9 minutes agoBBC writes about tense Kosovo- Serbia
Periskopi(4 years ago)
(4 years ago)The BBC has dedicated an article to tense Kosovo-Serbia relations. The article notes that the EU and Serbia have warned that violence could erupt in Kosovo after EU-mediated talks failed to resolve a dispute on Serbian car plates. Kosovo authorities want the ethnic Serb minority to hand over the plates [...]
Kosovo authorities want the ethnic Serb minority to hand over their plates issued by Serbia. Serbia does not recognise Kosovo's independence.
Kosovo police plan to pronounce fines of $150, starting Tuesday, for holders of plates issued by Serbia.
The US wants the move delayed and has called for concessions to maintain peace.
Kosovo argues that plates preceding the 1999 territory war for independence from Serbia can no longer be valid. He says 50,000 Serbs in northern Kosovo, who only accept local Serb institutions, must now use Kosovo plates issued in Pristina.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said multi-hour talks had failed to resolve the long-standing dispute.
“I think there is an important responsibility on the sides of both leaders for failing talks today and for any escalation and violence that could happen”, he said.
Serbia's President Aleksandar Vucic said the “situation is literally on the eve of conflict”. He has also asked Kosovo special police not to try to implement the fines. Ethnic Serb police officers resigned massively earlier this month in protest of the Pristina license decision.
Vucic spoke after talks on the dispute with Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti in Brussels.
Later, Kurti blamed the EU for failing to negotiate, and Borrell said Kosovo's leader had rejected an EU compromise proposal, though Serbia had accepted it.
Vucic said Serbia will stop issuing and renovation of its car plates to Serbs in northern Kosovo.
US State Department spokesman Ned Price said that both sides “would have to make concessions to ensure that we do not risk decades of hard-earned peace in an already fragile” region.
About 3,700 NATO peacekeeping troops remain deployed in Kosovo, the KFOR force, to prevent any explosions in the former Serbian province. Chief NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, wrote in Titter: “Now is the time for responsibility and pragmatic solutions. escalation must be deleted”.
