The Kosovo authorities, primarily the security forces, are still stationed in the buildings of the Provisional Authorities in three northern municipalities two days later their initial forced entry. Different types of police vehicles can be seen at the site – armored, regular, civilian jeeps, as well as units – from policemen in regular uniforms to special forces with helmets, bulletproof vests, and firearms, wearing both blue and gray uniforms.
There is still no indication of when the police units will withdraw from the municipal premises, or whether and who will be allowed to enter them tomorrow.
Apart from reacting to Friday’s incidents with two statements, the Kosovo Police have not provided any details about what is happening inside the facilities themselves. Neither have the representatives of Serbia, including Srpska Lista. The party called on Belgrade yesterday to halt the dialogue with Pristina thanked the citizens for protecting “what belongs to us.“
Yesterday, forensic units were spotted in the municipality of Zvecan. According to some readers’ testimonies, they were also spotted in other municipal buildings in the north. The police have not yet announced themselves on this issue.
Unlike North Mitrovica, where the Kosovo municipality and the Provisional Authority are in separate buildings, in Zvecan, Leposavic and Zubin Potok, those two institutions that do not recognize each other were situated in the same building until now.
As a result, one of the key questions now is whether the employees of the provisional authority will be allowed to enter the buildings, as well as what happened or will happen with documents belonging to the provisional bodies.
Whether and which documents were left behind before special units entered the building and what happened to them remains unknown.
We reached out to Srpska Lista chief, Goran Rakic, regarding this issue, but he did not respond to our message.
The presidents of the provisional bodies of Leposavic and Zvecan, Zoran Todic and Ivan Todosijevic, also did not respond to our calls, neither did the former mayor of Zvecan, Dragisa Milovic, who announced at an unscheduled press conference held yesterday regarding the latest situation that he has been the head of the municipality since 1999.
Our inquiries with the Kosovo Office also remained unanswered.
We submitted questions to that institution as to what steps (if any) have been taken to protect documents that are the property of the Republic of Serbia in the occupied municipalities.
We also asked what they did (if anything) to get the Kosovo police to leave the municipalities and to ensure that employees could continue their work.
As if now, we have received no replies to our queries.
On the other hand, the Kosovo government, headed by Albin Kurti, emphasizes that these are „properties of the Republic of Kosovo“, while the mayors announced that they will go to work on Monday. The mayor of Leposavic, Lulzim Hetemi, said that he is „going to the office on Monday, I cannot be stopped by thrown stones.“
The Kosovo authorities, as well as the Albanians in Kosovo view the activities of the provisional municipal bodies as illegal.
On the other hand, in the northern municipalities, services operating within the Serbian system continued to function even after the war, and most of them were the only ones operational on the ground, such as communal services, water company, funeral services, registrars, and other similar services.
A decade has passed since provisional municipal bodies have been opened in Serb-majority areas in Kosovo. They were formed after the Government of Serbia previously dissolved municipal assemblies, despite decisions handed down by the Constitutional Court.
The municipal assemblies in Kosovo that had operated within legal framework of the Republic of Serbia were dissolved in 2013 by the government of Serbia, which had been formed just one year earlier, after local elections held on the 6th of May.
After their dissolution, again by decision of the Government of Serbia, provisional bodies were formed.
The decision to dissolve municipalities in the north of Kosovo was made ahead of the local elections within the system of the Republic of Kosovo, which were held (at least de-facto) for the first time in that part of Kosovo.
Although according to the Law on Local Self-Government of Serbia, the President of the Assembly was obliged to call elections for local councilors within two months from the date of dissolution of these municipalities, to constitute a new unit of local self-government, but this did not happen.
The role of local self-governments in the system of the Republic of Serbia was then taken over by provisional bodies – 29 of which were planned to be formed – which function simultaneously with the municipalities in the Kosovo system. Moreover, there are (were) frequent cases where the president of a provisional body, for example, also served as a councilor or deputy mayor in a municipality under the Kosovo system.
In the meantime, on April 3rd, 2014, the Constitutional Court of Serbia declared the decision on the dissolution of the MA Podujevo, Djakovica, Suva Reka, Decani, Prizren, Urosevac and Klina („Official Gazette of RS“, number 42/10) and the formation of provisional bodies authorities as unconstitutional and illegal.
Within the Internal Dialogue on Kosovo and Metohija, which never received an official epilogue, and disappeared from the public agenda, at the round table in Nis held in February 2018, the Minister of Local Self-Government, Branko Ruzic, said that by strengthening the cooperation of municipalities, the sense of security among Kosovo Serbs is also strengthened.
„Serbia realizes its influence in Kosovo and Metohija through 29 provisional municipal bodies, by preserving the constitutional and legal order of the Republic of Serbia,“ said Ruzic and added that „provisional bodies are also important for the existence of several thousand Serbian families in the province.“
„We thus show that 150,000 of our compatriots in Kosovo have support and protection, that they deserve attention and a life worthy of the 21st century,“ said this SPS and Serbian government official in 2018.
The local elections that have been held in Serbia since then have never been called or held on the territory of Kosovo.
In the meantime, the referendum and parliamentary elections of Serbia, i.e. the „gathering of votes“ through the OSCE in Kosovo was halted.
Although the latest KP action has set a new precedent in the way the Serbian state system operated in the north, that is still not the case when it comes to Serb-majority communities.
A similar action also took place in the municipality of Strpce last year, during which the documents were seized and since then the provisional authorities have never again accessed the municipal building where they worked.
Read more:
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Von Cramon assessed the scene in front of the Zvecan municipal building as scary
Stoltenberg: Pristina must de-escalate and not take unilateral, destabilizing steps
The police replaced the door and surveillance camera in Zvecan municipal building
Grenell to Kurti: You have ruined the strong US-Kosovo bond
KP’s POV: We asked them to let the mayors in, they attacked us, we acted in self-defense
Arsenijević: Kosovo Police beat me, harassed me and insulted me with ethnic slurs
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Quint countries condemn Kosovo’s decision, concerned by Serbia’s decision
Blinken: Kurti to immediately halt violent measures and focus on dialogue
Bisevac: SL leadership went to Belgrade, the mayor and the police wanted to enter…
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