Citing unnamed sources, the news agency reports that two Albanians were beaten by a group of young Serbs in Mitrovica North on Thursday. According to the sources, the two victims were walking out of a pharmacy when they were attacked for no reason. Police are conducting investigations into the incident.
The Kosovo Assembly’s Committee for Economic Development adopted today in the first reading the draft law on the Trepca mining complex, which will be discussed at the plenary assembly session on Friday. Serbian List representative, Sasa Milosavljevic, said Serb MPs would not vote in favour of the draft law in its current content. He also criticised the government for not inviting Serb representatives to attend discussions on the draft law.
The Prime Minister of Kosovo Isa Mustafa, expressed on his Facebook profile his satisfaction with the presence of the opposition parties at the Assembly of Kosovo. “After a long break, the entire opposition was today present at the Assembly. Without teargas, or eggs, without scenarios. Concerned more than they should about Serbia, but interested in many matters of Kosovo,” Mustafa wrote.
Kosovo Police announced today that a hand grenade was found near the offices of the Kosovo Pension Administration in Pristina. Media report that Kosovo Police Demining Unit has removed the grenade and now are searching whether there are any other explosive devices in the area. The Pension Administration employees were evacuated from their offices.
Kosovo’s Minister for Dialogue, Edita Tahiri, said in an interview that the European Union has made it clear that the telecom agreement needs to be implemented the way the parties agreed to earlier in Brussels. However, she admitted that there are still some issues that have to be “finalized”, particularly that pertaining to dialing code for Kosovo. Tahiri said the recent reports that the site where a mosque stood in the northern part of Mitrovica is being used to construct a tennis court as part of the project for revitalization of the Ibër/Ibar bridge in Mitrovica were false.
Citing unnamed sources, the news website reports that a 36 year-old Kosovo Albanian man was beaten up by unknown persons in Mitrovica North on Tuesday. “As he was entering one of the buildings near Raiffeisen Bank to submit documents for a tender, the victim was attacked by four persons, he sustained head injuries and his documents were taken away,” the source said, adding that police later escorted the victim to Mitrovica South for medical treatment.
Kosovo Prime Minister Isa Mustafa told members of the Kosovo Assembly today that circumstances are not right to vote on the border demarcation agreement with Montenegro. “As Prime Minister, I believe that today the circumstances are not right to vote on the demarcation with Montenegro … The government has withdrawn the draft law from the agenda. We will try to reach a joint position on the law. We believe it is not appropriate to discuss this draft law at this point and we don’t want to make concessions about the draft law.
Slavko Simic, head of the Serbian List parliamentary group, told the news agency that Serbian List MPs will not attend today’s session of the Kosovo Assembly that is expected to vote on the border demarcation agreement with Montenegro. “We have decided not to attend the session because of the recent security situation and also because of the ongoing protest,” Simic said. The news agency notes that without the votes of the Serbian List, the border agreement cannot be ratified.
The League of Kosovo Historians, the branch in Deçan, has again called on members of the Kosovo Assembly not to vote in favor of the border demarcation agreement with Montenegro. They called on MPs to rise above their political interests, to listen to the call of the people and not ratify an agreement that is detrimental to the people of Kosovo.
Vice President Joe Biden warned the Kosovar government Wednesday of the "cancer" of corruption, during his first visit to the Balkans since 2009.
"I'm here today to affirm the United States is going to continue to stand with the people of Kosovo on your journey to become a prosperous, peaceful and multi-ethnic democracy," he told reporters.
He underscored, though, the dangers of corruption — what he called "a cancer that eats at the fabric of every society where it exists. In short, it jeopardizes everything Kosovo hopes to achieve, hopes to become, hopes for its future."