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World

Israelis rally in three cities against Netanyahu legal reforms

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TEL AVIV, Jan 14 (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of Israelis demonstrated in three major cities on Saturday against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s judicial reform plans, with organisers accusing him of undermining democratic rule weeks after his reelection.

Bestriding a religious-nationalist coalition with a solid parliamentary majority, Netanyahu, now in his sixth term, wants to rein in the Supreme Court in what he has described as a restoration of the balance of the three branches of government.

Critics say the proposed reforms would cripple judicial independence, foster corruption, set back minority rights and deprive Israel’s courts system of credibility that helps fend off war-crimes allegations abroad. Among those opposed are the Supreme Court chief justice and the country’s attorney-general.

After President Isaac Herzog appealed to polarised politicians to “lower the temperatures” of the debates, organisers of the demonstrations – held under chilly winter rain – sought to strike a note of national unity.

“Take an Israeli flag in one hand, an umbrella in the other, and come out to protect democracy and law in the State of Israel,” said centrist ex-defence minister Benny Gantz, who attended the Tel Aviv rally but, like other opposition figures, was not due to address it.

“We Are Preserving Our Shared Home,” read one demonstrator’s placard. Netanyahu was guilty of a “legal putsch”, said another.

[1/8] Israelis protest against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new right-wing coalition and its proposed judicial reforms to reduce powers of the Supreme Court in a main square in Tel Aviv, Israel January 14, 2023. REUTERS/ Ilan Rosenberg

Israeli media put the number in attendance at some 80,000, with thousands more at protests in Jerusalem and Haifa.

Social media footage showed a small number of Palestinian flags on display, in defiance of Netanyahu’s far-right allies. One of these, National Security Ministry Itamar Ben-Gvir, told Kan TV he wanted such flags removed but was awaiting the opinion of the attorney-general before ordering any crackdown by police.

The 73-year-old Netanyahu on Friday signalled flexibility on the reform plan, saying it would be implemented “with careful consideration while hearing all of the positions”.

Polls have diverged on public views of the reforms. Channel 13 TV last week found 53% of Israelis were opposed to changing the court appointments’ structure while 35% were in support. But Channel 14 TV on Thursday found 61% in favour and 35% opposed.

Critics of the Supreme Court say it is overreaching and unrepresentative of the electorate. Its proponents call the court a means of bringing equilibrium to a fractious society.

“Tens of thousands of people were at tonight’s demonstrations. In the election held here two and a half months ago, millions turned out,” tweeted Miki Zohar a senior lawmaker in Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party.

“We promised the people change, we promised governance, we promised reforms – and we will make good on that.”

Writing by Dan Williams; Editing by Christina Fincher and Mark Potter

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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World

China COVID peak to last 2-3 months, hit rural areas next -expert

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  • Peak of COVID wave seen lasting 2-3 months – epidemiologist
  • Elderly in rural areas particularly at risk
  • People mobility indicators tick up, but yet to fully recover

BEIJING, Jan 13 (Reuters) – The peak of China’s COVID-19 wave is expected to last two to three months, and will soon swell over the vast countryside where medical resources are relatively scarce, a top Chinese epidemiologist has said.

Infections are expected to surge in rural areas as hundreds of millions travel to their home towns for the Lunar New Year holidays, which officially start from Jan. 21, known before the pandemic as the world’s largest annual migration of people.

China last month abruptly abandoned the strict anti-virus regime of mass lockdowns that fuelled historic protests across the country in late November, and finally reopened its borders this past Sunday.

The abrupt dismantling of restrictions has unleashed the virus onto China’s 1.4 billion people, more than a third of whom live in regions where infections are already past their peak, according to state media.

But the worst of the outbreak was not yet over, warned Zeng Guang, the former chief epidemiologist at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, according to a report published in local media outlet Caixin on Thursday.

“Our priority focus has been on the large cities. It is time to focus on rural areas,” Zeng was quoted as saying.

He said a large number of people in the countryside, where medical facilities are relatively poor, are being left behind, including the elderly, the sick and the disabled.

Authorities have said they were making efforts to improve supplies of antivirals across the country. Merck & Co’s (MRK.N) molnupiravir was made available in China from Friday.

The World Health Organization this week also warned of the risks stemming from holiday travelling.

The UN agency said China was heavily under-reporting deaths from COVID, although it is now providing more information on its outbreak.

“Since the outbreak of the epidemic, China has shared relevant information and data with the international community in an open, transparent and responsible manner,” foreign ministry official Wu Xi told reporters.

Health authorities have been reporting five or fewer deaths a day over the past month, numbers which are inconsistent with the long queues seen at funeral homes and the body bags seen coming out of crowded hospitals.

China has not reported COVID fatalities data since Monday. Officials said in December they planned to issue monthly, rather than daily updates, going forward.

Although international health experts have predicted at least 1 million COVID-related deaths this year, China has reported just over 5,000 since the pandemic began, one of the lowest death rates in the world.

DIPLOMATIC TENSIONS

Concerns over data transparency were among the factors that prompted more than a dozen countries to demand pre-departure COVID tests from travellers arriving from China.

Beijing, which had shut its borders from the rest of the world for three years and still demands all visitors get tested before their trip, objects to the curbs.

Wu said accusations by individual countries were “completely unreasonable, unscientific and unfounded.”

Tensions escalated this week with South Korea and Japan, with China retaliating by suspending short-term visas for their nationals. The two countries also limit flights, test travellers from China on arrival, and quarantine the positive ones.

Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said on Friday Tokyo will continue to demand transparency, labelling Beijing’s retaliation as extremely “regrettable.”

Parts of China were returning to normal life.

In the bigger cities in particular, residents are increasingly on the move, pointing to a gradual, though so far slow, rebound in consumption and economic activity.

An immigration official said on Friday 490,000 daily trips on average were made in and out of China since it reopened on Jan. 8, only 26% of the pre-pandemic levels.

Singapore-based Chu Wenhong was among those who finally got reunited with their parents for the first time in three years.

“They both got COVID, and are quite old. I feel quite lucky actually, as it wasn’t too serious for them, but their health is not very good,” she said.

CAUTION

While China’s reopening has given a boost to financial assets globally, policymakers around the world worry it may revive inflationary pressures.

However, December’s trade data released on Friday provided reasons to be cautious about China’s recovery pace.

Jin Chaofeng, whose company exports outdoor rattan furniture, said he has no expansion or hiring plans for 2023.

“With the lifting of COVID curbs, domestic demand is expected to improve but not exports,” he said.

Data next week is expected to show China’s economy grew just 2.8% in 2022, its second-slowest since 1976, the final year of Mao Zedong’s decade-long Cultural Revolution, according to a Reuters poll.

Some analysts say last year’s lockdowns will leave permanent scars on China, including by worsening its already bleak demographic outlook.

Growth is then seen rebounding to 4.9% this year, still well below the pre-pandemic trend.

Additional reporting by the Beijing and Shanghai newsrooms; Writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan

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US

Embattled George Santos defies New York Republicans’ call to step down

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WASHINGTON, Jan 11 (Reuters) – Embattled U.S. Representative George Santos said he had no plans to heed fellow New York Republicans’ calls to step down, a plea they made on Wednesday due to what they called “lie after lie after lie” about his career and history.

Top House of Representatives Republican Kevin McCarthy said he had no intention of pressuring Santos, part of his narrow 222-212 majority, despite the public plea by more than a dozen top Republicans, many of them from Santos’ suburban New York City district.

The New York Republicans made their plea at a news conference two days after a nonpartisan watchdog accused Santos of breaking campaign finance laws in a filing with the Federal Election Commission.

“It’s just lie after lie after lie. It became a pattern,” said Joseph Cairo Jr., the party chairman in Nassau County.

Republican Representative Nick Langworthy from western New York and Representative Anthony D’Esposito, who represents a district next to that of Santos, were also among those calling on the first-term congressman to step down.

“I join with my colleagues in saying that George Santos does not have the ability to serve here in the House of Representatives and should resign,” he said.

Santos rejected those calls in remarks to reporters at the Capitol and elaborated on his plans on Twitter.

“I was elected to serve the people of #NY03 not the party & politicians, I remain committed to doing that and regret to hear that local officials refuse to work with my office,” he wrote, referring to the congressional district he represents.

McCarthy on Wednesday told reporters that voters, not lawmakers, should choose who represents them.

“In America today, you’re innocent until proven guilty,” he said.

‘SIMPLY TRAGIC AND OUTRAGEOUS’

[1/5] Newly elected U.S. Rep. George Santos (R-NY) sits alone on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives during voting for a new House Speaker on the fourth day of the 118th Congress at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S., January 6, 2023. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein

Santos, who represents much of Nassau County, as well as a small slice of New York City, has admitted to fabricating much of his resume.

He won his November race over Democrat Robert Zimmerman by a margin of 7.5 percentage points.

But his victory was quickly overshadowed by media reports indicating that the persona he presented to voters was largely a work of fiction.

Among other claims, Santos said he had degrees from New York University and Baruch College, despite neither institution having any record of him attending. He claimed to have worked at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup, which was also untrue.

He also falsely said that he was Jewish and that his grandparents escaped the Nazis during World War Two.

“For him to make up this story that his parents were Holocaust survivors is beyond the pale. It is simply tragic and outrageous and disgusting,” Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman said. “He is a stain on the House of Representatives.”

During the news conference, officials said they would direct Santos’ constituents to Representative D’Esposito in some cases, who had agreed to help residents of Santos’ district.

Two House Democrats on Tuesday referred the matter to the House ethics committee this week. The local district attorney has said her office is investigating Santos.

If Santos were to resign, his district could make for a competitive special election.

He won his 2022 election with 52% of the vote to Democrat Zimmerman’s 45%, handing Republicans a seat formerly held by Democrat Thomas Suozzi.

The 2022 election took place with newly-drawn district boundaries. Had those lines been in place in the 2020 presidential election, Democratic President Joe Biden would won the district by eight percentage points.

Under New York and federal law, the seat would be vacant until a special election is held, which would take roughly three months.

Reporting by Gram Slattery and Moira Warburton, additional reporting by Jason Lange and Doina Chiacu; Editing by Scott Malone, Mark Porter and Aurora Ellis

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Gram Slattery

Thomson Reuters

Washington-based correspondent covering campaigns and Congress. Previously posted in Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and Santiago, Chile, and has reported extensively throughout Latin America. Co-winner of the 2021 Reuters Journalist of the Year Award in the business coverage category for a series on corruption and fraud in the oil industry. He was born in Massachusetts and graduated from Harvard College.

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World

NATO declines Serbia’s request to deploy its troops in Kosovo

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  • Serbia last month sought permission to deploy troops
  • Shooting and wounding of young Serbs added to tensions
  • Peaceful protest takes place in Shterpce

SHTERPCE, Kosovo Jan 8 (Reuters) – NATO’s mission in Kosovo, KFOR, has declined a Serbian government request to send up to 1,000 police and army personnel to Kosovo after clashes between Serbs and the Kosovo authorities, President Aleksandar Vucic said on Sunday.

Serbia’s former province of Kosovo declared independence in 2008 following the 1998-1999 war during which NATO bombed rump-Yugoslavia, comprising Serbia and Montenegro, to protect Albanian-majority Kosovo.

“They (KFOR) replied they consider that there is no need for the return of the Serbian army to Kosovo … citing the United Nations resolution approving their mandate in Kosovo,” Serbia’s Vucic said in an interview with the private Pink television.

Last month, for the first time since the end of the war, Serbia requested to deploy troops in Kosovo in response to clashes between Kosovo authorities and Serbs in the northern region where they constitute a majority.

The U. N. Security Council resolution says Serbia may be allowed, if approved by KFOR, to station its personnel at border crossings, Orthodox Christian religious sites and areas with Serb majorities.

Vucic criticised KFOR for informing Serbia of its decision on the eve of the Christian Orthodox Christmas, after Kosovo police arrested an off-duty soldier suspected of shooting and wounding two young Serbs near the southern town of Shterpce.

Police said both victims, aged 11 and 21, were taken to hospital and their injuries were not life threatening.

Kosovo authorities condemned the incident, which has inflamed tensions.

On Sunday, a few thousands Serbs protested peacefully in Shterpce against what they called “violence against Serbs”.

Goran Rakic, the head of the Serb List, which is the main Serb party in Kosovo, accused Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti of trying to drive out Serbs.

“His goal is to create such conditions so that Serbs leave their homes,” Rakic told the crowd. “My message is that we must not surrender.”

Serbian media reported that another young man was allegedly attacked and beaten up by a group of Albanians early on Saturday, while media in Pristina reported that a Kosovo bus going to Germany through Serbia was attacked and its windscreen broken with rocks late that same day.

International organisations condemned the attacks, expected to deepen mistrust between majority ethnic Albanians and around 100,000 ethnic Serbs that live in Kosovo. Half of them live in the north and most refuse to recognise Kosovo’s independence.

Additional reporting and writing by Daria Sito-Sucic in Sarajevo; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise and Barbara Lewis

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US

Slipping over Mexico border, migrants get the jump on U.S. court ruling

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CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico Dec 28 (Reuters) – Even before the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday opted to keep in place a measure aimed at deterring border crossings, hundreds of migrants in northern Mexico were taking matters into their own hands to slip into the United States.

The contentious pandemic-era measure known as Title 42 had been due to expire on Dec. 21, but last-minute legal stays pitched border policy into limbo and made many migrants decide they had little to lose by crossing anyway.

After spending days in chilly border cities, groups of migrants from Venezuela and other countries targeted by Title 42 opted to make a run for it rather than sit out the uncertainty of the legal tug-of-war playing out in U.S. courts.

“We ran, and we hid, until we managed to make it,” said Jhonatan, a Venezuelan migrant who scrambled across the border from the Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez into El Paso, Texas with his wife and five children, aged 3 to 16, on Monday night.

Giving only his first name and speaking by phone, Jhonatan said he had already spent several months in Mexico and had not wanted to enter the United States illegally.

But the thought of failing after a journey that took his family through the perilous jungles of Darien in Panama, up Central America and into Mexico was more than he could bear.

“It would be the last straw to get here, and then they send us back to Venezuela,” he told Reuters.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a request by a group of Republican state attorneys general to put on hold a judge’s decision invalidating Title 42. They had argued its removal would increase border crossings.

The court said it would hear arguments on whether the states could intervene to defend Title 42 during its February session. A ruling is expected by the end of June.

[1/3] Migrants run to hide from the U.S. Border Patrol and Texas State Troopers after crossing into the United States from Mexico, in El Paso, Texas, U.S., December 23, 2022. REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez

Reuters images showed migrants racing across a busy highway alongside the border last week, one man barefoot and carrying a small child – the kind of risky crossing that alarms migrant advocates.

“We’re talking about people who come to request asylum … and they’re still crossing the border in very dangerous ways,” said Fernando Garcia, director of the Border Network for Human Rights.

John Martin, the deputy director at El Paso’s Opportunity Center for the Homeless, said the number of migrants his shelter has taken in are increasingly people who crossed illegally, including many Venezuelans.

“At one point, the majority were documented; now I’m seeing it reverse,” he said.

The agency’s El Paso sector was registering about 2,500 daily migrant encounters in mid-December, but the number dipped through Christmas to just over half that by the time of the court decision, CBP figures show.

On Tuesday before the Supreme Court ruling, a Venezuelan migrant in Ciudad Juarez who gave his name as Antonio said he was waiting to see whether U.S. border surveillance would let up, hoping to make money in the United States to send home.

“If they don’t end Title 42,” he said, “we’re going to keep entering illegally.”

Elsewhere along the border, other migrants said they felt they had run out of options.

“We don’t have a future in Mexico,” said Cesar, a Venezuelan migrant in Tijuana who did not give his last name, explaining why he has attempted once to cross the border fence to get into the United States, and plans to try again.

Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon in Mexico City and Jose Luis Gonzalez in Ciudad Juarez; Additional reporting by Lizbeth Diaz and Ted Hesson; Editing by Dave Graham and Gerry Doyle

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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World

Serbs in northern Kosovo to start removing barricades from Thursday

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  • Third major border crossing closed on Wednesday
  • Serbs in northern Kosovo resist moves they see as anti-Serb
  • Kosovo declared independence, with backing of West, in 2008

MITROVICA, Kosovo, Dec 28 (Reuters) – Kosovo Serbs who have been blocking roads in northern Kosovo for 19 days have agreed to start removing barricades from Thursday morning, bowing to calls by the United States and European Union to defuse tensions.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic who met Serbs from northern Kosovo in the Serbian town of Raska said the process of removing barricades will begin on Thursday morning.

“It is a long process and it will take a while,” Vucic said.

He also added that the United States and European Union, which are mediating talks between Belgrade and Pristina to resolve outstanding bilateral issues, have guaranteed that none of the Serbs who set up barricades will be prosecuted.

Removal of the barricades is expected to defuse tensions between Belgrade and Pristina.

For more than 20 years, Kosovo has been a source of tension between the West, which backed its independence, and Russia, which supports Serbia in its efforts to block Kosovo’s membership of global organisations including the United Nations.

The United States, NATO and European Union urged maximum restraint in the north of Kosovo, as authorities closed a third border crossing on Wednesday and tensions escalated with local Serbs over its 2008 independence.

NATO’s mission in Kosovo, KFOR, said it supported dialogue between all parties to defuse tensions, which have included Serb roadblocks on major arteries by trucks and other heavy-duty vehicles and violent clashes with police.

Serbia put its army on its highest alert on Monday.

The Kremlin, for its part, denied Kosovo interior minister’s claims that Russia was influencing Serbia to destabilise Kosovo, saying that Serbia was defending the rights of ethnic Serbs.

[1/3] Locals walk near a roadblock in the northern part of the ethnically-divided town of Mitrovica, Kosovo, December 28, 2022. REUTERS/Florion Goga

A former Kosovo Serb policeman, whose arrest triggered violent protests by Kosovo’s Serb minority, was released from custody and put under house arrest after a request from the prosecutors’ office, a spokesperson for the Pristina Basic Court told Reuters.

Dejan Pantic was arrested on Dec. 10 for assaulting a serving police officer. Since then, Serbs in northern Kosovo have exchanged fire with police and erected more than 10 roadblocks, demanding his release.

The court decision angered Kosovo government officials, including Prime Minister Albin Kurti and Justice Minister Albulena Haxhiu.

“I don’t know how to understand it and how it is possible that someone who is accused of such a serious crime related to terrorism goes to house arrest,” Haxhiu said.

“I am very curious to see who is the prosecutor who makes this request, who is the judge of preliminary procedure that approves it,” Kurti said.

Pantic was one of many Serbs who left the police and other institutions after Pristina said it would enforce a law requiring Serbs to scrap Serbian-issued car licence plates dating back to before the 1998-99 guerrilla uprising that led to Kosovo’s independence.

Serbs in northern Kosovo, which they believe to be still part of Serbia, resist any moves they see as anti-Serb.

Two border crossings between Serbia and Kosovo were closed on Dec. 10 and a third one, the biggest one for road freight, Merdare, was closed to traffic on Wednesday, disrupting journeys of Kosovars working elsewhere in Europe from returning home for the holidays.

Around 50,000 Serbs living in northern Kosovo refuse to recognise the government in Pristina or the status of Kosovo as a separate country. They have the support of many Serbs in Serbia and its government.

Albanian-majority Kosovo declared independence with the backing of the West, following a 1998-99 war in which NATO intervened to protect ethnic Albanian citizens.

Reporting by Fatos Bytyci; Editing by Ivana Sekularac, Andrew Heavens, Nick Macfie, Barbara Lewis and Himani Sarkar

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World

Kosovo closes main border crossing after roadblock in Serbia

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  • Merdare crossing most important for road freight
  • Serb president visits troops near border
  • Kremlin backs Serbia, denies Russia is stoking tensions

MERDARE, Kosovo, Dec 28 (Reuters) – Kosovo closed its biggest border crossing with Serbia on Wednesday after protesters blocked it on the Serbian side to support their ethnic kin in Kosovo in refusing to recognise the country’s independence.

Tensions between Belgrade and Pristina have been running high since last month when representatives of ethnic Serbs in the north of Kosovo left state institutions including the police and judiciary over the Kosovo government’s decision to replace Serbian issued car licence plates.

Kosovan Interior Minister Xhelal Svecla said on Tuesday Serbia, under the influence of Russia, was aiming to destabilise Kosovo. Serbia denies it is trying to destabilise its neighbour and says it just wants to protect its minority there.

The Kremlin on Wednesday also denied the Kosovan accusations but said it supported Belgrade. “Serbia is a sovereign country and it is absolutely wrong to look for Russia’s destructive influence here,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

For over 20 years, Kosovo has been a source of tension between the West which backed its independence and Russia which supports Serbia in its efforts to block the country’s membership in international organisations including United Nations.

Since Dec. 10, Serbs in northern Kosovo have exchanged fire with police and erected more than 10 roadblocks in and around Mitrovica. Their action followed the arrest of a former Serb policeman accused of assaulting serving police officers.

Serbia on Monday put its troops on highest alert. Late on Tuesday, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, who said Serbia was continuing to fight peace and seek a compromise, inspected the troops close to the border.

CROSSING BLOCKED

[1/7] A view of Merdare border crossing between Kosovo and Serbia which was closed by Kosovo after protesters blocked it on the Serbian side to support their ethnic kin in Kosovo in refusing to recognise the country’s independence, near Podujevo, Kosovo, December 28, 2022. REUTERS/Florion Goga

Serbs in Serbia used a truck and tractors on Tuesday to create the latest roadblock, close to the Merdare crossing on Kosovo’s eastern border, Belgrade-based media reported.

The government in Pristina has asked NATO’s peacekeeping force for the country, KFOR, to clear the barricades. But KFOR has no authority to act on Serbian soil.

Kosovo’s Foreign Ministry announced on its Facebook page the Merdare crossing had been closed since midnight, saying: “If you have already entered Serbia then you have to use other border crossings … or go through North Macedonia.”

The Merdare entry point is Kosovo’s most important for road freight, as well as complicating the journeys of Kosovars working elsewhere in Europe from returning home for holidays.

With two smaller crossings on the Serbian border in the north closed since Dec. 10, only three entry points between the two countries remain open.

Pristina main airport was also closed on Tuesday morning over a bomb threat, Kosovo police said in a statement. Police did not say if it was related to the recent tensions.

Serbian Defence Minister, Milos Vucevic, said Vucic was in talks with the so called Quint group of the United States, Italy, France, Germany and Britain about the current tensions can be resolved.

Around 50,000 Serbs living in ethnically divided northern Kosovo refuse to recognise the government in Pristina or the status of Kosovo as a country separate from Serbia. They have the support of many Serbs in Serbia and its government.

Albanian-majority Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 with the backing of the West, following a 1998-99 war in which NATO intervened to protect ethnic Albanian citizens.

Reporting by Fatos Bytyci; Editing by Bradley Perrett and Alison Williams

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World

Kosovan minister says Serbia aims to destabilise the country

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MITROVICA, Kosovo, Dec 27 (Reuters) – Kosovan Interior Minister Xhelal Svecla on Tuesday said Serbia, under the influence of Russia, was aiming to destabilise Kosovo by supporting the Serb minority in the north who have been blocking roads and protesting for almost three weeks.

Serbs in the ethnically divided city of Mitrovica in northern Kosovo erected new barricades on Tuesday, hours after Serbia said it had put its army on the highest combat alert following weeks of escalating tensions between Belgrade and Pristina.

“It is precisely Serbia, influenced by Russia, that has raised a state of military readiness and that is ordering the erection of new barricades, in order to justify and protect the criminal groups that terrorize… citizens of Serb ethnicity living in Kosovo,” Svecla said in a statement.

Serbia denies it is trying to destabilise its neighbour and says it just wants to protect its minority there. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Tuesday, Serbia would “continue to fight for peace and seek compromise solutions.”

Belgrade had said late on Monday that in light of the latest events in the region and its belief that Kosovo was preparing to attack Serbs and forcefully remove the barricades, it had ordered its army and police to be put on the highest alert.

Since Dec. 10, Serbs in northern Kosovo have erected multiple roadblocks in and around Mitrovica and exchanged fire with police after the arrest of a former Serb policeman for allegedly assaulting serving police officers.

Albanian-majority Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 with the backing of the West, following a 1998-1999 war in which NATO intervened to protect ethnic Albanian citizens.

Kosovo is not a member of the United Nations and five EU states – Spain, Greece, Romania, Slovakia and Cyprus – refuse to recognise Kosovo’s statehood.

[1/5] A woman walks near a roadblock, in the northern part part of the ethnically-divided town of Mitrovica, Kosovo, December 27, 2022. REUTERS/Florion Goga

Russia, Serbia’s historical ally, is blocking Kosovo’s membership in the United Nations.

Around 50,000 Serbs live in the northern part of Kosovo and refuse to recognise the Pristina government or the state. They see Belgrade as their capital.

Kosovo’s government said police had the capacity and readiness to act but were waiting for NATO’s KFOR Kosovo peace-keeping force to respond to their request to remove the barricades.

Vucic said talks with foreign diplomats were ongoing on how to resolve the situation.

In Mitrovica on Tuesday morning trucks were parked to block the road linking the Serb-majority part of the town to the Albanian-majority part.

The Serbs are demanding the release of the arrested officer and have other demands before they will remove the barricades.

Ethnic Serb mayors in northern Kosovan municipalities, along with local judges and some 600 police officers resigned last month in protest over a Kosovo government decision to replace Serbian-issued car license plates with ones issued by Pristina.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has led European Union states to devote more energy to improving relations with the six Balkan countries of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia, despite continuing reluctance to enlarge the EU further.

Reporting by Fatos Bytyci and Ivana Sekularac, Editing by Alexandra Hudson

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World

Kurds clash with police in Paris for second day after killings

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PARIS, Dec 24 (Reuters) – Clashes broke out for a second day in Paris on Saturday between police and members of the Kurdish community angry at the killing on Friday of three members of their community.

Cars were overturned, at least one vehicle was burned and small fires set alight near Republic Square, the traditional venue for demonstrations in the city where Kurds earlier held a peaceful protest.

Clashes broke out as some demonstrators left the square, throwing projectiles at police who responded with tear gas. Skirmishes continued for around two hours before the protesters dispersed.

A gunman carried out the killings at a Kurdish cultural centre and nearby cafe on Friday in a busy part of Paris’ 10th district, stunning a community preparing to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the unresolved murder of three activists.

Police arrested a 69-year-old man who the authorities said had recently been freed from detention while awaiting trial for a sabre attack on a migrant camp in Paris a year ago.

Following questioning of the suspect, investigators had added a suspected racist motive to initial accusations of murder and violence with weapons, the prosecutor’s office said on Saturday.

After an angry crowd clashed with police on Friday afternoon, the Kurdish democratic council in France (CDK-F) organised a gathering on Saturday at Republic Square.

[1/8] Smoke billows from a fire, as members of the Kurdish community attend a demonstration, following a shooting, in Paris, France December 24, 2022. REUTERS/Sarah Meyssonnier

Hundreds of Kurdish protesters, joined by politicians including the mayor of Paris’ 10th district, waved flags and listened to tributes to the victims.

“We are not being protected at all. In 10 years, six Kurdish activists have been killed in the heart of Paris in broad daylight,” Berivan Firat, a spokesperson for the CDK-F, told BFM TV at the demonstration.

She said the event turned violent after some protesters were provoked by people in a passing vehicle who displayed a Turkish flag and made a nationalistic gesture.

Friday’s murders came ahead of the anniversary of the killings of three Kurdish women in Paris in January 2013.

An investigation was dropped after the main suspect died shortly before coming to trial, before being re-opened in 2019.

“The Kurdish community is afraid. It was already traumatised by the triple murder (in 2013). It needs answers, support and consideration,” David Andic, a lawyer representing the CDK-F, told reporters on Friday.

Kurdish representatives, who met with Paris’ police chief on Saturday, reiterated their call for Friday’s shooting to be considered a terror attack.

The questioning of the suspect was continuing, the prosecutor’s office added.

Reporting by Manuel Ausloos, Antony Paone, Gus Trompiz, Kate Entringer and Caroline Pailliez; editing by Philippa Fletcher and Nick Macfie

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World

Kosovo asks NATO to airlift a Serb detainee as tensions rise

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PRISTINA, Dec 22 (Reuters) – (This Dec. 22 story has been corrected to say that police officers were transported by NATO via ground routes, not by helicopter, in paragraph 7)

Kosovo has asked NATO troops to airlift a former Serb policeman who was detained two weeks ago but could not be transferred elsewhere because local Serbs demanding his release set up barricades to prevent him being moved.

Dejan Pantic was arrested on Dec. 10 on charges of assaulting serving police officers during a previous protest.

Tensions have been running high since then as thousands of Kosovo Serbs protest, demanding the country’s Albanian-majority government pulls its police force out of the north, where the Serb minority is concentrated.

Local Serbs, who number around 50,000 in northern Kosovo, reiterated at a protest on Thursday that they would not remove the roadblocks unless Pantic is released.

“He (Pantic) should be in a detention center and not in a police station and that’s why we have asked our international partners to transfer him in an adequate facility,” Interior Minister Xhelal Svecla told a news conference in Mitrovica, just a few kilometers away from the first barricade.

NATO’s mission in Kosovo, KFOR, is the only force that has helicopters. Kosovo has no helicopters and would need NATO’s permission to hire one.

KFOR has already transported via ground routes nine police officers in recent days who were ill but unable to get out of the area after the roads were blocked.

The NATO force, which has more than 3,000 troops on the ground, said the KFOR commander is the sole authority to decide over Kosovo’s airspace.

“Every request that has been refused was because, as in the current situation, there were not the needed security conditions,” KFOR said in a written statement to Reuters without saying what request has been refused.

Svecla said his police force could remove the barricades but that he wanted local Serbs or NATO troops to remove them.

“For the sake of stability we are waiting for them to be removed by those who set them up or KFOR, but even waiting has its end,” he said.

Kosovo’s government has previously said people at the barricades are armed and any police intervention could harm people from both sides.

Ethnic Serb mayors in northern municipalities, along with local judges and some 600 police officers, resigned last month in protest over a Kosovo government decision to replace Serbian-issued car license plates with ones issued by Pristina.

Reporting by Fatos Bytyci, editing by Deepa Babington and Grant McCool

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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