Gunmen storm Serb monastery in Kosovo as ethnic tensions rise

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Armed militants stormed a village in Kosovo on Sunday, shattering months of relative calm within the former Serbian area whose disputed standing has fuelled battle between ethnic Serbs and Albanians.

About 30 fighters in unmarked, armoured automobiles descended within the early hours on Banjska, a village close to Mitrovica within the north of Kosovo, which has an ethnic Serbian majority, killing one police officer.

The gunmen then barricaded themselves right into a Serbian orthodox monastery in a stand-off with authorities. Monks and pilgrims remained contained in the buildings whereas the siege passed off, based on church officers. The siege, wherein three of the militants have been killed, ended on Sunday night.

The clashes on the monastery will additional complicate efforts to mediate between Kosovo and Serbia, elevating the spectre of additional bloodshed and expensive political antagonism between the 2 EU membership candidates.

The ethnicity of the attackers was not instantly confirmed, though Kosovo’s prime minister Albin Kurti stated within the early afternoon that they have been doing the bidding of Serbia.

“It isn’t abnormal Kosova Serb residents however Serbian state-supported troops perpetrating these terrorist assaults,” Kurti stated on the social media platform X.

Serbia’s president Aleksandar Vučić stated in a televised handle that whereas the killing of the Kosovo police officer was “completely reprehensible” the accountability for the tensions lay with Kurti and his refusal to grant Serbs a sure degree of autonomy.

Kosovo broke away from Serbia unilaterally in 2008, a transfer that Serbia and a number of other hundred thousand ethic Serbs in Kosovo haven’t recognised. A tentative settlement in March virtually put an finish to many years of battle but it surely rapidly fell aside over disputed native elections in 4 northern Kosovo municipalities, the one areas of the nation the place Serbs kind a majority.

Talking to the UN Normal Meeting earlier this week, Vučić condemned the west, saying it was complicit in violating the territorial integrity of Serbia. He additionally warned that Belgrade would by no means settle for the sovereignty and independence of “so-called Kosovo”.

Kurti, in the meantime, has refused to take part in normalisation talks, organized by the EU, except the popularity of Kosovo is included. This has prompted a repeated warning from Brussels that his stance may value each Pristina and Belgrade their EU membership.

Vučić known as for the assistance of the worldwide neighborhood to assist set up an Affiliation of Serb Majority Municipalities, a long-sought autonomy establishment for Serbs in Kosovo, including that “that is the one strategy to cease Serbs from being expelled and from conflicts”.

The Serbian Orthodox Church’s diocese of Raška-Prizren, which incorporates Banjska, stated that preventing across the monastery had ended after fighters deserted the compound. “The state of affairs is . . . secure, although apprehension stays,” the diocese stated.

“The armed people who breached the gate earlier right now have left the premises, and there may be now a presence of Kosovo police and Eulex on the entrance and throughout the monastery’s courtyard.”

Kosovo’s inside minister Dželjalj Svećlja stated on the scene that “this territory [is] below management,” including that three attackers had been killed, and 6 arrested, two of whom have been wounded and in uniform.

“Kosovo police found a rare quantity of explosives, uniforms, logistics, meals, barricade tools, which was tools for a number of hundred different attackers. They have been able to violate the sovereignty of Kosovo,” he stated.

The EU and UN condemned the violence. Josep Borrell, EU international coverage chief, known as for the perpetrators to face justice for a “hideous assault”. Borrell stated: “All info concerning the assault should be established. Extra harmless lives are in danger . . . These assaults should cease instantly.”

Eulex, the EU mission that acts because the second safety responder in Kosovo, was on the bottom and in shut contact with the authorities and Nato’s peacekeeping drive Kfor, Borrell added. Journalists have been barred from coming into the village.