‘If they dare to kill Serbs, Serbia will win’

Kosovo Serbs take to the streets in protest of new ID rules, leading international officials to get involved

In northern Kosovo, where the population is predominantly Serbian, tensions soared on Sunday amid plans by the authorities to require Serbian citizens entering the country to be issued temporary IDs as well as to replace Serbian license plates with Kosovo ones. Kosovo officials called the measures a “reciprocal” response to Serbia's policy of issuing temporary IDs to Kosovar visitors.

The changes were slated to come into effect on Monday, August 1. On July 31, local residents began building barricades to block major roads in the area, cutting off access to two major checkpoints in the villages of Jarinje and Brnjak. In the city of Kosovska Mitrovica, air raid sirens sounded for over three hours, according to Reuters.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić called the situation “very difficult” for Kosovo Serbs, vowing that “Serbia will win” if conflict breaks out. “We’ve never been in a more difficult situation than the one we’re in today. The Pristina regime is trying to take advantage of the global situation; a new Zelensky in the form of [Kosovo Prime Minister] Albin Kurti is making statements about the fight against hegemony,” he said, according to TASS.

Vučić said that the Kosovo authorities were planning to start “banning Serbian documents” at midnight on Sunday, and that they had sent special forces to the checkpoints ahead of time. Several Russian media outlets took liberties in their interpretations of Vučić’s words, publishing headlines such as “Vučić announced that Kosovo’s army is planning to attack northern Serbia at midnight.”

The Serbian president emphasized that he wanted to “maintain peace at any cost,” but also maintained that “if they dare persecute or kill Serbs, Serbia will win.” Russia’s Foreign Ministry expressed its support for Serbia, calling Pristina’s actions “another step in the direction of expelling the Serbian population from Kosovo.” “We call on Pristina, as well as on the U.S. and EU, which stand behind it, to stop the provocations and respect the rights of Serbs in Kosovo,” read the ministry's statement.

Video clips in which gunfire could be heard appeared on social media on Sunday evening. The Kosovo police, which had officially closed the Jarinje and Brnjak checkpoints, reported late in the evening on July 31 that at least some of the shots were targeting police, but “nobody was hurt, fortunately.”

Soon after, soldiers from the NATO-led international peacekeeping force in Kosovo, or KFOR, arrived at a bridge across the Ibar river, which divides Kosovska Mitrovica’s Serbian district from its Albanian district. In an official statement, the mission said it was “monitoring” the situation “closely," and was "prepared to intervene if stability is jeopardized.”

Later that night, the Kosovo authorities announced that they would postpone the new policies for one month if the protesters removed the barricades. According to Reuters, the statement came after Pristina consulted EU and U.S. representatives; U.S. Ambassador to Kosovo ​​Jeffrey Hovenier said that he was responsible for requesting the measures be postponed, as “it seems that there was misinformation and misunderstanding about the decision.” EU Foreign Policy Chief Josep Borrell said he welcomed the decision and expected “all roadblocks to be removed immediately.”

On the morning of August 1, Serbian state news outlet RTS reported that the barricades were still in place, the Jarinje and Brnjak checkpoints were still closed, and that at a checkpoint in the village of Merdare that was operating, people with Serbian documents were being given temporary IDs. The government said it would stop issuing the IDs once the barricades were removed, and that afternoon, KFOR oversaw their removal.

A similar flare-up occurred in the fall of 2021; when Kosovo police made car owners with Serbian license plates replace them with Kosovo ones, local Serbs began blocking the roads. As Deutsche Welle reported, the Kosovo authorities called those measures “reciprocal” as well, since Serbia requires Kosovo license plates to be replaced by Serbian ones on Serbian territory. After days of standoff, the two sides agreed that drivers from both countries would apply stickers with the symbol of their own country upon entering the other country. Representatives of both countries planned to come up with a more permanent solution within six months, but never did.