Fast-Tracked Expulsions Raise Rule of Law Concerns in Kosovo

By Ognjen Gogić

In the past two days, four Serbs have been expelled from Kosovo, all following the same pattern. The Kosovo Minister of Internal Affairs ordered that their citizenship be revoked and that they be deported—allegedly because they work for the Serbian police. In other words, based solely on their presumed place of employment, these individuals have been expelled from Kosovo, the place where they have lived their entire lives as full-fledged citizens.

This is a level of pseudo-legal lawlessness rarely seen anywhere. Yes, the law does provide a theoretical basis for revoking citizenship: it can happen if a person holds dual citizenship and is found to be acting against national security interests, which may include working for foreign security services. But in practice, such decisions require a lengthy and rigorous legal process—not a unilateral, discretionary act by a minister. The legal path is far more complex and demanding.

Even if grounds for revoking citizenship exist, that still doesn’t grant a minister the right to arbitrarily decide who gets deported. Where does he even get the information that these individuals worked for Serbian authorities? Who did they allegedly work for, and in what capacity? What evidence is there, and was it obtained lawfully? And if they genuinely posed a security threat, why were proper legal proceedings not initiated? If these people had done something illegal, how can the first measure taken against them be the stripping away of all their rights?

The answer is obvious: legal procedures require time and evidence. This way, everything is done by shortcut. The minister can, quite literally, invent any accusation about anyone and, on that basis alone—without court, without evidence, without due process or legal recourse—expel them from Kosovo, the only home they’ve ever known. And that is exactly what has happened.

Any decision to revoke citizenship must be individualized and proportionate. It strikes at the very core of fundamental human rights: the right to a home, freedom of movement, and legal certainty. The fact that these decisions were made en masse, overnight, targeting multiple individuals from the same ethnic group, with no transparent process, clearly reveals an abuse of power—and an ethnically motivated campaign of persecution.

This is legal violence stripped bare—so blatant that there’s not even an attempt to disguise how deeply it violates the most basic principles of the rule of law, legal certainty, and human rights protection. When a minister has the unchecked power to decide who gets to stay in their own home—without evidence, without trial—that’s not justice. That’s ethnic cleansing dressed up as law.

All statements presented in this text are the personal opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors. KoSSev is not the author of the text.

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