NATO troops secured a town hall in Zvecan, Kosovo, and the alliance said Tuesday it would send more troops to the region, a day after 30 NATO soldiers and 52 protesters were wounded in clashes and the EU and US called for a de-escalation of violence. , reports News.ro with reference to Reuters.

NATO said in a statement that it would send additional forces to Kosovo to reduce violence, but gave no details on when that would happen or how many soldiers would be involved.

“We have decided to deploy an additional 700 soldiers to Kosovo from the Western Balkans Operational Reserve Force in a few days and to place an additional reserve force battalion at a higher level of readiness so that it can be deployed if necessary. These are sensible measures by which we ensure that (the) KFOR mission has the strength and capabilities necessary to fulfill its UN mandate,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg later announced.

“KFOR will take all necessary measures to maintain a safe environment for all citizens of Kosovo. And we will continue to act impartially, in accordance with our mandate from the UN,” the head of NATO assured.

In the town of Zvečany, dozens of soldiers in riot gear from the United States, Poland and Italy guarded the municipal building on Tuesday as Serbs protested the appointment of an Albanian mayor. The Serbian protesters left around 4:00 p.m. local time (5:00 p.m. Romanian) and will return Wednesday morning, Serbian news agency Tanjug reported, citing Serbian officials in Zvecan.

A Reuters reporter saw four large NATO convoys heading north on Tuesday afternoon.

In the town of Leposavic, near the border with Serbia, masked people smashed the windshield of a car with the Albanian license plate “A2, CNN affiliate,” said a Reuters reporter who witnessed the incident. Another car belonging to another mass media was also destroyed. No one was hurt.

Unrest in the region has intensified since ethnic Albanian mayors took office in the Serb-populated area of ​​northern Kosovo following April elections boycotted by Serbs, prompting the US and its allies to rebuke Pristina on Friday.

Serbs refused to participate in local elections in April, and ethnic Albanian candidates won mayorships in four Serb-majority municipalities with a turnout of just 3.5%.

Most Serbs in northern Kosovo have never accepted Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence from Serbia and consider Belgrade their capital more than two decades after the Kosovo Albanian uprising against the repressive Serbian regime.

Ethnic Albanians make up more than 90 percent of Kosovo’s overall population, but Serbs in the north have long called for the implementation of an agreement reached by the EU in 2013 to create an association of autonomous municipalities on their territory.

International reaction

Russia, which has long had close ties to Serbia and shares its Slavic and Orthodox traditions, called on Tuesday for “decisive steps” to calm unrest in Kosovo.

The Russian Foreign Ministry urged “the West to stop false propaganda and stop blaming the incidents in Kosovo on the desperate Serbs, who are trying to defend their legitimate rights and freedoms peacefully, without weapons.”

Moscow helped block Kosovo’s bid to join the UN at Belgrade’s request.

On Friday, the US ambassador to Kosovo, Jeffrey Govenier, accused Pristina of stoking tensions in the north of the country by appointing Albanian mayors to their offices despite opposition from Serbia. “We are also thinking about other consequences,” he told reporters.

Washington, the most outspoken supporter of Kosovo’s independence, decided to cancel Kosovo’s participation in military exercises after Pristina refused to recall its mayors and police from the north.

For his part, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called on Kosovo and Serbian leaders to find a way to ease tensions through dialogue. “There is already too much violence in Europe today, we cannot afford another conflict,” Borrell told a news conference in Brussels.

On Monday, Serbian protesters in Zvečany threw tear gas and stun grenades at NATO soldiers, injuring 30 NATO soldiers and 52 Serbs.

“Acts of violence against citizens, against the media, against law enforcement agencies and KFOR troops (NATO forces in Kosovo) are absolutely unacceptable,” Borrell said.

Mutual objections between Belgrade and Pristina

The Kosovo authorities accused Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić of destabilizing the situation in Kosovo. Vucic accuses the Kosovo authorities of creating problems by appointing new mayors.

“Democracy has no place for fascist violence,” Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti said on Twitter late Monday.

After a meeting in Belgrade with ambassadors from a group consisting of the US, Italy, France, Germany and Britain, Vucic said he was demanding the removal of Albanian mayors from their positions in Serb-majority cities in the country’s north. country.

On the other hand, the President of Kosovo, Vjosa Osmani, said that the criminal groups supported by Vučić aim to destabilize Kosovo and the entire region.