The court in Pristina has refused the appeal of the defence for the Vetevendosje MPs - Albin Kurti, Albulena Haxhiu, Faton Topalli, – that called for their release from house arrest. The court decided to uphold its earlier decision and announced that the next court session against the MPs who are being charged with using dangerous weapon or instrument and preventing official persons from carrying out their duties will take place on 15 February. The MPs stressed they will refuse to answer questions from the prosecution or the trial chamber as they consider their case to be political.

In an end-of-year press conference, the Kosovo Democratic Institute (KDI) presented its activities in 2015 and recommendations for relevant Kosovo institutions. KDI said the people of Kosovo continue to face corruption and that according to their information, the citizens have shown readiness to report such activity. In 35 cases of corruption reported during the second half of 2015, KDI said that 7 involve allegations against ministries, 6 against municipalities, 5 against judicial institutions and 4 against the Privatisation Agency of Kosovo (PAK).

Kosovo Police general director Shpend Maxhuni, during a press conference today said that preventing and combating organized crime remains a priority for this institution, together with the fight against terrorism, extremism and radicalism. According to him, Kosovo's citizens deserve to have less crime and much more security. Kosovo’s Interior Minister, Skender Hyseni, stressed that another priority of the Kosovo Police and Interior Ministry remains its membership in all international organizations.

The government of Kosovo concluded today’s meeting where they stressed that the government would not annul or renegotiate the agreement for Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities.

Kosovo’s Minister for Dialogue, Edita Tahiri, said today during the meeting of the government of Kosovo that the Constitutional Court did not annul any point of the agreement on Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities and neither was it requested to renegotiate the issue.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon yesterday announced the appointment of Christopher Coleman of the United States as his Deputy Special Representative for the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK). He succeeds Jennifer Brush of the United States to whom the Secretary-General expresses his gratitude for her dedicated service with UNMIK. Mr.

The EU Office in Kosovo/EU Special Representative has taken note of the decision of the Constitutional Court concerning the assessment of the principles on the establishment of the Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities. “The Constitutional Court has held that the Association/Community of the Serb-majority municipalities is to be established as provided by the First Agreement, in accordance with the Constitution.

The Vetevendosje Movement MP Faton Topalli, who was arrested several days ago for his role in throwing teargas in the Kosovo Assembly, argues in an opinion piece that ignoring the opposition and over 205 thousand citizens who want the annulment of recent agreement with Serbia, has brought Kosovo to a serious situation.

Kosovo’s Minister of Labour and Social Welfare, Arban Abrashi, announced yesterday that the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Kosovo has allocated 160,000 euros grants for self-employment programme in the Mitrovica region.  “With UNDP we signed the expansion of self-employment program for the region of Mitrovica, where 160,000 euros in grants where allocate for the establishment of new businesses by unemployed job seekers, who will use the grants to start new businesses and employ others.

Deputy leader of the Vetevendosje movement, Driton Caushi, said during a press conference today, that Kosovo will not manage to complete the European Union’s set criteria for liberalization of visas, being that one of the basic criteria is fighting of corruption. “The government cannot fulfill these criteria, because this means that it would have to fight itself,” Caushi said.