Hundreds attend vigil in Mitrovica for three Serb gunmen killed in clashes in Kosovo

(26 Sep 2023)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:

ASSOCIATED PRESS
North Mitrovica , Kosovo - 26 September 2023
1. Wide of people in the center of North Mitrovica
2. Close up of photographs of killed Serbs
3. Wide of people arriving to light candles
4. Mid of people lighting candles
5. Wide of people at the vigil
6. Mid of people lighting candles
7. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) Nikola Vitorovic, local resident:
”We lost our friends, and tonight we wanted to pay a tribute to them in this way.”
8. Various of people lighting candles
9. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) Savo Drobljakovic, local resident:
”People have to remain here, we Serbs as Serbs have to fight. It is KFOR who did all this, actually creature (referring to KFOR). It is them who are doing all this.”
10. Wide of people lighting candles

STORYLINE:
Hundreds of Serbs in the northern Kosovo town of Mitrovica lit candles and laid flowers in memory of those killed in recent violence between armed Serbs and Kosovo police.

Early Sunday about 30 masked men opened fire on a police patrol near the village of Banjska. They broke down the gates of a Serbian Orthodox monastery and barricaded themselves with the priests and visiting pilgrims.

The violence further raised tensions in the Balkan region, at a time when European Union and U.S. mediators have been pushing for a deal that would normalize ties between former wartime foes Serbia and Kosovo.

A NATO bombing campaign on Serb positions in Kosovo led to the end of the 1998-99 war.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic met with ambassadors from five Western countries and the EU in Belgrade on Tuesday.

He said he wanted the NATO-led Kosovo Force, or KFOR, to take over “all the security matters in the north of Kosovo instead of (Kosovo Prime Minister Albi) Kurti’s police.”

Kurti accused the Serbian government on Sunday of logistically supporting “the terrorist, criminal, professional unit” that fired on Kosovo Police officers.

Vucic denied the allegations, saying the gunmen were local Kosovo Serbs “who no longer want to withstand Kurti’s terror.”

KFOR has around 4,500 troops stationed in Kosovo, where ethnic Serbs are concentrated in four northern municipalities. There was no immediate reaction from NATO to Vucic's request, but it is highly unlikely to be granted because the primary role of the troops is peacekeeping, not policing.

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