Office for Kosovo and Metohija: Explosive device thrown at church in Prizren; Pristina authorities show their true attitude toward Serbs

The Office for Kosovo and Metohija announced that an explosive device had been thrown at the St. Panteleimon Church in Prizren the previous night, stating that the burning of Serbian holy sites on the second day of the biggest Christian holiday showed the true attitude of the authorities in Pristina toward Serbs and their temples.

According to the statement, extremists attempted to set fire to the entrance door of the sanctuary with an explosive device, and only by sheer luck was a passerby nearby who managed to quickly extinguish the fire that had engulfed the external wall of the church and damaged the entrance door.

"While Albin Kurti 'congratulates' Serbs on Easter, his extremists burn our holy sites on the second day of the biggest Serbian holiday. This shows the true attitude of the authorities in Pristina toward Serbs and their temples. This case clearly indicates that Albanian extremists were not satisfied with desecrating not only the St. Panteleimon Church but all Orthodox holy sites in Prizren during the March Pogrom in previous years, so they would destroy and burn Serbian cultural heritage monuments in Kosovo and Metohija again, and expel the remaining Serbian population from these areas by the same model," the statement emphasizes.

It is pointed out that the examples of endangering the lives and property of Serbs in Kosovo, as well as the property of the Serbian Orthodox Church, are becoming increasingly extreme and are accompanied by incendiary statements by politicians in Pristina, in which they demonstrate clear intolerance toward everything Serbian.

"By not condemning, arresting, and prosecuting the perpetrators of such atrocities, they only give hooligans a boost to strike harder and more aggressively against Serbs," the Office states.

Additionally, the fact that the international community does not see the degree of danger to the Serbian people in Kosovo is worrying, according to the statement.

"Moreover, foreign diplomats in Pristina represent this area as some kind of oasis of peace and religious tolerance, while the real situation on the ground almost daily contradicts them. It is unacceptable that such dangerous incidents occur in the heart of Europe in the 21st century, which is why we will never stop appealing to raise the level of security and protect the religious monuments of the Serbian Orthodox Church that represent the history of the Serbian people on the Kosovo and Metohija territory," the Office for Kosovo and Metohija statement concludes.