a high-level meeting of security and military officials on Sunday night, said the Kosovo government was trying to put him in the same light as President Vladimir V. Putin by blaming the unrest on Serbia’s close relationship with Russia. , a Slavic and Orthodox Christian nation.
The leader of Kosovo, Mr. Vucic, he said during Sunday’s press conference, was trying to take advantage of the global mood by projecting that “big Putin gave orders to little Putin, so the new Zelensky, in the form of Albin Kurti, will be a savior and fight against the great Serbian hegemony”.
Vladimir Djukanovic, a member of the Serbian Parliament from the ruling party of Mr. Vucic also linked the border spat to the war in Ukraine, tweeting: “Looks like Serbia will be forced to start de-Nazification of the Balkans,” an ominous reference to Russia’s justification for invading Ukraine.
Serbia, a candidate to join the European Union, has maintained close ties with Moscow and has not joined Western sanctions on Russia, although it has voted in favor of a United Nations resolution condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Belgrade and Moscow share animosity over the NATO military alliance over the bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999, when Mr. Vucic was a spokesman for Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic.
NATO still maintains a peacekeeping presence in Kosovo, with a force of approximately 3,700 troops. In a press release, NATO said its force on the ground was “ready to intervene if stability is threatened.”
After a meeting with the US ambassador on Sunday night, the Kosovo government announced that it would delay the implementation of both the registration and identification decisions by one month.
Russia quickly intervened on Sunday, calling the registration and identification laws “another step to expel the Serbian population from Kosovo,” Russian news agency TASS reported.
“We call on Pristina and the United States and the European Union to support her in ending the provocation and respecting the rights of the Serbs in Kosovo,” said Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry.
Kosovo’s northern border with Serbia has been a hotbed of violence in the past. In 2011, when the Kosovo police tried to take full control of the area, a Kosovo police officer was dead and 25 others were injured.