After the Kosovo government on Friday started an operation to deploy customs and police officers at the Jarinje and Brnjak border crossings in the north of Kosovo on the border with Serbia, the Serbian government called on people living in the north of Kosovo to stay calm and not respond to acts of provocation, while opposition parties mostly criticised the government for the latest developments.
Government spokesman Milivoje Mihajlovic said the government was following and fully controlling the situation in northern Kosovo and that the situation was calm.
In a statement carried by the Belgrade media, Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said the presence of Kosovo customs officers at the border crossings, which Serbia calls administrative crossings, represented abuse of the agreement on the acceptance of the Kosovo customs seal.
The fact that a customs officer must go to work by helicopter is surreal and cannot last, Dacic said, adding that the situation was tense and that Serbia was "critically interested in preserving peace and settling all issues through dialogue."
The leading opposition Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) of Tomislav Nikolic said in a statement that "Kosovo Albanians, EULEX and KFOR have unlawfully taken" the Jarinje and Brnjak border crossings, describing the government's policy as "wrong and senseless" and its results as "disastrous for the Serbs and the Serbian state".
The SNS called on the government to call an urgent session of parliament to vote on confidence in the government.
Members of the opposition Serbian Radical Party and Democratic Party of Serbia on Friday went to the north of Kosovo, entering Kosovo separately by using secondary roads after they were returned from Jarinje and Brnjak.
Accusing the government in Belgrade of being responsible for the developments in the north of Kosovo, representatives of the two parties said they would stay in Kosovo to support local Serbs who oppose the arrival of Kosovo customs and police officers.
Kosovo customs and police officers and members of the EU rule of law mission in Kosovo (EULEX) were deployed this morning at the two border crossings in an operation during which they were taken by helicopter to Jarinje and Brnjak from a KFOR (Kosovo Force) base near Leposavic. Kosovo Interior Minister Bajram Rexhepi said that EULEX would be doing the operational part of the work on the border crossings, while Kosovo officers would have a technical role. He added that the deployment was carried out without any problems.
On the night between Thursday and Friday, as well as on Friday, local Serbs were protesting peacefully at barricades against the establishment of the Kosovo customs and police service on the border crossings with Serbia. Protests were held in Kosovska Mitrovica, and roads were blocked at several locations in the northern municipalities of Leposavic, Zvecan, Kosovska Mitrovica and Zubin Potok.
NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen visited Kosovo on Thursday, saying that KFOR would respond if necessary to protect peace and order in Kosovo.
