Erdoğan urges Serbian, Kosovar leaders for dialogue

ANKARA

Türkiye has urged Serbia and Kosovo to diffuse tension and resolve the problems through dialogue amid recent escalation between the two countries.

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan spoke by phone with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti late on May 31, the Communication Directorate said in a statement. Both leaders congratulated Erdoğan on his reelection, read the statement.

“During the calls where the bilateral relations and regional issues were addressed as well, President Erdoğan, as regards the developments taking place in the north of Kosovo, stated that ensuring progress in the dialogue process is the only method for the establishment of lasting peace and stability in the region,” said the statement.

President Erdoğan also noted that Türkiye stands ready to make the necessary contributions to the dialogue process.

Ankara is following the events in the north of Kosovo where tension has risen between Kosovar officials and local Serbs. In a statement through the Foreign Ministry, it called on all sides to avoid violence and not to take actions that may escalate tensions.

The confrontation unfolded last week after ethnic Albanian officials who were elected in a vote overwhelmingly boycotted by Serbs entered municipal buildings to take office. When Serbs tried to block them, Kosovo police fired tear gas to disperse them in Zvecan, leading to clashes with NATO-led troops that left 30 international soldiers injured.

Ethnic Serbs have insisted that both ethnic Albanian mayors and Kosovo police must leave northern Kosovo.

On May 31, NATO-led peacekeepers stepped up security around a town hall in northern Kosovo, where hundreds of ethnic Serbs gathered again at the scene of clashes earlier this week that left more than 80 people injured.

NATO has decided to deploy hundreds of reinforcements to strengthen Kosovo’s international peacekeeping mission (KFOR) after Monday’s violence in the town of Zvecan. Hundreds of ethnic Serbs rallied outside Zvecan’s town hall on Wednesday for a third consecutive day and held aloft a huge Serbian flag that stretched over 200 meters (660 feet) from the municipal building to the town center.

KFOR soldiers encircled the town hall, additionally securing the building with a metal fence and barbed wire, an AFP journalist said.

Many Serbs are demanding the withdrawal of Kosovo special police forces, as well as the ethnic Albanian mayors they do not consider their true representatives.