Arrests in Jarinje: The most risky point of Pristina's pressure on the Serbs

For the Serbs from Leposavic and the surrounding area who cross the administrative crossing every day, some even several times a day, for work, purchasing necessities in neighboring Raska, visiting relatives, or visiting properties on the other side of the administrative line, after the numerous arrests made there by the Kosovo Police in the last for several months, Jarinje became a high-risk point.

Arrests of the Serbs at that crossing are becoming more frequent. Nikola Todorovic, a doctor employed at Hospital Medical Center in North Mitrovica, was recently arrested; he was stopped by members of the Kosovo Police because of missing documentation for the children he was driving to Srbica for a family celebration. He was arrested after he verbally clashed with the police officers who mistreated him in front of the children. After that, he was ordered to be detained for 30 days for "attacking an official".

Shortly before that arrest, Miljan Jovanovic, a resident of Leposavic, was arrested in Jarinje, also in front of his children, who were in the car with him, who spent the night in custody because of a misread letter in his ID card. There are frequent arrests of former members of the Kosovo Police in Jarinje, who left the service a few months ago, together with other Serbs from the north who left Kosovo's institutions, as well as detention and harassment of people because of license plates. They let them go in the direction of Raska, and then they don't let them go back.

The Serbs from Leposavic and surrounding towns say that because of all this, they live in fear and uncertainty due to the constant pressure exerted by the Pristina authorities. They are of the opinion that the international community, which does not listen to the problems they are facing, has also failed.

A resident of Leposavic, Srecko Radosavljevic, believes that arresting people in front of their children is scandalous.

"It's a horror, beyond all horrors, to arrest people and take them out of the car in front of children, these are the traumas that remain forever. It's fine if someone is really guilty, he should be arrested no matter what nationality he is, but if it's random just because is a Serb, it is absolutely reprehensible. The Serbs are not at all safe here at the moment, because whatever you do, whatever business you engage in, people are arrested regardless of guilt. The Serbs in Kosovo have no rights in any sense. This is purely expelling the Serbs from Kosovo, nothing else. Unfortunately, the international community also helps them in that, which is unthinkable," Radosavljevic said.

Radosavljevic adds that the Serbs are in fear for their safety and that many are thinking about who will be arrested and for what.

"I left for Raska; the question is how I will return and if I will return, and I went to take medicine. If it remains as it is now, the Serbs have no future here. Surely 50 to 60 percent of the Serbs have left, there are no young people as far as I know in the municipality of Leposavic, it does not exist, they leave every day, they simply run away from here," Radosavljevic said.

Zivan Premovic, a resident of Leshak, says that he is not indifferent when he hears that someone has been arrested because Jarinje is a place where they pass every day.

"It's a pressure on all of us, when you hear it, you cannot be indifferent. We pass by every day, and they just point the finger at you and arrest you, without any reason, a disaster; I don't know what to do. It's a daily uncertainty that can change in a day; we don't know what will happen tomorrow and who it will happen to. Here is the doctor, even though I don't know him, regardless who he is and how he reacted, it is not a reason to act like that in front of small children. Those children will have trauma for sure. Tomorrow, when they see our soldiers or anyone else's, they won't recognize whose uniforms are whose, fear remains," Premovic said.

Premovic adds that the daily pressures of Pristina have great consequences for the Serbs and cause enormous worries.

"These are uncivilized actions that they carry out on us. You can't even think consciously anymore, it affects our intelligence, and our common sense, in addition to other daily worries we have that too. It's intimidation, to make us as few as possible, such as they did in other countries, today they reduce us to a minimum and that they can do whatever they want with us, it's really difficult," Premovic noted.

Another resident of Leshak, Milan Mijatovic, believes that bullying people in front of their children and families is unacceptable.

"I don't know what the background is, whether the people are guilty or not, because as far as we read in our press that they didn't do anything terrible and sinned to be treated like that. They use excessive force, which they complained about during Milosevic's time was used by the Serbian police, so here they won something of their own and now they are using the same thing that they once criticized. There were always blows to the family, which is something catastrophic, to which any normal person would react quickly so that excessive use of force is not OK," Mijatovic added.

Mijatovic assesses that in this way Pristina is "humiliating" the Serbs, who, as he added, "no longer have the right to life".

"I think this is intimidation, in order to humiliate these people into obedience. I have friends whom I invite to come to us, they say they will come when the situation calms down. I don't know how it was presented to them that we live dangerously, but it is not quite harmless," Mijatovic said.

Bojan Jovanovic from the village of Pridvorica near Soqanice said that it was evident that all the Serbs feared the behavior of the Kosovo Police in Jarinje and the increasingly frequent arrests.

"Everyone is afraid, no one is indifferent anymore and no one knows when someone will be arrested. Kurti’s people are hot-headed. You never know when they will legitimize you and where they will arrest you and why. If it weren't for this trouble and problems, it would be fine here to live," Jovanovic said.