Serbia has placed its military on the highest level of alert as tensions continue to rise in northern Kosovo between ethnic Serbs and Kosovo authorities backed by NATO.
“The president of Serbia, as the commander-in-chief, has ordered tonight that the Serbian Armed Forces be at the highest level of combat readiness, meaning the preparedness to use their armed potential,” Serbia’s Defense Minister Milos Vucevic said on Monday, according to RT.
Officials in Belgrade say that Serbia’s armed forces are ready to intervene in Kosovo to protect the ethnic Serb population. Tensions have been high in northern Kosovo since the summer when Pristina tried to ban license plates from Serbia. Ethnic Serbs in the area reject the plan as they don’t recognize the government in Pristina and still use Belgrade-issued documents.
Earlier this month, Serbs in northern Kosovo erected roadblocks in response to the arrest of a former ethnic Serb police officer, and Pristina has been calling for NATO troops to dismantle the barriers.
If NATO doesn’t clear the barriers, Kosovo suggested it will deploy its own forces to do so. Tensions show no sign of waning as ethnic Serbs erected more roadblocks on Tuesday.
Pristina has increased its police presence in the north, and NATO said it has stepped up patrols in the area. “Since October we’ve been reinforcing our presence, including with additional troops & patrols in northern Kosovo this week,” NATO’s Kosovo Force, known as KFOR, wrote on Twitter on December 16.
There are about 3,700 NATO troops deployed in Kosov under KFOR, including over 600 US troops. NATO has had a presence in the region since its 1999 bombing campaign against Serbia that resulted in the creation of the state of Kosovo, which formally declared independence from Serbia in 2008. Many countries don’t recognize Kosovo as a country, including Russia and China.
NATO makes me scratch… All of their movements feels like little creepy crawlers all over me….
So we are going to war over license plates? Good a reason as any and the world is overpopulated. Obviously some more senseless killing has to go on there until they decide war is not the way to go on this one.
“So we are going to war over license plates?”
Not even over license plates per se — just over which gang’s license plates will be used.
While I’m anti-war and anti-death-penalty, I’d be tempted to support a war against all gangs that try to impose crap like “license plates” on anyone, with summary execution for anyone caught purveying them.
No joke. This is an opportunistic war against Washington and its illegal partition of Serbia, coming at a singularly inconvenient time … for Washington, that is.
Clinton and Albright empowered and created this pseudo-state. I like your term ‘gang’ with its criminal organization inference.
We know who really runs NATO. Serbia is not anti-Russia is their crime. So a stink over license plates. Perhaps the people in the northern part should do a Kosovo and declare independence. ICJ said it was okay for Kosovo to do that with Serbian land.
I agree! Let’s begin with the adolescents who are running our foreign “policy” team.
Kosovo is the classic example of failed NATO policy. Decades later Kosovo is still isolated, poor, and unrecognized as it ever was and ready to go to war over license plates… Should’ve just made peace with Serbia and formed a federal government.