Kosovo complains of biased western envoys in talks with its former foe Serbia

PRISTINA, Kosovo — Kosovo’s prime minister on Thursday complained of bias in opposition to his nation from the United States and the European Union and tolerance of what he referred to as Serbia’s authoritarian regime.

Prime Minister Albin Kurti stated his Cabinet took a special stance. “We insist that behaving well with an autocrat doesn’t make him behave better. On the contrary,” he stated.

The U.S. and EU envoys for the Kosovo-Serbia talks – Gabriel Escobar and Miroslav Lajcak respectively – “come to us with demands, with requests of the other side,” he stated in an interview with The Associated Press.

Ethnic Serbs just lately clashed with Kosovo police after which the NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping power, leaving 30 troopers and over 50 Serbs injured and upsetting fears of a renewal of the area’s bloody conflicts.

Lars-Gunnar Wigemark, outgoing head of the EU Rule of Law Mission, often called EULEX, stated that in final week’s violent confrontation “there were very serious injuries sustained by several KFOR soldiers.”

“There already was violence of the worst kind of thing. Everyone … says we’re lucky that there were no casualties.”

PHOTOS: Kosovo complains of biased western envoys in talks with its former foe Serbia

After the troopers had been injured final week, NATO stated it might ship an extra 700 troops to northern Kosovo.

Wigemark stated the time would come when EULEX civilian police, who now not have government powers however solely “monitoring and mentoring Kosovo police,” wouldn’t be wanted in Kosovo.

“But the conditions are not quite there yet,” he stated.

The European diplomat didn’t rule out that NATO might determine to deploy “thousands of military troops” in Kosovo.

“If the situation is becoming increasingly unstable, if it starts to escalate again, of course, that is an option.”

The clashes grew out of an earlier confrontation after ethnic Albanian candidates who had been declared the winners of native elections in northern Kosovo entered municipal buildings to take workplace and had been blocked by Serbs. Ethnic Serbs overwhelmingly boycotted the votes.

Brussels has requested Kosovo to withdraw its particular police forces from northern Kosovo, the place a lot of the ethnic Serb minority lives, and to carry contemporary elections.

In February and March, Kosovo and Serbia reached a EU-facilitated deal on normalizing relations, with an 11-point plan for implementation. The course of stays the main focus of the talks mediated by the envoys from Washington and Brussels.

Kurti insisted the particular police forces couldn’t be “downsized” till legal Serb gangs both left the nation or had been arrested. He stated there was peace in Kosovo if there have been no “orders for violence from Belgrade.”

Western powers shouldn’t indulge Belgrade, the basis drawback of the violence within the Western Balkans, Kurti stated.

Kurti complained that even for the April snap election within the 4 northern municipalities with a Serb majority inhabitants, “international mediators, European facilitators failed us.”

He stated they urged Kosovo to make electoral amendments however didn’t put stress on the ethnic Serbs’ solely political occasion to participate within the vote.

He stated he would want the worldwide neighborhood’s assist to foster political pluralism within the ethnic Serb minority “for a fair competition, for a democratic race for new mayors.”

“We cannot afford another process where Serbian candidates boycott it a couple of days before the elections start because that’s what Belgrade orders,” he stated.

Wigemark, who has additionally served in Bosnia-Herzegovina, stated it was very important that “these kinds of incidents are not allowed to flare up, to spill over to some sort of armed conflict.”

“The ongoing dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina, that is the venue to sort out most of the outstanding questions,” he stated.