Kosovo-Serbia, because there are new tensions

The government of Serbia he put his own army in state of maximum alertdue to the growing tensions with the Kosovoburst close to the elections municipal in cities with an ethnic Serb majority. In recent weeks, violent protests have broken out in these cities, there have been shootings and the inhabitants raised up barricades in the main streets.

The conflict

After the dissolution of Yugoslavia, between 1998 and 1999 one of the bloodiest chapters of the conflict in the Balkans. On one side stood what remained of the old state of Josip Broz Titoi.e. Serbia and Montenegro, and on the other hand the army Kosovar-Albanianwho fought to achieve the independence of what is now a former province of Serbia.

In about a year and a half of war almost 14 thousand people diedbetween civilians and military, and still today the legacy of the brutal conflict represents a open wound in the society of the two countries. The war ended only with an intervention by NATO which, with indiscriminate aerial bombardments, forced the withdrawn from Kosovo the troops of the Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevicpromoter of a discriminatory policy of the Albanian community.

With the end of the conflict and the separation of Kosovo from Serbia, the country remained under ainternational administration led by the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (Unmik), until the 2008, when the country’s leaders proclaimed themselves independent. Since then, the Unmik administration has been replaced by the European union rule of law mission in Kosovo (Eulex), the largest civilian mission ever launched in the context of the common security and defense policy of the European Union, which deals with giving support and guarantee of independence to the Kosovan institutions.

New tensions

After the declaration of independence, Kosovo has been recognized by the United States, the European Union, but not by Serbia and its historical allies, Russia and China. Thus, while around 100,000 Serbs still live in the region, tensions and memories of the brutality of the conflict have returned to burning following the invasion of Ukrainewith a part of the Serbian population siding with Russia and the Kosovars with Kyiv.