Vucevic: It is important not to fall for provocations, Kurti wants Serbia to make a wrong move

Serbian Defense Minister Milos Vucevic assessed that Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti was playing a game of nerves, expecting that Serbia would make some wrong move.

When it comes to Albin Kurti's announcement that after Christmas he will talk with KFOR representatives to remove the barricades, Minister Vucevic assesses that this is just a continuation of his moves that lead to escalation.

"If it's not license plates, then it's ID cards, if it's not ID cards, then it's the replacement of the regional police commander, if it's not that replacement, then it's the dissolution of the municipal election commissions, and all of that is accompanied by arrests all the time. What's worrying is that a similar narrative we can hear in the National Assembly that the reason why Kurti is sending special units to the north is because there are organized criminal groups there. It's unbelievable that someone even has the morals to say that, as if they are deliberately working against their country and people. This is a question whether the remaining 100,000 Serbs in Kosovo will survive and whether Serbia will preserve its national interests", assessed the minister, who pointed out that he understood Kurti's message as "if KFOR will not do it, then Pristina will use its police units to remove the barricades.

It is important that the Serbian community avoids any possible conflict with KFOR and EULEX

"He moves the ball into KFOR's yard and raises the stakes in his gambling game, a game of nerves and waiting for someone to make a wrong move, and that is why it is important for the Serbian community to remain calm, to avoid any possible conflict with KFIR and EULEX, because then we will go to the scenario we saw in the 90s, that the Serbs are the bad guys who need to be punished, that we are some disruptive factor that does not respect the agreements. In fact, everything is opposite, Pristina is doing it all," the Minister of Defense of Serbia stresses.

Asked what would happen if there was an escalation of violence, Vucevic pointed out that there were always negotiations and there were limits.

"Serbia is always in favor of a policy of peace and agreement, no matter how unpleasant it is to sit in the company of people like Kurti, it is better to negotiate and make not always easy compromises, than to go to wars and conflicts. We must clearly emphasize that there are red lines - no May 1, 1995, no "Bljesak Operation", no August 5, 1995 and "Storm Operation" and no March 17, 2004, no pogrom. If someone plays with it, if the international community allows it, then I am great pessimist regarding the preservation of peace and stability in the area of Kosovo and Metohija. Everyone must be aware of this. If they think that Serbia will wait for columns of Serbian refugees on tractors and trucks with bottles of water, sandwiches and blankets in Jarinje and Brnjak, or let us watch as they kill us and they expel children, women, old people, and we don't see the reaction of the international community, I don't know what other scenario is possible except the one that we would not want to see. Pristina wants to be ethnically clean about Kosovo, without Serbs".

When asked if this is a Pristina's attempt to take over the north, Vucevic claims that this is "a clear policy of Pristina, ethnically pure Kosovo, without Serbs."

"The intention is to clean up the north. Then the enclaves remain, which are otherwise under pressure. And then they will say that the Serbs could not fit into the civilized and democratic Kosovo society. That is why it is important to be calm and to persist in our demands, and let's not fight with each other on the issue of Kosovo and Metohija. That would be healing for Serbian society. This is not the time for strong slogans. It's easiest to say it from here, but we have to protect people in Gracanica, Velika Hoca, Orahovac, Gorazdevac, Lipljan, Gracanica, Ranilug, Partesu is also in the north of Kosovo. We have to protect all our people, without endangering the whole of Serbia. That's why it's important not to fall for provocations, not to be the first to go in the wrong direction," says Vucevic.

Kurti, he is convinced, was not asked by the international community where the members of the president's family - his brother and son - were from the arrest lists.

"Obviously the international community didn't ask Kurti that. They didn't even ask him what happened to the Serbs who were arrested, who are in prison for a year each. You have a Serb who was sentenced to a year in prison because he said that a case was staged in Racak, and it was. And they talk about human rights, and by direct action they nullify them. Pantic was imprisoned in a base for over two weeks, and where is the European Convention on Human Rights now? They should not talk about barricades, but see what the cause is. What made the Serbs to go on the roads and streets? It's not that they're bored, it's something that drove them. The problems won't be solved if the barricades are removed."

Increased combat readiness, the Army received precise instructions

"The Serbian Army carefully monitors everything that happens on the territory of Kosovo and Metohija, it has received clear instructions from the President of the Republic as commander-in-chief and is ready to carry out any task. The Serbian Army does not want conflicts, because it is aware of what conflicts and war mean, but it is motivated and equipped, trained to protect all national interests. I hope no one is crazy enough to check if this is true, if we are threatening with an empty gun. We are not threatening anyone, and the gun is not empty either.”