Serbs in Kosovo are learning Albanian ? Trying to heal old wounds

In a picturesque village in northern Kosovo, Marko Djuriqi drank from a bottle of Gazimestan's beer and smiled at the cameras. On a visit to this area several weeks ago, Djuric was arrested by special forces, entered a police van and was soon deported. This time, Serbia's key man for the Kosovo issue was allowed to stay, though with a helicopter above his head to keep watch.

Djuric was in Kosovo, which Serbia still considers its province to be its own, for a visit to a micro-bird producing beer with the name honouring the medieval battle that is key to Serbia's emotional connection with Kosovo. He also visited a resort, under construction to care for Serb pilgrims at the 14th century Banjska monastery.

It is my duty to be here and proudly stay with our people”, Djuric said in front of the assembled television teams. I invite all Serbian citizens to come here without prejudice, and experience the sacred sites here in Kosovo and Metohija”, he said, using the Serbian name for the province, reports The Guardian”.

Almost two decades after Serbian forces withdrew from Kosovo in 1999 after a NATO air bomber campaign against Slobodan Milosevic, and a decade after Kosovo declared independence, the country's most sensitive issue is the fate of remaining Serb residents, as well as the political status of areas in which they live. Punishment measures by Kosovo Albanian guerrillas following Milosevic's crackdown on Kosovo's Albanian population in the 1990s, followed by independence, led to a sustainable Serb evacuation, and now they make up about 5% of Kosovo's 1.8 million population, the Koha.net broadcasts.

Under an agreement signed in Brussels in 2013, the Kosovo government is expected to establish the so-called Association of Serbian municipalities, which would bring majority Serb areas into its system and give collective voice. Belgrade and Pristina are still dealing with the final format, until they approach a comprehensive agreement on normalisation of reports and potentially enter the EU.

Avni Arifi, chief of staff of Kosovo's prime minister, has said that cultural guarantees and political representation for Serbs have only been embedded in the Constitution of Kosovo, and has accused Belgrade of wanting to create a Trojan horse, similar to Republika Srpska, the increasingly independent Serb entity within Bosnia. They're asking for more, but pardon is all we can give them because everything else is busy”, Arifi said.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vuciq said last week that Kosovo has done nothing “to implement its promises. Vuciqi has been working in the diplomatic district, seeking support for concessions in Serbia (the authorities still do not know), as well as preparing public opinion in the country for potentially painful compromises.

One of Belgrade's suggestions, which is constantly being mentioned in the media, is the division along the Iber River, so that Kosovo's north could possibly go to Serbia as part of a trade that includes majority Albanian regions in southern Serbia. “All Serbs will say this is one of the solutions”, Vuciq said, while refusing to comment whether this is one of the specific goals in negotiations, the Coha.net broadcasts.

Kosovo President Hashim Thaci has rejected this option. There will be no division of Kosovo. There will be no exchange of” territories, he said. Even Western diplomats strongly oppose this idea, at least partly because of the precedent it can set for other border disputes in the Balkans.

In addition, many Serbs live in enclaves south of the river, such as Gracanica, a few miles from Pristina. A large photograph of Vucinqi dominates the main square, where Serbian flags wave. Serbian dinars, as well as Euros, are accepted there. The Orthodox monastery of Gracanica, built in 1321, is filled with brakes of Bible scenes, and the most common is a Last Judgment with sinners burning. It is the medieval monasteries of Kosovo that arouse emotions for many Serbs, who view it as the heart of their nation and religion.

Here, the police force offers a thin thread of hope to those who want to see an integrated and multiethnic Kosovo. Of the police station in Gracanica, 41 are Serbs and 12 are Albanians. Svetlana Kaitanovic, a 43-year-old Serb police officer who speaks fluent Albanian, says that in recent years the ethnically motivated incidents have been very rare, while most of the police work has to do with combating small crime. Police all wear uniforms with the Kosovo flag, contrary to all Serbian flags throughout the city.

Kaitanovic said she decided to learn Albanian after an incident in her early career as a police officer in 2003, when she was summoned to a group of Albanian police officers in a violent domestic incident involving a young Albanian woman.

I was the only female cop, and the girl was giving me looks, like she wanted to communicate with me without telling the men. I could see that she wanted help from me and I wanted to talk to her, but I didn't know to speak Albanian, and neither did she speak Serbian. I suspected there might have been rape, and I reported it to my commander. Later, it turned out that I was right. Then I realized I had to learn Albanian”, said Kathanov, broadcast Koha.net.

As one who speaks Albanian fluently, Kaitanovic is a rare Serb. While there is still a generation of Kosovo Albanians who remember Serbians, among young people this language is rare. Children in Serbian schools, who still hold the Serbian state's curriculum teaching, do not learn Albanian, even the opposite.

“Unfortunately we still have a situation where Serbs and Albanians live separate lives”, Dalibor Jevtic, Kosovo Serb deputy prime minister speaking Albanian, has said. While avoiding the issue of his positions on Kosovo status, Yevtic says all sides should have a constructive approach to language. Although his party, the Serb List, has strong ties with Belgrade, he says it does not belong to Serbia to show Kosovo Serbs how to live.

Fifty percent of Serbs in central Serbia have never been in Kosovo. They don't understand our lives, and I do take very seriously when they tell me how to live my life with my neighbours, he said.

Although the majority of Kosovo Serbs are still concerned with the idea of independence, many now see unemployment and economic discrimination as greater threats than ethnic tensions. There is also division within the community, which is well illustrated by the murder of Oliver Ivanovic in January, a Kosovo Serb politician who opposed the Serbian List, which dominated the Serbian political scene. Ivanovic was shot dead in Mitrovica, a city divided between Serbian and Albanian sides by Ibri. No one's been arrested for murder.

“It is not safe to speak freely in this city, but say it was not Albanians who killed it”, said Marko Jaksic, political associate of Ivanovic, during an interview in northern Mitrovica, broadcast Koha.net.

Some Kosovo Serbs say Belgrade and Pristina are equally frustrated in exploiting their situation to score points. High profile visits to Kosovo by Djuric and others are often seen as dedicated to public opinion in Serbia rather than to making material improvements for them. For Belgrade, Kosovo is a poker chip to play on Serbia's path towards EU integration”, says Jaksic. “Vuciqi is willing to play it, and Djuriqi is dedicated to act as a sedative that makes things easier for us”.