Last week, Ambassador of the Russian Federation in the Republic of Serbia, Aleksandr Chepurin, visited Mitrovica North, where he met mayors from northern Kosovo and Presidents of Serbian interim authorities, and laid wreaths at the two monuments. After that Chepurin visited returnee village “Sunny Valley.”
However, this visit was reported only by a few media, but not the largest number of local media in the Serbian language. As stated by Kossev portal, they have not been informed that a senior official of the Russian Federation will come to the Kosovo north. Due to the selective informing of the public, Kossev editor Tatjana Lazarević has sent a letter of protest to the Department for Media Relations of the Office for Kosovo, whose representative informed only certain media. President of the Association of Journalists of Kosovo and Metohija (DNKiM), Budimir Ničić said that selective invitation for the journalists is “obstruction of the truth and the rights of the citizens to informing.” The Bureau for Social Research (BIRODI) joined the protest of Kossev editorial board.
In a reply, Press service of the Serbian Government Office for Kosovo stated that they had not organized the visit of the Russian ambassador. They said that institutions of the Republic of Serbia do not organize visits to the ambassador, stressing that these are false accusations.
