Sutanovac: Kurti will not de-escalate, he wants to drag Serbia into a conflict with KFOR; the EU and the USA know this

The former Minister of Defense of Serbia, and the founder of the Council for Strategic Policies, Dragan Sutanovac, assessed for Kosovo Online that it was in the interest of the Pristina authorities to escalate the conflict and that it was no wonder that they were trying to show that there were weapons in the north of Kosovo, the confiscation of which the Kosovo Police Minister Xhelal Svecla also spoke recently.

"There is no doubt that Albin Kurti's administration and his entire Government do not want to de-escalate, on the contrary, it is in their interest to escalate the conflict and it is no wonder that they are trying to show that there are some weapons in the north of Kosovo and that there are mostly criminals who obstruct the legal system of Kosovo, and the essence is actually the opposite. The essence is that the EU, NATO, and the US insist on de-escalation," Sutanovac says.

He recalls that NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani, that according to the 2013 agreement, the Kosovo Security Forces had no right to come to the north of Kosovo without an agreement with KFOR and requested that the Kosovo Police in the north coordinated actions with this mission.

"The fact is that before every meeting in Brussels, Kurti tries to raise tensions in order not to fulfill the obligations that were signed back in 2013. It is obvious that in the last month or two, they have been doing this successfully, especially in the Western media through their lobbyists, who do not deal with the essence. The essence is that Kurti does not want to act based on the agreement signed in 2013 and that he does not want to admit the fact that Europe and the USA caught him in a lie; they know that he does not want to de-escalate the situation," Sutanovac says.

He points out that these same countries also know that Kurti planned to build police bases in the north of Kosovo, in an area for which they do not have permission, which, he says, will later grow into military ones, and which will be a factor of destabilization in the entire region.

Referring to the research of BIRN, which published a text about Albanian criminal groups from Kosovo, south-central Serbia, and Albania, who sell weapons to migrant smugglers, Sutanovac said that many attempts had been made to cover up the biographies of such.

"It is simply incredible how the Albanian lobby managed through the media to somehow stop the Kosovo Albanians, among whom there are many criminal people and who operate on the territory of the whole of Europe and even New York, are not actually involved in crime. We have confirmation, BIRN did research that weapons from Kosovo are resold, among other things, to refugees in the north of Serbia who use them in mutual confrontations, and we know that the authorities in London recently decided to return a certain number of Albanians from that country to Pristina," Sutanovac says.

On the other hand, he points out, the mention of criminal groups in the north of Kosovo is a classic "spin".

"Instead of dealing with what was signed and what was asked of them, they are dealing with spins. After all, Kurti's Government has been sanctioned for evading its obligations, and he is still trying to criminalize the Serbs and portray them as the main problem, which is not true. The fact is that Serbs are threatened in Kosovo and that Kurti is causing problems not only in Kosovo, but also in North Macedonia and Albania, and that relations between Pristina, Skopje, and Tirana have never been worse," Sutanovac points out.

He assesses that Kurti is now publicly showing his pretensions towards "Greater Albania".

"It is interesting that it continues to be promoted in the Western media, which is not adequate, but what is important is that the executive authorities in Europe and the US recognize his intentions and that is why they imposed sanctions on him," Sutanovac says.

He assesses that only an irresponsible man who is in the position of Prime Minister can feel comfortable while sanctions are being imposed on his Government and him.

"He is clearly an irresponsible man, he has no awareness of what this means for Kosovo society. On the other hand, he does not have the strength to escalate the conflict between Belgrade and Pristina, his idea is to present the Serbs as "bad guys" and cause a conflict between KFOR and Serbia; that is his goal. He knows that he has neither military, police, nor political strength, but he skillfully manipulates even a part of public opinion in Serbia and in the world, by saying that Serbia wants tensions, which is completely incorrect at the moment," Sutanovac says.

He adds that Kurti shifts his focus from his duties to the other side.

"From the dialogue, he tries all the time to extract only what suits him, and he refers to that as he refers to the Constitutional Court of Kosovo in a situation where the Brussels Agreement is allegedly not constitutional, and when the property should be returned to the Decani Monastery, then Kurti declares the Constitutional Court of Kurti incompetent. He manipulates with his power, but I think he is 'seen through' to a good extent," Sutanovac believes.

He points out that now it is very important that the Serbian side both in Kosovo and in Belgrade be very careful in its decisions.

"All the time we avoid being the 'bad guys' and we must not allow any third party to drag us into that game, because there is a third-party interest that would like to see that conflict and shift the focus from Ukraine to this part of Europe. We have to be aware that we should only look at the interests of the citizens of Serbia and Kosovo and the interests of our country," Sutanovac concluded.