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SERBIA HAS PLACED its security troops on the border with Kosovo on “the full state of combat readiness”, ignoring Nato’s calls for calm between the two wartime Balkan foes.
Serbia’s Interior Minister Bratislav Gasic said he “ordered the full combat readiness” of police and other security units and that they be placed under the command of the army chief of staff according to “their operational plan”.
He said in a statement that he acted on the orders of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic so that “all measures be taken to protect the Serbian people in Kosovo”.
It was not immediately clear what this order meant on the ground as Serbian troops have been on alert for a while on the border with Kosovo.
Officials claim alleged harassment of Kosovo Serbs by ethnic Albanians who are a majority in the breakaway province that declared its independence in 2008.
Yesterday, Nato-led peacekeepers said they were investigating a shooting incident in a tense northern region of Kosovo, urging calm as Serbia’s top military officials inspected their troops on the border in a show of combat readiness.
The incident on Sunday evening took place in Zubin Potok, a town where local ethnic Serbs have been manning road barricades for the past two weeks and where tensions have been running high.
The peacekeepers, known as KFOR, said the incident happened near one of their patrols. A statement said no one was injured and “we are working to establish all the facts”.
Serbia’s defence minister and the army’s chief of staff travelled to the border with Kosovo, praising the combat readiness of Serbian troops and their firepower, including howitzers and other military hardware.
Serbia, which has been armed through Russian donations and military purchases, has been sabre rattling and threatening force against its former province for a long time.
Kosovo remains a potential flashpoint in the Balkans years after the 1998-99 war that ended with Nato intervention.
Serbia does not recognise the 2008 declaration of independence of its former province, while Western efforts to mediate a solution so far have failed.
Fears of violence have soared since the start of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The United States and most European Union countries have recognised Kosovo’s independence, while Serbia has relied on Russia and China in its bid to maintain a claim on the province.
The rising tensions involve several issues amid international efforts to step up mediation efforts.
Most recently, ethnic Serbs in the north put up roadblocks in protest of an arrest of a former Serb police officer.
Serbs in the north previously had walked out of Kosovo’s institutions, claiming harassment by Kosovo authorities.
Belgrade repeatedly has warned it would protect local Serbs “with all means” if they are attacked.
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Serbia would do well to study how Russian armour is performing in Ukraine…
The world needs a full reset. Who knows how to turn it off and on again
@Shaun Gallagher: chuck an asteroid at it and leave it develop over time
@Pol Mlp: Exactly
STOP NOW! We must not revisit the horrors of the 90s in the Balkans.
No stop it Serbia. The journal commenters wont be able to handle this
Straight from Putin’s playbook
Slavic nationalism showing its ugly head again. First Russia now Serbia. History repeating itself.
@Elrond Rivendell: The CIA book I’d say. Interesting that “ethnic tensions” start near Armenia and Serbia, both ot them Russian allies.
@Zmeevo Libe: Yeah, everything’s America’s fault. Ethnic tensions have been part and parcel of the Balkans ever since the Turkish conquest in the 1600s. America wasn’t a factor then. Nor were they in the 1990s when the Serbs starting massacring their neighbours and attempting to ethnically cleanse the Balkans of Muslims as per Srebrenicia and Kosovo. If it wasn’t for the Croats and NATO, Serbia would have turned the Balkans into a Muslim cemetery.
@Elrond Rivendell: wouldnt Ukrainian nationalism be considered slavic Nationalism?
@Sean Casey: That as it may be, though to say it’s exclusively Slavic nationalism would ignore the huge historical Polish influence in Western Ukraine as well as ignore the fact that Ukranians, while a majority are ethnically Slavic, do not see themselves as Russian nationals. Similar in many ways to Irish nationalism while ethnically similar to Britain in many ways, saw themselves and still do as distinctly Irish in terms of national and cultural identity. In the Ukrainian context, Russian nationalism is very much a driving factor in Putin’s thinking and if you look at his support of Serbia and Serbian claims over Kosovo and parts of Bosnia-Herzegovina, one might reasonably see this as part of a broader pan-Slavic nationalist assertion.
@Elrond Rivendell: Ethnic tensions have been part and parcel of everybody’s history. Turkish conquest was in the 1400s, but you were right that there were wars on the Balkans long before that. But America (i.e. NATO) was very much a factor in the 1990s. As for the Croats, didn’t they do their own bit of ethnic cleansing?
If things continue like this there’ll be no need for Eurovision pre-contest heats.
Don’t make me come over there and protect myself!
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