Expert: Results of Local Election in Kosovo Expected

Dusan Janjic (BETAPHOTO/MEDIJA CENTAR BEOGRAD)

The director of the Forum for Ethnic Relations, Dusan Janjic, described as expected the results of a local election in Kosovo, according to which the Self-Determination party had failed to win a majority in a single municipality, because, as he put it, a multiparty system had been embraced by the Albanians in Kosovo.

Janjic said in a comment for BETA that the Self-Determination leader, Albin Kurti, knowing he was about to lose the election, had decided to introduce new license plates, which led to a number of incidents at the administrative crossings Jarinje and Brnjak, and to launch a Kosovo police operation in the north of Kosovo.

Janjic explained that the incidents sparked fears among the citizens of Kosovo, but the Serbs voted for the Serb Ticket and the Albanians, out of that same fear, voted against the ruling party, as they had been given "different options." "Kurti might have missed the fact that Belgrade actually needed a clash with Pristina. It was the clashes that made the Serb voters in Kosovo go to the polls en masse to support the Serb Ticket," Janjic said.

The analyst also said that Kosovo's early parliamentary vote would take place next April, adding that 2022 would be the year of elections across the Western Balkans. Janjic suggested that the region might witness a series of security incidents throughout the year.