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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Continuous legal, physical violence against Serbs in Kosovo Metohija

Belgrade/New York, 22 April 2024

President of the Republic of Serbia Aleksandar Vucic stated today at the session of the United Nations Security Council in New York that the regime in Pristina creates unbearable living conditions for Serbs and carries out their systematic mistreatment.

At the session where the regular six-month report of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on the work of the UN Mission in Kosovo and Metohija (UNMIK) was presented, Vucic reminded that Serbia has fulfilled all the difficult obligations from the Brussels Agreement, but not even after 11 years from of its signature, the formation of the Community of Serb Municipalities is not even in sight.

Of course, this resulted in what we can call today continuous legal violence and physical harassment of the Serbian population in Kosovo and Metohija, Vucic pointed out.

The President said that the measure to abolish the use of the dinar in Kosovo and Metohija is the culmination of an ethnically motivated, deliberate campaign, which the temporary Pristina institutions are leading against the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija, and that because of this, the work of schools, kindergartens, medical, social and other institutions is practically impossible.

Employees of those institutions, which are still working, face daily the fear of unfounded arrests carried out by Kurti's regime on false charges. This situation greatly affects children in kindergartens, pensioners, single mothers and seriously ill people in rural areas, but of course also everyone else, Vucic said.

He also reminded that on 8 February, a special session was held in the UN Security Council because of the situation in Kosovo and Metohija, and because the temporary institutions of self-government in Pristina are creating unbearable conditions for Serbs and other non-Albanians.

Kurti then said that he had given the Serbs a three-month transitional period, during which none of their rights to accept and receive the dinar would be abused. From the moment the session ended, no one in Pristina, nor in the international community, even mentioned the three-month transitional period. And all measures against Serbs in connection with the dinar began to be applied immediately, the Serbian President said.

Vucic also stated that from 8 February until today, five rounds of talks between Belgrade and Pristina were held in Brussels, and the only tangible outcome of these efforts was the exposure of Pristina's true motives.

He also stated that 16 ethnically motivated attacks have occurred since then.

They include, as he pointed out, an armed attack against Serbs in Gracanica, shootings and intimidation of the decreasing number of Serb returnees in the west of Kosovo and Metohija, continuous unjustified detention, violent removal of signs with titles and names in the Serbian language in purely Serbian municipalities in the north of Kosovo and Metohija by the police.

Also, Vucic pointed out that the continuous attacks within the campaign of persecution of Serbs deepened after the Pristina parapolice forces broke into Serbian pharmacies in Kosovska Mitrovica and Zubin Potok, where the persecutors of Serbs seized large quantities of medical supplies.

If the population of Kosovo and Metohija cannot rely on the United Nations as an objective arbiter and someone who will prevent the cunning ethnic engineering of Pristina, this can lead us to the possibility of unpredictable scenarios with huge consequences, said the President of Serbia and added that that is why it is necessary for the special representative to exercise her powers and supervise the temporary institutions, he said.