Radulovic: It is up to the KFOR commander to approve the request for the return of the Serbian army to Kosovo

Regarding the request for the return of 1,000 members of the Serbian security forces to Kosovo, the question must also be raised as to whether this initiative includes the entire territory of Kosovo or only the north, the military analyst Vlade Radulovic says for Kosovo Online.

As Radulovic states, the issue of the north also opens up some other issues.

"The potential return, i.e. the request for the return of the security forces, has its basis in the UN Resolution 1244, and there it is clearly defined in which four cases (connection with the international civilian mission and international security presence, clearing minefields, maintaining the presence at the places of Serbian cultural heritage and at the main border crossings) that can happen. On the other hand, the military-technical agreement from Kumanovo clearly recognizes KFOR's obligations to prevent any entry of Serbian security forces, except in four cases defined by point 6 of annex 2 of the UN Resolution 1244," Radulovic says.

Our interlocutor points out that the bottom line is that based on this, Serbia can request the return of up to 1,000, that is, as the document recognizes, "in the hundreds, not in the thousands" of members of the security forces, but that the KFOR commander is the one who should expressly approve such a thing.

"It seems to me that at this moment such a scenario is not realistic. On our side there is an initiative, on the other hand, something like that is not realistic at this moment, and the question arises whether our initiative would include the entire territory of Kosovo and Metohija or only the north which is mentioned more and more often," Radulovic says.