43-day capture of Leposaviqi chairman Lulzim Hetemi

The new Albanian mayor of Leposaviqi, the Serb-run municipality in northern Kosovo, is standing closed in the municipal building since it entered, over forty days ago.

Lulzim Hetemi was helped by the Kosovo Special Police Unit to enter his office early morning on May 29th, and since that day it has not been reported out of the municipal object.

There, Lulzim Hetemi eats, stays, works, cleans and sleeps.

His entry into the municipal facility was met with protests by local Serb residents and various violent groups that attacked law enforcement forces and gathered journalists.

Leposaviqi's brother claims that his family is working under extraordinary conditions within the municipal building, but says he cannot comment on the reasons that “s and why he [Lulzim Hetemi] is still staying within the municipality”.

“Normically, the mayor's work is very challenging. I believe, and I hope you do, but these circumstances, normally, are too heavy for him and for us. It's a problem to work under these conditions, but I think he'll make it. Why, as it stands, I cannot speak for it”, the Hetemi Union declares Radio Free Europe.

He says the entire Hetemi family is concerned about the lack of functioning of rule and law in the northern part of Kosovo.

According to Bashkim Hetem, the “something is not right” even with the international community's stance, which, although it declared recognition of the outcome of extraordinary elections in four municipalities in northern Kosovo, inhabited by Serb majority, is demanding the departure of the mayors, including his brother, from municipal buildings.

Bashkim says he often communicates with Lulzim Hetem, but that it is not clear how much his brother will be able to exercise the mayor's post under current conditions.

I don't know how long it can go under these circumstances, but the circumstances he [Lulzim Hetemi] is working on are extraordinary. It's hard work. It is not being allowed to work normally”, says the Hetem Union.

Free Europe Radio has contacted the Leposaviqi chairman several times since his closure at the workplace, but he has not responded.

Lulzim Hetemi has also been contacted about this article, but he has not responded to phone calls or text messages.

The Party of Sée comments on Hetelim drawing
Why Hetem is still not leaving the municipality building has not spoken even to the party he belongs to, the Vetevendosje Movement (LVV).

The political subject, which leads even Kosovo at the central level, has not commented even when asked how long Hetem will continue to be confined.

But, that Hetemi was seriously staying at the municipal building in Leposaviq, Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti announced, simultaneously. When he was describing a phone call with Hetem, Kurt said on June 11th that “when I was worried that he might be upset [Hatem], he was worried that I might be upset.

Hetemi has been visited at the municipal building in Leposaviq by various Kosovo Government officials including Local Power Management Minister Elbert Krasniqi; Minister of Internal Affairs Jelal Svecla; Environment, Spatial Planning and Infrastructure Minister Lieburn Aliu as well as LV deputies.

Protests against the new Albanian chairman are continuing in Leposaviq.

After increasing tensions in municipalities in northern Kosovo, inhabited by Serb majority, the international community -- including the European Union and the United States of America -- demanded that the new mayors leave the municipal facilities, and were exercising their positions from alternative buildings.

So did Zubin Potok's chairman, Izmir Zeqiri, and Zvecan's Ilir Peci, both of whom are among the Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK).

In addition to Hetem, who remains confined to the municipality facility in Leposaviq, the removal from the municipal object is reported to be made from time to time by the mayor of North Mitrovica.

Erden Attic has not spoken of those claims, although he was on several occasions seen outside the municipality building, including in an event at the American Embassy in Pristina, for the July 4th issue of US Independence Day.

Attic has not responded to Radio Free Europe's interest in these claims. Contacted several times by the REL, Father has not returned.

However, claims that, at various times, Attic has stayed at night in the municipality's object, denies North Mitrovica Deputy Mayor Katarina Adjanic.

“Atic lies in the municipality building without working hours. He's here from 8 to 4, or maybe later, but he's definitely going home. He lives in [South] Mitrovica”, says Adjanciq for Radio Free Europe.

She adds that she consults with Attici on all decisions, and that co-operation between them is good, but stresses that it takes even a short time for the North Mitrovica municipality to work with full capacity.

“We are still being organised, we are appointing department directors, there are many unloaded sectors, but we are gradually resolving [works]. When we have all appointed directors, we will also announce the competition for official selection. I can't wait for capital investments to start, so citizens can feel the improvement”, she says.

Markovik: Mayors cannot solve any essential problems
Programme director in the organisation “Structible”, based in North Mitrovica, Igor Markovik, says new leaders cannot solve any essential problems for citizens' lives.

“As both municipalities [Leposaviqi and Zubin Potoku] suffer from many problems that need to be resolved quickly, the newly elected mayors are not dealing with these key issues, thus endangering the process of integration of Kosovo's north, which has been implemented since 2013”, says Markovic for Radio Free Europe.

He estimates that the mayors are also making mistakes, referring to the North Mitrovica municipality's decision to open the main bridge over the Iber River, between her and South Mitrovica, at a time when, he says, tensions had culminated.

Markovic claims that the chairman of northern Mitrovica has had the most priority topic to address, including the issue of wandering dogs, lack of public green spaces, water supply problems, and illegal parking

Meanwhile, for Leposaviqi's chairman, Markovic says that, except he ended up in the media fronts related to his being dragged into the municipality building, he has done nothing in describing his duties.

Moreover, his refusal to leave the building has raged even more the local community, so much so that he has lost even the smallest legitimacy of the community, which could have been gradually built, through the implementation of the so-called technical leader's role, at some other facility, as was the case in the other two northern municipalities of Kosovo”, Markovic says about REL.

The extraordinary elections in four northern Kosovo municipalities, inhabited by Serb majority ão Mitrovica, Zvecan, Zubin Potok and Leposaviq this year, were held on 23 April, following the resignation of mayors from the ranks of the Serbian List, the largest party of Kosovo Serbs in November 2022.

They were boycotted by the Serb majority population in that area, which currently does not accept the new Albanian mayors, while the Kosovo Central Election Commission announced that only about 3 per cent of eligible voters participated in the voting process.

Zubin Potok and Zvecanin won the candidates of the Democratic Party of Kosovo, while Northern Mitrovica and Leposaviqi took over the Vetevendosje Movement.

Since taking office, the activity of new mayors is very limited, while legitimacy is being rejected.

The departure of Hetem and Attic from the office is one of the requirements the international community has submitted to the Government of Kosovo, in the plan it has submitted for the suspension of the situation in northern Kosovo.

In this part of Kosovo, Serb residents' protests against young Albanian leaders escalated even in violent clashes, with dozens of injured, including soldiers of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation mission (NATO) in Kosovo, KFOR.

The Kosovo government announced on July 11th that it has agreed to reduce police presence in the north and support holding new elections in the four northern municipalities as part of actions to defuse the situation.