Kosovo has closed two of its four border crossings with Serbia, the government said, after protesters on the Serbian side blocked roads and turned away passengers carrying Kosovo documents.
The closures at Brnjak and Merder crossings – both located in Kosovo’s northern region with a majority ethnic Serb population – came into effect overnight from Friday to Saturday.
Kosovar Interior Minister Zellal Svekla said the move was due to “masked extremist groups in Serbia” selectively blocking transport for tourists.
“And all this in plain sight of the Serbian authorities,” he said.
At least two other crossings between Serbia and Kosovo remain open.
What spurred the Serbian protests?
On Friday, dozens of demonstrators in Serbia blocked a crossing to stop traffic entering Serbia from Kosovo.
They said they were protesting the closure of a parallel administration that ethnic Serbs had set up in northern Kosovo to rival the official ones.
The Serbian government in Belgrade—which has never recognized the independence of its former southern province of Kosovo—finances a parallel health, education, and social security system for the latter’s ethnic Serb population in Kosovo.
Serbian demonstrators told the media that their border blockade would last until the Kosovo police “is withdrawn from the north of Kosovo and the usurped institutions are returned to the Serbs”.
They also demanded that the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Kosovo (KFOR) “take control of the north of Kosovo”.
The border blockade began a few days after police in northern Kosovo raided and then closed five administrative offices linked to the Belgrade government.
Chronic stress
Kosovo Foreign Minister Donika Gervala-Schwarz told reporters on Friday that the Serbian protests were “yet more proof” that Belgrade is trying to provoke and destabilize its southern neighbor.
Animosity has continued After the war between Serbia and Kosovo in the 1990s between Serbian armed forces and ethnic Albanian separatists from Kosovo.
Kosovo declared independence in 2008. But Serbia has refused to recognize the move and has encouraged ethnic Serbs living in Kosovo to remain loyal to Belgrade.
Tensions rose earlier this year, when Kosovo made the euro its sole legal currency, effectively outlawing the use of the Serbian dinar.
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