The Kosovo Ministry of Infrastructure started installing new town name signs in the north of Kosovo today. The names are written in two languages – first in Albanian, and in Serbian below.
The Ministry of Infrastructure is assisted by the Kosovo Police of the Region north, it was confirmed for KoSSev.
Workers in yellow work suits are removing signs which until now contained the names of the towns and villages in Serbian only – in Cyrillic and Latin.
The Kosovo Police is assisting these teams that are moving from Rudare to Jarinje and removing the existing signs.
In addition to the workers in yellow suits, a police jeep and a civilian vehicle can be spotted following behind them.
It is not known when they will arrive in North Mitrovica and Zvecan.
With the new Albanian leadership in the North, the language also changed
Serbian and Albanian languages are official languages in Kosovo and as such, their use is symmetrical, Article 5 of the Constitution of Kosovo states.
With the change in the ethnic structure of the municipal leaderships in the North, at the very beginning of the mandate of the new mayors, the boards displayed in the municipalities themselves were changed – the inscriptions are now written first in the Albanian language and in a bolded font, followed by the Serbian inscription in Latin, as well as English in Latin, in regular font.
Also, in Serbian, Kosovo is written as „Kosova“ – „Republic of Kosovo“.
Moreover, in the last two years, there has been a noticeable removal of the Cyrillic alphabet, and the emphasis on the Latin alphabet when it comes to the names of certain central institutions in Pristina. So far, neither the Kosovo authorities or Srpska Lista have announced themselves regarding this issue.
Sentić: The use of the Serbian language in institutions in Kosovo is a paradigm of the position of the Serbs
Observance of Article 5 of the Constitution of Kosovo and the Law on the Use of Languages and the use of the Serbian language in institutions are a paradigm of the position of the Serbian community and other non-majority communities in Kosovo, says Kosovo Deputy Ombudsman Srdjan Sentić.
„There are few institutions that consistently and fully implement Article 5 of the Constitution of Kosovo and the Law on the Use of Languages, and, unfortunately, those institutions where language rights are violated on a daily basis are in the vast majority,“ he points out.
He emphasizes that signboards at the central level must be the same or:
„Similar, as, for example, the ones displayed at the Institution of Ombudsmen, or the Constitutional Court, while boards at the local level should reflect its population. In any case, the letters and the font must be the same size in accordance with the principle and logic of equality,“ said Sentić.
The law on the use of language has been violated in Kosovo for years. This problem has been regularly pointed out in numerous international reports.
Preuzimanje i objavljivanje tekstova sa portala KoSSev nije dozvoljeno bez navođenja izvora. Hvala na poštovanju etike novinarske profesije.
