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/From our special correspondent in Kosovo./
“From the Czech Republic.”
‘Where is it? Can you go to Kosovo?’
While traveling to the north of Kosovo, memories of the conversation with the bus driver who took me from Belgrade, Serbia to Pristina, Kosovo come to mind. Although Serbia does not recognize the existence of a neighboring state, when I crossed the shared border a few days ago it was much less eventful than one would imagine.
Passport checks three times, just wait a moment and then observe the contrasts between the individual landscapes.
This time I won’t cross the border, but I’ll make my way to the city that seems to pass through. Mitrovica, in the northern part of Kosovo, has been a symbol of the country’s ethnic division for many years. While the southern part is inhabited by Kosovo Albanians, on the other side of the Ibar River there are mainly Kosovo Serbs.
Independence of Kosovo
Serbia lost control of Kosovo in 1999 when NATO airstrikes forced Belgrade to withdraw Serbian troops. The country declared its independence in 2008, but only about half of the UN countries recognize it, including the USA and most EU countries, including the Czech Republic.
On the other hand, Kosovo’s independence is not recognized by Russia, China or Ukraine, nor by four NATO member states – Romania, Spain, Greece and Slovakia.
“Living in such a divided city is ridiculous,” says 22-year-old Qëndrim, whom I meet in the Kosovo part of the city. It is said that his grandmother and grandfather used to live in the north, but today they can no longer. “It’s a sad situation. Some of us just grew up and grow up in this environment and hostile atmosphere, we know nothing else. It’s pretty messed up.”
His friend Rinor, who is a year older than him, is also sitting on the bench with us, and they both agree that they have no friends among the Kosovo Serbs. However, he tells me that it is no problem for them to go to the other side. But they feel like they’re not welcome there, and there’s a warning in their heads that if they meet the wrong people, they’ll get in trouble.
“I like all nations, but it’s difficult with the Serbs, they don’t want to change and we can’t do anything about it,” shrugs Qëndrim. However, he and his friend emphasize that they “do not lump all Serbs together” and believe that there are good people on the other side too.
Photo: Tereza Ulrychova
Attitude (worth it) my friend youth.
Another pair of friends expressed a similar opinion to me. 21-year-old Albin has a family in the northern part and crosses the river about every two weeks. It is said that he even got away with playing Albanian music in the car. But in his opinion, trouble easily arises when one encounters a bad-tempered group of young people who are “defending their territory.”
“I’ve been to the northern part a few times. I am part of an organization that connects people through music and have had to be on site at concerts or various organizational things. But I don’t feel completely safe when I have to go there, especially in moments when tension increases, like the Banjska incident,” adds Albin’s friend Murad. He mentions the siege of the Orthodox monastery in northern Kosovo in September.
The environment is alive around us – corporate gardens are full of people, groups and individuals are constantly milling about, and the jumble of noise is the classic noise of a busy street. As I get closer to the iconic bridge that separates the two sides of the city, the number of people around me diminishes, and eventually the crowd consists only of isolated pedestrians.
City of Ghosts
I can see from a distance that the bridge is not passable. At the end there is a large, lonely car with the inscription “Carabinieri” that belongs to the MSU unit under KFOR, the NATO peacekeeping operation operating in the region. There is a small makeshift tent in front of the vehicle from which the crew monitors the situation on site.
Kosovo and KFOR
KFOR is a multinational peacekeeping force led by the North Atlantic Alliance that has been operating in Kosovo since 1999. Its main task is to contribute to the creation and maintenance of a secure environment that allows the continuation of the peace process and democratic development of the country without the need for the future presence of military units.
As soon as they arrive in Mitrovica, where they routinely patrol, vehicles with the KFOR markings can be seen. This also includes those who belong to the multinational special forces unit, also known by the abbreviation MSU. However, you can also meet here outside of Mitrovica, including Czech military police, whose commander Seznam Zprávy interviewed.
After crossing the bridge, I notice the first of many signs that adorn this side of the city, indicating that Kosovo is part of Serbia. The main street is lined with countless Serbian flags and I meet significantly fewer people on it compared to the other bank. This reminds me of a comparison I’ve heard before, that the Serbian part of Mitrovica is more of a ghost town.
Compared to what I experienced just a few hundred meters away, it feels like life here has slowed down and lost its luster. The contradictory impression of the northern part of the city is also underlined by the fact that I can’t find anyone among the locals who wants to talk to me about how they live here. I have to rely primarily on what I have learned from others.
“It is true that the government’s attitude towards the Serbs in the north is not the same as towards those in the rest of Kosovo,” Ramadan Ilazi of the Kosovo Center for Security Studies told me in Pristina just a few days earlier. “I think our government has failed to understand this community, it looks at it and sees Belgrade.” “They could have done a lot more to understand, but they failed.”
Photo: Tereza Ulrychova
However, it wasn’t just Ilazi who said that life for the Kosovo Serbs wasn’t exactly rosy, and that’s exactly what I think of when I sense the nationalist atmosphere in which I currently find myself. This is reinforced by other signs in the north of the city that call for NATO to withdraw or compare Kosovo with Crimea.
The creations also include the spray-painted letter Z, which has been a symbol of the Russian army since the attack on Ukraine last February.
Fear of war?
Finally, in the case of Kosovo, there is also speculation about the possibility of war – or at least a major armed conflict. There have been some acts of violence in recent months and, as I have already learned in the south of the city, there are concerns about this scenario here too.
“The potential for war is probably still there. “The Serbian propaganda is incredible, they consider Kosovo their holy land,” Murad assessed the whole situation, while his friend Albin nodded. “This brainwashing is crazy, many people support the idea that Kosovo is Serbia. But it’s not like that, we have our own republic.”
Photo: Tereza Ulrychova
Albin (vlevo) and Murad.
“However, I noticed that many young people in Serbia don’t really believe that Kosovo is part of Serbia and that they don’t want war,” added the young man, who said he blamed both Kosovo Serbs and locals for this can become Albanians for nationalism. However, according to him, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić is still in power because he incites hatred against Albanians.
But Rinor also pointed out the high costs of a possible war. “If the 90s were to repeat itself, Kosovo cannot endure it simply because of the poor economic situation. It would be destroyed.”
This article was produced with the support of the BIRN Reporting Democracy program.
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