Kosovo’s prime minister, Albin Kurti, has warned of Russia inflaming tensions between his country and Serbia due to the war in Ukraine faltering, as Belgrade took its first step in deploying troops to the region.
Ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo, where they are in the majority, have had barricades set up for more than a week, preventing the free movement of the Kosovan authorities, despite US and EU calls for the illegal road blocks to be dismantled.
A large group of members of the Narodne Patrole, a Serbian nationalist organisation with ties to the Russian paramilitary group Wagner, had also massed on Sunday on the Serbian side of the Serbia-Kosovo border threatening to confront Nato troops.
With the risk of violent clashes growing, Serbia’s president, Aleksandar Vučić, used his right under a UN resolution to ask Nato for permission to send 1,000 police and army personnel, citing a need to protect Serbian communities.
Serbia’s request on Friday, the first since the Kosovan war ended in 1999, will almost certainly be rejected, but the concern will be that it could be the first step towards a unilateral decision to deploy.
Credit: theguardian.com
