UPDATE - Kosovo shuts down all 'parallel' Serb institutions

UPDATES WITH REACTION FROM SERBIA, ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND

By Eren Beksac and Talha Ozturk

PRISTINA, Kosovo (AA) - Kosovo announced Wednesday that all offices of "parallel" Serb institutions operating in the country have been closed.

“The era of parallel and criminal Serbian municipalities and institutions in the Republic of Kosovo has come to an end,” Interior Minister Xhelal Svechla said on social media.

“Today, the parallel Serbian municipal offices in Lipjan, Obiliq, Prishtina, Fushe Kosove, Vushtrri, Novoberde, Kamenice, Viti, Rahovec, Skenderaj, as well as the illegal postal and tax offices, have been shut down,” Svechla said.

“As we have committed, we do not allow any parallelism, especially criminal acts by Serbia, to undermine the Constitution and the rule of law in our country,” he added.

Serbian Prime Minister Milos Vucevic criticized the move, claiming that his Kosovar counterpart Albin Kurti is acting unlawfully towards the country’s ethnic Serbs.

"Serbia is closely following what is happening. We will take measures to protect the Serbian population from Kurti's new blows,'' said Vucevic.

Foreign Minister Marko Djuric said the new measures are not in fact aimed at Serb institutions but against the very identity of the Serbs living in Kosovo.

The moves indicate a dangerous escalation, he warned.

After hearing of the developments, Petar Petkovic, the head of Serbia's Kosovo Office, left a meeting he was attending in Brussels to return home.

Kosovo has recently closed several offices of Serb institutions, particularly in the northern regions of the country. Kosovo’s population is overwhelmingly ethnic Albanian, but it has a Serb minority, mostly in the north, next to neighboring Serbia, a region of the country which has seen unrest in recent years.

Serbs in Kosovo have resisted moves seen as encroaching on their Serbian identity – for instance, an earlier successful initiative to replace Serbian car license plates with Kosovar plates.

Issues between Kosovo and Serbia have also recently threatened to raise bilateral tensions.

Serbia’s refusal to recognize Kosovo as an independent state, following its 2008 declaration of independence, remains the primary cause of frequent confrontations between the two countries. The US, European Union, and Türkiye, among others, recognize independent Kosovo.

Under the EU-mediated Belgrade-Pristina Dialogue Process, initiated in 2011, efforts are ongoing to normalize relations and eventually reach mutual recognition between Kosovo and Serbia.