Kosovo Center for Security Studies has presented the research “Perception of Serbian community towards Kosovo Police. A friend or a foe?”
According to this research, the stance of Serbian community towards Kosovo Police is predominantly shaped by daily politics and overall political developments between Kosovo and Serbia.
“The K-Serb community has a low level of trust towards Kosovo Police, with only 4.7 percent. The lack of trust is more pronounced in North Mitrovica when compared to other regions in Kosovo. Moreover, the K-Serb community considers Kosovo Police as the most corrupted institution in Kosovo;
Most of the safety concerns in Serbian majority municipalities are not of an interethnic nature. Poor infrastructure, domestic violence, stray animals, thefts and traffic accidents represent the overarching safety concerns of the communities in majority Serb municipalities;
People express greater levels of distrust towards police and indicate links between political structures, organized crime elements and police elements as reasons for distrust;
There is a greater level of fear among people in the north, which leads to hesitancy to talk about serious crimes, power structures in the north and the assassination of Serbian politician Oliver Ivanovic;
The justice system, and the State Prosecution in particular, is not effective in responding to police demands and does not provide updates on cases deposited by police structures in Serbian majority municipalities;
The Kosovo Police structures in four Northern municipalities (North Mitrovica, Zubin Potok, Zvecan and Leposavic) have severe problems with fleet management. This includes reports of insufficient technical means such as vehicles that undermine the quality of services;
Due to lack of translators, the Kosovo Police Regional Directorate of North Mitrovica fails to meet demand for translation requested from the stations under its command. The language problem affects police efficiency and results in misunderstandings between the police and citizens;
Kosovo Police have a number of incompetent officials in structures in Serb majority municipalities. This is due to an eased promotion process for ethnic-minorities and an accelerated vetting and training procedure in the integration process of former Ministry of Interior of Serbia (MUP) members;
The Kosovo Police structures in Serbian majority municipalities have poor gender representation, with only 10.9% female police officers in North Mitrovica, Zubin Potok, Zvecan, Leposavic, Gracanica and Shterpce.
