Serbian historian says Kosovo is independent: Mitrovica is hotbed of crime, violence

In an interview with the Serbian medium, Nova.rs, he stressed that “Kosovo has territory, people and governments independent of Serbia, and that is the price of Tito and Milosevic's” policies.

Protic said Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts Chairman Vladimir Kostic, who recently expressed a similar position in public, told the truth.

With that attitude, Kostic proved that he is a man who thinks with his head and comes to his conclusions independently, regardless of how the environment will react to him and what prejudices are expressed in public. Second, he spoke the truth. We all know it's true, but many don't want to hear it, but they put their heads in the sand because they don't want to face the facts”, he said.

Protic stressed that Kostic did not present his judgment but declared the actual state of the issue.

In this regard, I can go further than he is, but here we are talking about authenticity, authenticity, courage, individualism of a man who is in a very sensitive and important position in this country. And despite that, there is enough courage and personal integrity to express such an attitude and not fear what reactions will be and how many poisonous arrows will be directed by him, while, on the other hand, there is no one who is willing to protect him”, Protic said.

He added that today Serbia is paying the price of the wrong policy led by Slobodan Milosevic, the newspaper Express broadcasts.

This is the price of Tito and Milosevic's policy. We're paying him today. Tito allowed and enabled the creation of a limited territory in Kosovo, creating an autonomous zone, and then a province. Even then, Kosovo was practically and essentially separated from Serbia, and all power was given to Albanians there. It was now clear at the time that it was separate from Serbia and would not return. Milosevic then tried to force it back, but failed, which became an additional argument against Serbia's right that “Kosovo continues to be treated as its territory”. In our awareness, this medieval experience of that part of our country is neither territorial nor ordinary”, he said.

Protik says that “The combination of Kosovo” -- that is, “the experience of our being, existence, our history -- has no connection with material”.

Other “combes have lost their meaningful parts, and we ourselves have lived without that Kosovo for many centuries. She returned to us in 1912, but we never had the opportunity to integrate fully. That is why Kosovo remained our past experience and national identity, and not just territory. Kosovo has become a difficult, insolvent problem for us. We as a people and a country only lose in that war that was previously lost. It is no longer a matter of whether we will save Kosovo, but whether we will save Serbia. We don't have people for this territory either”, he said.

According to him, the problem is becoming much deeper than the Kosovo issue itself.

And not to talk about what's going on in Mitrovica, which is a case of crime and violence... We keep our people there, those unfortunate children, in the thorn wire like some hostages of the Serbian idea. What future do these children have? How can people in Serbia see a clean conscience, the afflictions in which they grow? What kind of future awaits them and what they can expect of life, surrounded by Albanians, in thorn wire, with some poor and improvised schools they learn there. Will it be their soul? What is this about?

Serbian chief opponent Vladimir Kostic recently said that “somebody should tell these people that Kosovo is no longer de facto or de jure in our hands” and that at this moment, “the only political wisdom is how to leave Kosovo with a dignity of”.

A group of 93, called Serbian intellectuals, had sent an open letter to the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts demanding that its chairman, Vladimir Kostic, resign over his statements that “Kosovo was and will be our”.

But in the course of criticism of fierce attacks in the direction of Kostic, he had sided with Serbian politician Nebojsa Zelenovic.

“I support Academy Chairman Vladimir Kostic's proposal for the start of a serious and effective debate on Kosovo. The requirement for Kostic to leave the head of the Academy is, in essence, an invitation to escape reality and to surrender to fate, which we will not influence” had Zelenovic written on Twitter.