The Guardian: If Vuciqi stands behind the attack, Western access to dialogue could change

Authorities in Pristina displayed a series of modern weapons that the armed attackers group used during the attack, including two armoured Serbian production vehicles and a grenade launcher, along with a document allegedly showing that the grenade launcher, made by the Zastava arms company, had been released by the Serbian Army.

The Kosovo government also confirmed that the group's leader was Kosovo Serb politician Milan Radojciq, loyal to Serbian President Aleksandar Vuciq, and that one of the three paramilitary fighters killed Sunday was a former bodyguard of Aleksandar Vulin, the US-sponsored Serbian intelligence chief in July for corruption.

“This group has come from Serbia, they are trained in Serbia, financed by them, and also equipped by Serbia's military and its police. Part of the weapons were taken from army warehouses and handed over to terrorists who have come to Kosovo from Serbia”, Kosovo Interior Minister Jelal Svechla has told Guardian.

Svechla has said his ministry had shared evidence with Western embassies and agencies.

“What they wanted to do is seize Kosovo's territory and open a new channel of communication, a new route from Serbia to Kosovo”, he has said, adding that the final goal was to divide the country.

The Serbian government has denied involvement with the armed group, but has kept an official day of mourning for the three dead attackers.

Vuciq has sought to justify his actions by claiming false -- at a meeting with the Russian ambassador to Belgrade -- that the government of Kosovo was performing ethnic cleansing.

Kosovo claims the group was led by Milan Radoic, deputy leader of the Belgrade-backed Serbian List party, which dominated politics in the four Serb majority municipalities in northern Kosovo.

Svecla has said that Kosovo's intelligence service believes Radicic, who was sanctioned by the US and Great Britain, was injured and being healed at Belgrade's main military hospital.

The clash occurred at a time when EU-mediated talks aimed at normalising relations between the two countries have stalled, with Vucinqiqi pledging she would never recognise Kosovo and the Kosovo government as a result refusing to establish the Association of Serb majority municipalities.

The US has backed the talks and so far sided with Europe, blaming Prime Minister Albin Kurti for failing to negotiate. But the Biden administration is investigating Belgrade's involvement in the paramilitary unit and is trying to uncover its mission.

If Vuciqi is found to have been involved, this could change the approach of the US and EU to negotiations. This could also lead to sanctions against Serbia.

The “is increasingly clear that there has been a scenario to provoke a conflict so that the Serbian Army then enters to protect the Serb people in the north and thus implement the division of Kosovo”, Sonja Biserko, president of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia, has said.

This operation, regardless of who is directly responsible for it in Belgrade, has crossed a red line that the West cannot tolerate. This situation is not provoked by Kurti, as most say in Belgrade. Rather, he showed maturity and Kosovo police showed professionalism”, Biserko added.

Edward Joseph, former deputy head of the Kosovo mission of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, has said that if Belgrade is behind the paramilitary group, the US will have to rethink its approach to the region.

The question is that calls for dialogue are now empty that the entire US strategy to cultivate Vuciki's Serbia as réparter dealt with”, said Joseph, now senior member of Johns Hopkins University's advanced international studies school in Washington.

“The effects of Vuciki's knowledge are as reliable as US illusion policy towards Serbia”, he added.