PRISTINA, Kosovo, 24 Sep: Kosovo\u2019s prime minister on Sunday said one police officer was killed and another wounded in an attack he blamed on support from neighboring Serbia, increasing tensions between the two former war foes at a delicate moment in their European Union-facilitated dialogue to normalize ties.
\nPrime Minister Albin Kurti said \u201cmasked professionals armed with heavy weapons\u201d opened fire on a police patrol in the village of Banjska, in Leposavic municipality, 55 kilometers (35 miles) north of the capital Pristina at 3 a.m. (01:00 GMT).
\nKosovo police said two trucks without license plates blocked a bridge at the entrance to the village. Three police units were sent to unblock it but came under fire from different positions with various weapons, including hand grenades and bombs.
\nPolice managed to push back the attack and take two injured police officers to the hospital in southern Mitrovica.
\nOne of them was dead on arrival, doctors said. The condition of the other is not life-threatening.
\nIn a statement, the Kosovo Diocese of the Serbian Orthodox Church \u2014 which has several monasteries in the former Serbian province \u2014 said a group of masked men in an armored vehicle stormed the Banjska Monastery in the same village, breaking down the locked gate.
\nA group of pilgrims from the city of Novi Sad, in northern Serbia, is currently visiting the monastery, along with an abbot, the Rev. Danilo.
\nFor safety, they locked themselves inside and the monastery\u2019s temple is also locked down.
\n\u201cArmed, masked men move around the courtyard and occasional gunshots are heard,\u201d the diocese said.
\nSerbia and its former province, Kosovo, have been at odds for decades. Their 1998-99 war left more than 10,000 people dead, mostly Kosovo Albanians. Kosovo unilaterally declared independence in 2008 but Belgrade has refused to recognize the move.
\nSpeaking after a meeting of the country\u2019s Security Council Sunday, Kurti said it was a \u201csad day\u201d for Kosovo and named the dead police officer as Afrim Bunjaku.
\nThe prime minister displayed a set of photos which showed a number of four-wheel drive vehicles without license plates and an armored personnel carrier \u201cwhich does not belong to the Kosovo police,\u201d near the Orthodox monastery in Banjska.
\nThere was ongoing gunfire from what he described as a group of at least 30 military professionals, masked and heavily armed.
\n\u201cIt is clear that these uniformed persons, at least 30, are an organized professional unit who have come to fight in Kosovo,\u201d he said, calling on them to hand themselves over to the Kosovar authorities.
\nMost of Kosovo\u2019s ethnic Serb minority lives in four municipalities around Mitrovica, in the north.
\nReports in Kosovo Serb media said residents of Banjska were woken by shootings and explosions in the night.
\n\u201cIt was a real little war: first some gunfire, then silence, shootings, detonations,\u201d Serbian Kossev news agency quoted an unidentified resident as saying.
\nSerbian media said both local roads and crossings with Serbia were blocked.
\n\u201cOrganized crime, which is politically, financially and logistically supported from Belgrade, is attacking our state,\u201d Kurti wrote on his Facebook page.
\nKosovar President Vjosa Osmani, who is in New York at the United Nations General Assembly, denounced the killing. AP<\/p>\n
\u201cSuch attacks testify once again to the destabilizing power of the criminal bands organized from Serbia which for a long time … are destabilizing Kosovo and the region,\u201d she said.
\nEU\u2019s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell condemned \u201cthe hideous attack by an armed gang against Kosovo Police officers\u201d and asked that \u201call facts about the attack need to be established. The responsible perpetrators must face justice.\u201d
\nHe added that \u201cthese attacks must stop immediately,\u201d adding that the EU\u2019s rule of law mission, or EULEX, as second security responder, is on the ground and in close contact with the authorities and KFOR.
\nMiroslav Lajcak, EU\u2019s envoy for the talks, also condemned the \u201chorrific attack\u201d and repeated the call \u201cto return to dialogue immediately\u201d
\nIn a statement, the U.S. ambassador in Pristina \u201cstrongly\u201d condemned the orchestrated, violent attacks on the Kosovo Police this morning,\u201d adding that \u201cthe Kosovo Police has full and legitimate responsibility for enforcing the rule of law according to the constitution and laws of Kosovo.\u201d
\nSerbia\u2019s parliamentary speaker Vladimir Orlic said Kurti \u201cwas quick to blame the Serbs,\u201d adding that Kurti was the one who wanted an \u201cescalation.\u201d
\n\u201cHe (Kurti) said it was some kind of organized action by professionals,\u201d Orlic told local Prva television station. \u201cThey must have been identified and he knows who they are and what they are, and everything is clear.\u201d
\nIn Belgrade, Serbia\u2019s President Aleksandar Vucic is expected to address the public later on Sunday to \u201cexpose Kurti\u2019s lies,\u201d according to pro-government media.
\nEarlier this month, an EU-facilitated dialogue meeting in Brussels between Kurti and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic ended in acrimony. Washington has fully supported the negotiations and the stance of the EU.
\nIn February, the EU put forward a 10-point plan to end months of political crises. Kurti and Vucic gave their approval at the time, but with some reservations that have still not been resolved.
\nThe EU warned both countries that the commitments that Serbia and Kosovo made in February \u201care binding on them and play a role in the European path of the parties,\u201d which refers to their chances of joining the 27-nation bloc.
\nIn May tensions in northern Kosovo left 93 peacekeepers hurt in riots.
\nA particular flashpoint has been the creation of the Association of the Serb-Majority Municipalities, or ASM, to coordinate the work of Serb-dominated municipalities on matters such as education, health and economic development.
\nKosovo considers the ASM as an effort by Belgrade to create a Serb mini-state with wide autonomy, similar to Republika Srpska in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
\nThe ASM\u2019s establishment was first agreed in Brussels in 2013, and approved in the Kosovo parliament. But Kosovo\u2019s Constitutional Court later deemed it unconstitutional, because it wasn\u2019t inclusive of other ethnicities and could entail executive powers.
\nIn protest, last year Serb lawmakers, prosecutors and police officers walked off the job. Their posts have still not been filled. A few Serb police officers were recruited but received threats telling them to resign.
\nNorthern Kosovo\u2019s rule of law has been run by international police officers from the EU mission, EULEX, and a limited number of Kosovo police, whose presence has been vehemently protested by Belgrade.
\nThe border is guarded by peacekeepers from the 4,000-strong NATO-led KFOR force, which has been in Kosovo since 1999. AP<\/p>\n
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