Nikolic: High-handed behavior of Kurti’s police officers

The Chairwoman of the Serbian Parliament’s Committee on Kosovo and Metohija, Danijela Nikolic, condemned the conduct of members of the Kosovo Police during an incident in the village of Vuca near Leposavic, when firearms were used during an attempt to check the identity of a young Serbian man.

“The unprofessional, high-handed behavior of Kurti’s police officers in the north of the Province is the regular state of torture that the Serbian people have endured for years. By using firearms in the village of Vuca, near Leposavic, they went a step further, showing no hesitation over whether their identity check endangered the life of a Serbian youth, who, fortunately, suffered no life-threatening consequences,” Nikolic said.

She added that it is not the first time that one of the methods of stopping Serbs in Kosovo has been to “pressure the trigger,” which in this and similar cases constitutes abuse of police powers.

“Is there a clear limit to the protection of a people’s human rights that will prompt a reaction from the international community, or is such conduct by Kurti’s police a regular state of affairs in Kosovo and Metohija, which in fact represents a black hole for human rights and freedoms on European soil? Or do the guardians of European values also uphold and approve of such behavior, at least when it comes to Serbs?” Nikolic asked.

In the village of Vuca near Leposavic yesterday, an incident occurred in which the police detained one young man of Serbian nationality, while another fled but later turned himself in at a police station. According to witnesses, during the attempt to check their identities, the Kosovo police used an automatic rifle and fired in the direction of the forest into which one of the young men had fled.