Odalovic: This is a sobering moment for Kurti

President of the Serbian Government’s Commission on Missing Persons Veljko Odalovic stated that the results of the local elections in Kosovo have brought a moment of sobering for Albin Kurti, adding that the elections revealed deep disunity among Albanians, while on the other hand showing strong unity among Serbs and support for the Serb List.

Speaking for Prva TV, Odalovic said that the local elections demonstrated that Kosovo’s society is deeply politically divided.

“These elections have shown, on one side, the strong unity of Serbs and support for the Serb List, and on the other, the deep disunity among Albanians,” Odalovic explained.

He emphasized that the results of other parties cannot be compared to those of the Serb List, since, as he said, no one is dealing with the Serb List or has sent a message indicating readiness to build bridges with it in the future.

“Albanian parties are in an internal war,” he underlined, adding that this situation will also affect the formation of the next government.

Odalovic pointed out that through his prime minister-designate Glauk Konjufca, Kurti sent a clear message that he does not intend to form a coalition with any party.

“After these elections, he has nothing else to say except what has already become evident – that he intended to lead Kosovo toward new elections. I don’t see any coalition capacity when there are parties emerging that do not want to cooperate with him. Why would they shoot themselves in the foot when they can form a coalition on their own? This is a moment of sobering for Kurti. It will be interesting to see how many votes he lost between the parliamentary and local elections,” Odalovic added.

He noted that Kurti managed to win only in South Mitrovica when it comes to larger municipalities.

Odalovic pointed out that Kurti is counting on the diaspora, which traditionally returns to Kosovo in mid-December and represents his stronghold of support.

He reminded that two-thirds of the electorate do not live in Kosovo, which is something Kurti is counting on to a certain extent.

When asked whether the attitude toward Serbs might change if Kurti’s government is nearing its end, Odalovic reminded that the parties that could form a coalition instead of Kurti have already been in power and that such levels of pressure on Serbs did not exist at that time. However, he added that if any of them were to come to power now, they would be facing a completely different situation.

“When we look at the period behind us, if Kurti fails to form a government, all those parties – Thaci, Haradinaj, Mustafa or Hoti – have been in power before, and we didn’t have this kind of terror. What we’re seeing now cannot be compared with the physical and institutional terror carried out by Albin Kurti. There is nothing worse than what he’s doing,” Odalovic said.

In that sense, he repeated that even the European Commission was “soft” in its report, stating that Pristina had overstepped in its actions in the north, criticizing only the method but not saying that such actions should not have taken place at all. He also noted that it was never explicitly said that the so-called “container mayors” were illegitimate.

“A big uncertainty lies ahead of us,” Odalovic concluded.

He also recalled that none of the authorities in Pristina before Kurti wanted to establish the Community of Serb Municipalities, not even Hashim Thaci, who actually signed the agreement.

Nevertheless, he expressed confidence that the establishment of the CSM is now closer, since it will, as he said, be one of the key conditions for anyone in Pristina seeking support from Western partners.

He noted that circumstances are now different and that Serbs must fight to make their own mechanisms functional, without being hindered by the central administration, since Kurti has created a system in which every local decision can be questioned or overturned.

“Regardless of who comes to power, it will be difficult, because why would anyone act much differently when everything has already been ‘set up’? They may not have participated directly in Kurti’s acts of repression, but neither did they condemn them. They will now be facing a different reality,” Odalovic emphasized.