Mitrovica Mayor, Agim Bahtiri, said he is determined to continue efforts to remove barricades in Mitrovica North. Bahtiri said the barricades in the north will be removed with or without the support of the new Mitrovica North Mayor, Goran Rakic. “That barricade will be removed. If not today, then tomorrow,” declared Bahtiri.
Bahtiri said he asked the former mayor-elect of Mitrovica North, Krstimir Pantic, to each take a shovel and symbolically begin removing the barricade but this was before Pantic was dismissed for refusing to take an oath of office according to Kosovo laws. However, Bahtiri said he will make the same proposal to the new mayor, Rakic, as soon as he meets him.
Bahtiri said if Rakic refuses to cooperate on the matter, he will be forced to undertake other steps. “Those will be in the way of international pressure to have the barricades removed,” Bahtiri added.
