The European Union strongly condemns this weekend’s “terrorist” attack on police forces in Kosovo, Peter Stano, spokesman for European diplomatic chief Josep Borrell, said on Monday.
A Kosovar police officer was killed on Sunday while on patrol in the north of the country, on the Serbian border, by attackers who then barricaded themselves in an Orthodox monastery. A shootout with Kosovo law enforcement followed, in which three members of the armed group were killed.
Mr Borrell had already condemned a “heinous” attack on Kosovo police forces on Sunday.
Mr Stano again called on Serbia and Kosovo to take “urgent measures” to reduce violence and promote dialogue. He recalled that the European Union could also take “measures” against Serbia, as it had done in the past against Kosovo.
The international community regularly calls on both parties to de-escalate. But recent attempts at talks between Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic failed again in Brussels in mid-September when Mr Kurti accused the EU of being biased in favor of Belgrade. According to Pristina, the EU would be friendly to Serbia so as not to encourage it to become too close to Moscow.
The Kremlin on Monday expressed concern about the “potentially dangerous” situation in Kosovo and expressed support for the Serbs.
A meeting between representatives of France, Germany, Italy, the European Union and the United States is scheduled to take place in Brussels on Monday to review the situation, according to a European diplomatic source.
Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, nearly a decade after NATO helped expel Serb forces from the former province in a bloody war that killed about 13,000 people, most of them of Albanian origin.
Since then, Serbia, supported in particular by its Russian and Chinese allies, has refused to recognize the independence of Kosovo, where a Serbian community of around 120,000 people lives. Some of its members are mainly based in the north and refuse any loyalty to Pristina.