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MITROVICA, Kosovo — 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 degree of fight readiness.
The brand new obstacles, product of closely loaded vehicles, had been put up in a single day in Mitrovica, a northern Kosovo city divided between Kosovo Serbs and ethnic Albanians, who symbolize the bulk in Kosovo as an entire.
It was the primary time for the reason that latest disaster began that Serbs have blocked streets in one of many major cities. Till now, barricades had been set on roads resulting in the Kosovo-Serbia border.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic has stated he ordered the military’s highest state of alert to “defend our individuals (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 police officer.
On Tuesday, Vucic addressed reporters along with Serbian Patriarch Porfirije, who was barred by Kosovo authorities on Monday from getting into Kosovo and visiting a medieval Serb church there earlier than Serbian Orthodox Christmas, which is widely known on Jan. 7.
In his common method, Vucic blasted the West and Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian authorities of plotting collectively to “set off unrest and kill the Serbs” who’re manning the barricades.
“Their intention is to expel Serbia out of Kosovo … with the assistance of their brokers in Belgrade,” he stated, apparently referring to the uncommon opposition and unbiased media, that are important of his dealing with of the Kosovo disaster and his more and more autocratic insurance policies.
Nonetheless, he stated that he’s at present negotiating with European Union and U.S. mediators “on preserving peace and discovering a compromise answer” for the present disaster.
Kosovo officers have accused Vucic of utilizing Serbia’s state media to fire up hassle and set off incidents that would 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, advised Serbian state tv RTS that the fight readiness of Serb troops was launched as a result of Kosovo had carried out the identical factor.
He claimed that closely armed Kosovo models wish to assault Kosovo Serbs, together with “girls, the aged, kids, males. Our individuals who on the barricades are simply defending the suitable to reside.”
Kosovo has requested NATO-led peacekeepers stationed there to take away the obstacles and hinted that Pristina’s forces will do it if the KFOR power doesn’t react. About 4,000 NATO-led peacekeepers have been stationed in Kosovo for the reason that 1999 conflict, which ended with Belgrade dropping management over the territory.
Any Serbian armed intervention in Kosovo would seemingly end in 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 Nineteen Nineties.
Tensions between Kosovo, which declared independence after a conflict in 2008, and Serbia have reached their peak over the previous month. Western makes an attempt to achieve a negotiated settlement have failed, with Serbia refusing to acknowledge Kosovo’s statehood.
KFOR and the EU 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 conflict that ended with a NATO intervention that pushed Serbian troops out of the previous Serbian province.
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Dusan Stojanovic reported from Belgrade, Serbia.
