There has been unrest on the Kosovo-Serbia border for months. That tension came to a boil on Sunday evening. The reason? Disagreement over the license plates of Serbian and Kosovar drivers. How did this conflict arise? And is it really just about license plates?
The license plate dispute started on September 20, 2021. Then Kosovo announced a new measure: Serbian cars wishing to enter Kosovo had to replace their Serbian license plate with a Kosovar one. The difference: The Kosovar plate has the letters RKS, for Republic of Kosovo.
A different license plate, that may sound like a small adjustment. But those three letters carry an age-old history of war, sorrow and struggle for independence.
Where it all started
Since 2011, the agreement between the two countries has been as follows: plates with the letters KS (Kosovo) were allowed to enter Serbia, but plates with the letters RKS (Republic of Kosovo) were not. The reason: Belgrade sees Kosovo as a province, not an independent republic, despite the country’s declaration of independence in 2008. License plates with the letters RKS would recognize Kosovo as a country, which is prohibited on Serbian territory.
That’s how we can do it, the Kosovar government thought last year, when the deal was about to expire. So in September announced that the agreement would not be extended, and that only cars with RKS number plates were allowed into Kosovo. Because, said Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti, “if Kosovars have to fumble with their number plates at the border, Serbs must too”.
Kosovo’s independence (since 2008)
- Kosovo was once a partially autonomous province of Serbia, until Serbian troops decided to take away this autonomy in the 1990s. This led to a bloody conflict, which prompted NATO to intervene.
- In 2008 Kosovo declared full independence. Since then, the two countries have been at odds with each other.
- In September 2020, the leaders of Serbia and Kosovo reached an agreement to strengthen economic ties between the two countries. They did this with the help of the United States.
- One of the first agreements that were made then was about the number plates.
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What happened then
Serbs living in northern Kosovo responded immediately. About 50,000 Serbs live in the north of Kosovo who still use Serbian license plates and documents. The protesters blocked roads between Serbia and Kosovo for four days, set fire to a registration counter and threw hand grenades into the building of a registration office. Protesters harassed also two buildings of the Ministry of the Interior.
Kosovo responded by sending armored vehicles and special police units to the border and Serbia flew fighter jets and helicopters close to the border. The situation was getting really out of hand.
To prevent further escalation, the European Union decided to intervene, after which Serbia and Kosovo concluded an agreement. The agreement This included NATO peacekeeping troops to replace Kosovar police units, and Kosovar ethnic Serb Kosovars to remove their blockades at border crossings. A temporary sticker system created: drivers from both countries had to tape the national symbols on their number plates.
What would happen
But Kosovo did not want to stop there. At the end of June, the country announced the measures for Serbian drivers. The measures were to come into effect on August 1. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic called the measures a “new storm”.
He was referring to Operation Storm (Storm), the largest European battle since World War II. Croats then expelled more than 200,000 Serbs who had lived in Croatia for centuries. It was the largest single ethnic cleansing during the Balkan Wars of the 1990s. Vucic said that “the Kosovar government will force Serbs to re-register their cars, otherwise they will take their cars away”.
Serbs will not tolerate that this time, Vucic said. He warned that as long as the new measures are in place, “an attack on northern Kosovo is planned” with Serbia’s response “businesslike, deadly and realistic”.
How are things now
The new measures should come into effect on Monday, but on Sunday evening it became restless again at the border. At the border crossings at Jarinje and Brnjak, protesters used trucks filled with gravel to block roads. Kosovar police also said that shots were fired at officers, but no injuries were reported. According to local media, the air raid siren went off in the north. Kosovo decided later in the evening to close the border crossings to close.
Due to the unrest, the government of Kosovo has decided to postpone the measures by a month. The implementation of the laws, which were supposed to take effect today, have been suspended until September 1 at the request of the US. Kosovar Prime Minister Kurti made a condition that the protesters had to lift the roadblocks. Meanwhile, Serbian soldiers have started to remove the roadblocks.
The UN peacekeeping force in Kosovo (KFOR), led by NATO, says it is “ready to intervene if stability is threatened”. For now it seems calm again. Traffic has resumed and the blockades have been lifted. But with the postponement of the measures, the license plate dispute between the Balkan countries is slowly simmering.
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