2023-06-16 17:34:00
A US government official has called on Serbia to release three police officers imprisoned in neighboring Kosovo. The officers did not cross the border intentionally and it is likely they were abducted from Kosovo or “accidentally crossed the border,” US Deputy Secretary of State Gabriel Escobar told journalists on Thursday.
However, a Serbian court on Friday ordered the further detention and investigation of the three Kosovo police officers arrested in a border area this week. Prosecutors in the southwestern Serbian city of Kraljevo said they charged the three police officers with illegally manufacturing, possessing, carrying and dealing in weapons and explosives.
The penalty range is between two and twelve years in prison, the broadcaster Free Europe reported. In an initial reaction, Petar Petkovic, head of the Kosovo government office, spoke of possible terrorism on Wednesday.
Belgrade and Prishtina are still arguing regarding where exactly the police officers were arrested. According to Serbian authorities, the arrest took place on Serbian territory, 1.8 kilometers from the Kosovo border. According to Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti, they were “kidnapped” in the territory of the northern Kosovar municipality of Leposavic, 1.3 kilometers from the border. Kurti welcomed Escobar’s request. “Serbia kidnapped them on a road in Kosovo that Serbian smugglers use,” he said on Friday at a dialogue forum in the North Macedonian seaside resort of Struga on Lake Ohrid.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, in turn, denied the allegations and accused Kurti of fueling the conflict. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has convened crisis talks with Kurti and Vucic for next week. Kurti initially declined to comment on the invitation on Friday.
Escobar accused Kurti of “unnecessary escalation” in a tense situation. At the end of May, the USA had already excluded the Kosovan armed forces from a joint NATO maneuver. Kurti tried to downplay this. “We have minor differences with our allies, but that has no major consequences,” he told the German Press Agency on the sidelines of the forum in Struga.
Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg (ÖVP) regretted the “unsustainable situation” in northern Kosovo, as he announced on Twitter on Friday. “Kosovo and Serbia must immediately take concrete de-escalating measures and resume the dialogue promoted by the EU in order to promote normalization,” emphasized Schallenberg.
Tensions have been building between the two neighboring countries for months. At the end of May, violent Serbs attacked soldiers from the NATO-led security force KFOR in northern Kosovo. The clashes left dozens injured on both sides. The trigger for the conflict was the appointment of mayors of ethnic Albanian origin, who emerged from elections boycotted by the Serbs at the behest of Belgrade.
Kosovo declared its independence in 2008. Serbia does not recognize this and officially still considers Kosovo a part of its territory. Some EU countries have not recognized independence either. In the north of Kosovo almost exclusively ethnic Serbs live, in the rest of the country almost only ethnic Albanians.
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