• COVID-19: 1,047 new cases, 14 deaths (media)
• Prishtina Mayor appeals to citizens to respect new measures (media)
• Osmani: EU favoring Serbia as a spoiled child (media)
• Haxhiu: New elections before President is elected (media)
• Lack of quorum continues to impede Assembly’s work (Kosovapress)
• SPO: We have jurisdiction to try Serbian forces for war crimes (RTK)

COVID-19: 1,047 new cases, 14 deaths (media)

1,047 new cases of COVID – 19 and 14 deaths from the virus were recorded in the last 24 hours in Kosovo. 187 patients have recovered from the virus during this time. There are 10,972 active cases of coronavirus in Kosovo. The highest number of cases is from the municipality of Prishtina (347).

Prishtina Mayor appeals to citizens to respect new measures (media)

Prishtina Mayor Shpend Ahmeti called on the citizens of Prishtina today to respect the new measures against the spread of COVID – 19. “Good morning, Prishtina, we are starting this weekend with new restrictive measures by the government aimed at preventing the spread of COVID – 19. Therefore, in order to stop the virus from spread, we beg you to be careful in following the key rules by keeping the distance, masks and washing hands more frequently,” Ahmeti wrote in a Facebook post. Several news websites note that the new measures have entered into force on Friday and that Prishtina is faced with the strictest measures.

Osmani: EU favoring Serbia as a spoiled child (media)

All media cover an interview that Kosovo’s Acting President and Assembly President, Vjosa Osmani, gave to the Associated Press, highlighting her remarks that the European Union is favoring Serbia as a spoiled child.

Osmani accused the European Union on Friday of not treating Kosovo on “an equal footing” with neighboring Serbia in the negotiations to normalize ties between the former war foes.

Osmani, the second female head of state in post-war Kosovo, told The Associated Press in an interview that she thinks Brussels has not learned from past mistakes and treats Serbia as “a spoiled child.”

“We need to be considered on an equal footing during this dialogue. If that happens, it sets a path for a successful dialogue in the future,” Osmani said in an interview to the Associated Press.

The EU has facilitated Kosovo-Serbia negotiations since 2011, but few of the more than 30 signed agreements the talks yielded have been applied.

Osmani, 38, took over as Kosovo’s president this month when former President Hashim Thaci resigned to face war crimes and crimes against humanity charges at a special court based in The Hague, Netherlands. Osmani is expected to serve in an acting capacity for a maximum of six months.

Thaci, former parliamentary speakers Kadri Veseli and Jakup Krasniqi, and two other former top commanders of the Kosovo Liberation Army that fought for independence from Serbia are on trial. None of them have accepted any of the charges.

Osmani said that while Kosovo was establishing a world precedent by having top officials willingly going to the court, Serbia, “a state sponsored regime (which) killed civilians, many of whom were little children, is not doing the same.”

“They deny all of the horrible crimes that they committed all across Yugoslavia, but specifically in Kosovo” during the 1990a, she said.

The 1998-1999 war in Kosovo, then a Serbian province, ended after a NATO military intervention that forced Serbia to withdraw its forces. The United Nations ran the territory for nine years before Kosovo in 2008 declared independence, a move that Serbia doesn’t recognize.

More than 10,000 mainly ethnic Albanians were killed and more than 1,600 are still missing from the war.

Osmani said that Serbia lost Kosovo in 1999 when they “abused the power of territorial integrity and the principle of sovereignty to kill the people that lived in that territory.”

“Once they accept that reality, then we can have a successful dialogue,” she said.

“I hope that the international community will understand that without putting pressure on Serbia, they will never change,” Osmani said, adding: “There has still been no justice for the victims” more than two decades after the conflict ended.

Haxhiu: New elections before President is elected (media)

The Kurti-led Vetevendosje Movement said it will not support any candidate for the post of Kosovo President without early parliamentary elections. Albulena Haxhiu, member of the Vetevendosje presidency and former Minister of Justice, said in an interview with Ekonomia Online that the current Assembly cannot elect a new President and that a new government and the President must be voted by a new legislative.

“We don’t have a candidate for President because this Assembly cannot elect a new President. Any tendency to elect a President now, is a tendency to extend the life of the current government. We want the country to go to early elections and for a new Assembly to elect the new government and President,” she said.

Haxhiu said Vetevendosje will not support AAK leader Ramush Haradinaj’s candidacy for president. “He was Prime Minister and we saw his work. Vetevendosje doesn’t support him,” she said.

Haxhiu sad Vetevendosje wants an apolitical figure with integrity to be elected to the post.

Lack of quorum continues to impede Assembly’s work (Kosovapress)

The news agency reports that the Kosovo Assembly has failed to hold three sessions this week due to lack of quorum. MPs did not even attend an extraordinary session to vote on the second reading of the economic recovery bill, and only 31 MPs were present in the session. Representatives of the ruling coalition accuse the opposition for boycotting the sessions, while opposition parties argue that it is not their responsibility to secure a quorum for the ruling coalition. Vetevendosje MP Eman Rrahmani told the news agency that Kosovo must go to early parliamentary elections in order to have a government and Assembly that can do its work properly.

SPO: We have jurisdiction to try Serbian forces for war crimes (RTK)

The Specialist Prosecutor’s Office in The Hague said today that they have jurisdiction to try and prosecute war crimes committed by the Serbian army, police and paramilitary troops against ethnic Albanians in the 1998 – 1999 conflict, the news website reports. The prosecution however did not disclose if and when it will initiate such proceedings.