Security and Association, biggest challenges this year

This issue must certainly be resolved in 2024 with international pressure. The Government of Kosovo expects this challenge”, says Rabbi Mani from Pristina.

“We are hoping in the support of our friends, from America and Europe, to find an appropriate module that does not endanger the Kosovo Constitution”, says Bajram Kalaba from Kamenica.

It refers to establishing the Association of Serb majority municipalities in Kosovo, for which Kosovo has pledged an agreement with Serbia since 2013.

However, the association has not yet been established, for fear that its broad competencies could influence the functionality of the state.

The international community, recently, has stepped up pressure on Kosovo to form it and on Serbia to recognise Kosovo de facto, viewing it as the only way to normalise relations between them.

The two countries, at the end of October, have also been presented a plan for this purpose, which Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti, and Serbia's president, Aleksandar Vuciq, have accepted in principle.

Miodragou, a Serb citizen from Northern Mitrovica, says forming association remains a priority for the predominantly Serb population of this area.

“An association as a whole... and not an association created by Kurti, which will bully you as you're being harassed now, confiscating Serbian goods”, he says, without specifying more.

The Kosovo government did not answer Radio Free Europe's questions about what expectations and challenges it considers important for 2024.

But, referring to the normalisation of relations with Serbia in the new year, Prime Minister Kurti wrote on Facebook on December 22nd that Kosovo security, territorial integrity and improved the living conditions of all citizens remain to its priority, indiscriminately.

The Challenge of Security

In September 2023, Kosovo experienced one of the biggest security challenges since the postwar in 1999. On 24th that month, armed Serb groups attacked the country's police in the village of Banjska in the north, killing police officer Africa Bulnjak.

Three Serb attackers were also killed in the subsequent clashes.

Police later found large quantities of weapons and arrested several suspected attackers, while others declared the search.

The Kosovo government blamed Serbia for the incident, but it denied involvement.

The event sparked concern among the international community about stability in the region.

Some opposition representatives in Kosovo say the government is not doing enough to integrate the Serb community into the north, which -- nearly 25 years after the war -- continues to disobey the decisions of Kosovo institutions and to view Belgrade as its capital.

“There can be no security in any part of the country without the integration of the local community, without the participation of the local community in Kosovo institutions. We, as a majority community, have to do much to integrate the other community [Serbian], especially in the north”, says Rashit Qalaj, deputy of the Democratic Party of Kosovo, for Radio Free Europe.

Lutfi Haziri, deputy chairman of the Democratic League of Kosovo, says implementation of the Agreement on normalisation of relations with Serbia, which envisions the formation of association, will be the challenge Kosovo will continue to face even in 2024.

But, according to him, it also remains to be seen whether Kosovo will go towards a regular election process, which should be determined during the last four months of 2024, or go to early parliamentary elections.

Haziri says the possibility for the pretext for early elections to create the Government itself is not ruled out, with the conviction that it can remove the issue of implementing the Agreement with Serbia.

But, Mr. Kurti is not authorized by dialogue...”, Haziri points out.

Besnik Tahiri, chief of the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo Parliamentary Group, sees similar challenges.

Referring to the attack on Banjska, Tahiri says that in 2023, Serbia had <x0 hostile attitude towards Kosovo” and “Kosovo should exploit this situation” in negotiations awaiting the Serbian state.

What Kosovo has to do is argue that Serbia has hostile politics and reaches an agreement with Serbia, without causing any internal damage, meaning the constitutional order of Kosovo. The AAK has backed the Brussels Agreement [for normalisation of relations, reached in February 2023] and we think that whatever next agreement comes, it will not be better, but it will be worse”, Tahiri says.

What do observers expect of the political situation?

Efforts to normalise Kosovo-Serbia relations will continue to be among the main topics even in 2024, they say.

With the European Union's mediation, the two countries are in negotiations from 2011. They have reached dozens of agreements, but few have applied.

Because we have elections in the European Union ahead of us, and the election campaign in the United States will start, it is possible that the dynamics for implementing the Brussels Agreement will decline. This, on the other hand, could bring about even greater tensions between Kosovo and Serbia, not excluding even possible security incidents” here, says Lulzim Peci from the Kosovar Institute for Research and Development of KIPRED Policy.

According to him, there are indications that some elements of the agreement in question are starting to apply “in a silent way”. The start of implementing the energy agreement, but also for license plates, gives such signals, he says.

However, the key part of the agreement, in which Kosovo has major obligations, such as establishing the Association of Serb majority municipalities and the future status of the Serbian Orthodox Church, cannot be implemented quietly, because implementation is required on the ground and it is not only a government act”, Peci notes.

Miodrag Milliq, executive director of the non-governmental organisation active by Northern Mitrovica, also agrees that the security situation and stabilisation of the situation in the north will be among the key challenges for Kosovo, in 2024.

And, according to him, this stabilisation will depend on the dynamics of the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue process, as well as on reports that will be created between the two countries.

Concretically for the Serb-run northern majority, he says, the challenge will be holding early local elections.

The Kosovo government has agreed to organise them, in accordance with the country's law. The elections, in fact, have been the international community's request to reduce tensions that have caused the installation of Albanian leaders in the north.

This is something that has been waiting for us since the first half of the year [2024]. Given that during 2023 the initiative for the departure of mayors in northern Kosovo has been initiated, the epilogue will take place in 2024”, Milliq says.

In the internal plan, analysts say, the challenge for Kosovo will also be the economic and social situation. According to them, the cost of living has increased, due to inflation on one side and the reduction of salaries on the other.