BELGRADE, Serbia — Serbs on Tuesday erected extra roadblocks in northern Kosovo and defied worldwide calls for to take away these positioned earlier, a day after Serbia put its troops close to the border on a excessive stage of fight readiness.
Washington
Serbs put up new roadblocks as tensions soar in Kosovo
It’s the first time because the current disaster began that Serbs have blocked streets in one of many primary cities. Till now, barricades had been set on roads resulting in the Kosovo-Serbia border.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic stated he ordered the military’s highest state of alert to “shield our folks (in Kosovo) and protect Serbia.”
He claimed that Pristina is making ready to “assault” Kosovo Serbs within the north of the nation and take away by power a number of of the roadblocks that Serbs began placing up 18 days in the past to protest the arrest of a former Kosovo Serb policemen.
Kosovo officers have accused Vucic of utilizing his state media to stir hassle and set off incidents that might act as a pretext for an armed intervention within the former Serbian province.
Petar Petkovic, a Serbian authorities official answerable for contacts with Kosovo Serbs, instructed the Serbian state RTS TV that the fight readiness of Serb troops was launched as a result of Kosovo had completed the identical factor.
He claimed that closely armed Kosovo items wish to assault the Kosovo Serbs “with the intention of attacking our girls, the aged, youngsters, males. Our individuals who on the barricades are simply defending the proper to dwell.”
Kosovo has requested NATO-led peacekeepers stationed there to take away the barricades and hinted that Pristina’s forces will do it if the KFOR power doesn’t react. Some 4,000 NATO-led peacekeepers have been stationed in Kosovo because the 1999 struggle that ended with Belgrade dropping management over the territory.
Any Serbian armed intervention in Kosovo would possible lead to a conflict with NATO forces and would imply a significant escalation of tensions within the Balkans, that are nonetheless reeling from the bloody breakup of Yugoslavia within the Nineties.
Tensions between Kosovo, which declared independence after a struggle in 2008, and Serbia have reached their peak over the previous month. Western makes an attempt to succeed in a negotiated settlement have failed, with Serbia refusing to acknowledge Kosovo’s statehood.
KFOR and the European Union have each requested Pristina and Belgrade to point out restraint and keep away from provocations.
Kosovo stays a possible flashpoint within the Balkans years after the 1998-99 Kosovo struggle that ended with a NATO intervention that pushed the Serbian troops out of the previous Serbian province.