Vucic: We have crossed the Rubicon; it will be difficult to return to normality

The President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, pointed out that we were at the crossroads of whether we would continue to have peace or not, and that the Rubicon had been crossed, as well as that it would be difficult to return to normality.

"We are at a crossroads. Not because of our intention not to have peace, but because there is one man in the Balkans who wants to have a war and provoke conflicts at any cost," Vucic said in a guest appearance on Dnevnik 2 of the RTS, regarding the situation in Kosovo and the arrest three Kosovo police officers on the territory of Serbia.

He underlined that it was about the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti.

"I no longer have any doubts about that. I am afraid that we have crossed the Rubicon and that it will be difficult to return to normality," Vucic said.

He stated that according to the regulations, from CEFTA to all other international legal regulations, Pristina could not ban the import of Serbian goods and that with such a move he wanted to starve the Serbs in Kosovo.

"To be left without medicines, food, bread, milk, and other things, because they get most of the pastries from Raska. The intention is to drive the people away from the north of Kosovo forever," Vucic said.

He pointed out that since the beginning of the year, only the Serbs had been arrested and wounded, and that no Serb had shot a single Albanian.

"Not one Albanian has been shot, and since the beginning of the year, we have had six Serbs shot. And when the international community calls on "both sides", it is our duty to explain how things are. No Albanian has been shot on the territory of Serbia. It only happens to the Serbs," Vucic said.

He reminded that the whole crisis had started when someone had made the decision to go to the elections, and everyone, he said, knew that those mayors were illegitimate.

"And it is not enough for them that they were let to install someone who does not represent anyone in North Mitrovica, but entered premises where they have never been. They have no reason to be there, it's just to humiliate the people. Then we had incidents in Zvecan, until yesterday's arrest of Milenkovic, and before that, Dusan Obrenovic and Rados Petrovic. They shot Dragisa Galjak. And no one was responsible for it. Everyone is pretending that the Serb was not shot from behind," Vucic said.

He said that he had had a difficult night because of the need to calm people in the north of Kosovo.

"It's not easy to talk to people, they curse me because of the barricades, I'm to blame for the barricades, and they don't understand how many lives we've saved because they would have come into conflict with NATO," Vucic said.

Speaking about the case of Milun Milenkovic, Vucic pointed out that that morning he had had a meeting with representatives of the Quint, and that the prosecutor claimed that Milenkovic was guilty of the incident in front of the Election Commission building in North Mitrovica, where, he said, they had come to show force and where nothing had happened.

"A shock bomb was thrown there, they say it wasn't him, but he was there. I told them today that I convinced people for the barricades because I had guarantees in written form that those people would not be arrested," Vucic says and adds that today he showed them that, but that the only answer is "please de-escalate the situation".

As he says, he had a fair conversation with the KFOR commander.

"The conversation with Ristuccia is not easy, he feels hurt, he is a soldier, and he is responsible. I showed him the video showing that Dusan Obrenovic and Rados Petrovic did nothing. He says he knows about that video," Vucic said.

Commenting on that video, Vucic points out that Rados Petrovic can be seen sitting, and suddenly they pull him out.

"He's not resisting, NATO says he didn't do anything, and they extended his detention because they beat them," Vucic said and pointed out the terror the Serbs in Kosovo live in.

According to him, those he spoke with from the international community only said that they were monitoring the situation through EULEX.

"I answer them not to monitor because I guaranteed our people that you would prevent such people from being arrested".

He states that after the meeting with Ristuccia this morning, no one had any idea what was going to happen, and repeated that members of the Kosovo Police had been arrested on the territory of Serbia.

"Mojsilovic had a meeting after that, I ended the conversation with a little less pessimism, and then I received information around one, as soon as it happened, that our members of Special anti-terrorist units arrested three members of the Special Police Forces, armed with automatic rifles, Glock pistols, GPS, and binoculars. One says that he does not know how to use GPS, one that he knew, the other that he did not, who knows. Look at Kurti's statement, he says that we have a suspicion that the Serbian Army carried out the kidnapping of special units, these people have nothing to look for in that area without the approval of KFOR, especially not with long guns, my first question is whether you want to kill people who smuggle Coca Cola, bread. Second, if you informed KFOR, we have evidence that they did not," Vucic said.

As he stated, the Serbian police had arrested them not at 18 meters in the territory of central Serbia, but at 1.8 kilometers.

"I guarantee that not a single soldier, policeman, crossed the administrative line. We arrest them 1.8 kilometers from the administrative line, on the stretch Orahovo - Gnjilica," Vucic said.

I will always fight for peace; Kurti's only goal is war. They are just waiting for Serbia to do something to introduce sanctions for both sides

In response to the statement that Kurti spoke with the Quint yesterday, and that after an hour or two long guns appeared in North Mitrovica, Vucic pointed out that Kurti had known that a meeting had been held in Brussels yesterday and that, with the help of several Serbs, he had wanted to cause riots, so that Serbia would react and be punished.

"All because they want war, they want Serbia to be punished for something. He wants war all the time. They make a decision not to accept the goods in a frantic way. Serious people don't make decisions like that, because they mean life for people," Vucic said.

He said that people in Kosovo should not worry, because Belgrade would not allow them to be hungry or thirsty, as it had not allowed when we had been faced with taxes.

Vucic pointed out that the Pristina authorities had almost disfigured Milenkovic, one of the symbols of resistance to Kuti's horror, in front of the world public.

"He is a strong and brave guy, he will endure it. But have you heard anyone oppose it? What will you say to the Serbian police, who carried out the arrest in a professional manner following all regulations? We will have to fight in every way possible," the President of Serbia said.

He pointed out that Serbia had been put in a situation where they were waiting for Serbia to do anything so they could say – “Now we are imposing sanctions on both sides”.

"We managed to avoid that so far. And what should we do, except fight," Vucic stated.

He added that it was easiest for him to talk with the representatives of KFOR because even though these conversations were difficult, you talked to them about facts and not about "philosophical nonsense".

"We are talking about the people who this afternoon said about the special police officers that they should be sent back to be tried for national treason because they hadn’t even fired a bullet. That man dreams of being Zelenskyy, because he has no military history. And, he doesn’t, and I'd like it to stay that way, because we want to keep the peace. But we will not allow our people to perish, to be hungry and thirsty," Vucic said.

They have to resign, and according to the Law on Foundations and Property Law Relations to withdraw the Special  Police; what are the long guns doing there?

He says there are two key messages:

"We did not participate in the escalation of the situation; on the contrary, we are trying to de-escalate it. We are talking with KFOR, to withdraw part of the forces, so that no one feels threatened, but you can't when you have people who long every day to make an incident".

He added that there were two suspicions about today's events - one was that the Kosovo Police officers had been expecting someone whom they should have liquidated, and the other, given the false information about how Red Star fans were going to Zvecan, that they wanted to arrest them all or do something else with them.

"NATO cannot say that they knew about this action, because we have evidence that they did not know, that they were not informed. I will always fight for peace because peace is beneficial for the Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija and the whole country, but we will not allow the humiliation of our people, that they have nothing to eat, because someone has decided that way," Vucic said.