25% of police officials withdraw from northern municipalities

50% of Kosovo police members placed in and around municipal facilities have so far left there. The second quarter, left Friday, until the situation was deemed quiet and without serious incidents, for more than a month. Prime Minister Albin Kurti announced that this is being done under the Bratislava Agreement, which included the gradual withdrawal of the Kosovo Police, but that there will be no complete departure from the north.

Police officials standing by to secure municipalities in northern Kosovo day-to-day are shrinking in number.

Initially on 13 July, the withdrawal of the Special Intervention Units was decided, and 25% more Kosovo Police officials took the route outside these municipalities this Friday.

After more than two months of daily engagement of police effectives there, Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti suggested that this government movement is within Bratilsawa's relationship with the de-excedentation of the situation in the country's north.

“As we said more than two months ago: 1) there will be no permanent and immediate reduction of the presence of the police, but only gradual and proportional; 2) reductions are valid for police presence in municipal buildings and their surroundings, not for the north of the country, where there is still the challenge of working for full rule of law”, Kurti has said.

Although he mentioned that there have been no serious incidents for more than a month and a half in the north, Kurti wrote that they remain alert to the potential re-exception, which, according to him, may come from statements that incite hatred and political and state aggression stemming from Serbia.

The situation as a calm one is also appreciated by the police, until they refocus that full withdrawal from the north is not planned.

Once upon a time we are in the entire territory of Kosovo, we do not have any plans for withdrawal from the north in general. I can consider that there may be an assessment of the security situation in general as envisioned by political agreement, so that we can decide how many policemen will be in municipal buildings, but there is no plan for police to withdraw to the rest of northern Kosovo”, said Deputy Police Director in Northern Mitrovica Veton Elshani.

Despite welcoming the government's co-ordination with international actors, security connoisseur Valdet Hoxha did not hesitate to mention the consequences that the two-month situation in northern Kosovo caused, envisioning elections in the coming months.

The “is a fair and rational decision, but unfortunately it has already taken its set in place a few measures from the European Union, and I remember that the Government of Kosovo has seen the alarm that threatened it with taking unilateral steps, and thankfully it is already seen that there is co-ordination and the Bratislava agreement has begun to be implemented even its second point of trust that the pressure will be put on the side of Serbs and very soon during September or there will be election organisation in the northern Kosovo municipalities of<1> Hoxha said.

The Kosovo Police engagement in the vicinity of northern municipalities has begun late May, when the Serb community in the north sharply opposed the entry of elected mayors through northern municipalities in the 23 April elections.

Until the reduction of members of the police placed in and around municipal facilities came after a meeting of Kosovo Police Directors, EULEX's KFOR, which is held within the framework of the assessment of the overall security situation, which also precedes decisions for the eventual withdrawal of Kosovo Police members. /Rtv Dukajini