Hundreds of ethnic Serbs rallied in Kosovo on Sunday as a row over car number plates exacerbated ongoing tensions between Belgrade and Pristina.
The government’s decision to phase out number plates issued by Serbia has angered Kosovo Serbs, most of whom live in the north of the country and do not recognize Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence.
Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti’s demand that police begin warning those who continue to use Belgrade-issued number plates prompted members of the ethnic Serb minority to resign from government posts in protest at the directive on Saturday.
During protests on Sunday in the Serb-majority municipality of North Mitrovica in northern Kosovo, Serbian political leaders said police officers, judges and other public servants would not return to their jobs unless the Kosovo government reversed its license plate policy would.
“We are on our land and we will not give up,” said Serbian politician Goran Rakić. “There is no retreat. Long live Serbia.”
The NATO-led peacekeeping mission in the country, KFOR, has said it stands ready to intervene on the ground should further escalations occur.
Brussels calls for an end to unilateral decisions
Demands for more rights for Albanians and an end to active repression sparked an armed conflict in 1998-1999 that left around 13,000 dead.
At least 1 million became refugees after the government in Belgrade, led by strongman Slobodan Milošević, launched a brutal crackdown on Kosovo’s ethnic Albanians.
NATO bombed Serbia and Montenegro – then in a state union – in 1999 to end the war.
The Serbian government, with support from China and Russia, has refused to recognize Kosovo’s statehood and blocked its membership in international organizations such as the UN and Interpol.
Most member states of the European Union, Great Britain and the USA recognize Kosovo as an independent state.
Both Serbia and Kosovo have been told that they must normalize relations in order to move forward in their bid to join the EU.
However, EU-brokered talks have stalled, raising concerns about instability more than two decades after the conflict.
The bloc’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said in a statement on Saturday that recent developments in Kosovo “endanger years of hard work and achievements made within the framework of the EU-backed Belgrade-Pristina dialogue and threaten the security situation in the affect the region and beyond. “
Borrell also called on “both sides to refrain from unilateral measures that could lead to further tensions”.
Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dačić, who further dashed hopes of a quick solution, said on Sunday that the country’s leadership had rejected the latest proposal for a deal led by France and Germany.
The proposal reportedly offered Serbia a faster path to EU membership in exchange for Kosovo’s membership in the United Nations.
Dačić told local TV channel Prva that the proposal put forward by France and Germany “starts from the position that Kosovo’s independence is already a foregone conclusion”.
“Serbia cannot accept that,” he said.
The Kosovan government has previously postponed until November 1 an obligation for vehicles with old or Serbian number plates to replace them with Kosovar number plates.
EU and US officials have stepped up efforts to bring Serbia and Kosovo closer to an agreement to fully normalize their relations.
The West fears that Russia may seek to destabilize the Balkans to divert at least some attention from its invasion of Ukraine.