2023-09-29 20:10:06
“Create the conditions to realize the dream of freedom of (his) people in the north of Kosovo” This is the objective that Milan Radojicic, political leader of the Kosovo Serbs, says he aimed for by leading a commando attack on the weekend last in Kosovo.
Accused by Pristina of having been the leader of this operation in the north of the country, in which a local police officer was killed, Milan Radojicic did not deny it. This Friday, through his lawyer, he claimed to have organized this group, without the knowledge of the Serbian government. The Serb explained in an open letter read at a press conference in Belgrade by his lawyer Goran Petronijevic, that he had acted in response to the “terror” of the Kosovo government against the local Serb community.
One of the most serious escalations of violence in recent years
Serbia refuses to recognize the independence that Kosovo, its former southern province, with an Albanian majority, proclaimed in 2008. The death of this Kosovar Albanian policeman, in the north of Kosovo, where the Serbs are in the majority, is one of the most serious escalations that have occurred there in recent years. A shootout ensued, between the special forces of the Kosovar police and the heavily armed Serbian commando.
Three members of the commando, who had taken refuge in an Orthodox monastery in the village of Banjska, not far from the border with Serbia, were killed there. “I myself carried out all the logistical preparations,” assured Radojicic in the letter, claiming to have acted without the knowledge of Belgrade, accused by the Pristina government of being behind the commando.
A solo shot from Radojicic and his commando?
“I did not inform anyone in the power institutions of the Republic of Serbia about this (…) nor did I get any help from them,” Radojicic wrote. According to him, the death of the police officer was “accidental” and was “followed by a fierce confrontation in which our three comrades, the heroes, gave their lives for freedom”.
Earlier this week, Kosovo’s Interior Minister, Xhelal Sveçla, accused Radojicic of having been the commando leader. He broadcast a video filmed with a Kosovo police drone during the clashes, in which Milan Radojicic appears, among a group of paramilitaries.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said this week that Radojicic was in “central Serbia” and would be questioned by Serbian authorities. Radojicic, who announced in the letter his resignation as vice-president of the main political party of the Kosovo Serbs, the Serbian List, has been targeted by American sanctions since 2021.
On Friday morning, Kosovar police carried out searches in several locations in northern Kosovo, notably in Mitrovica, in premises believed to belong to Radojicic, as well as in a hospital.
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