Ethnic Serbian representatives have walked out of Kosovo’s government in response to the arrest and expulsion of a senior Serbian government official, and have set up a roadblock in northern Kosov

Serbs Walk Out Of Kosovo

Politicians representing Kosovo’s Serbian minority announced the decision to leave the government after they met on March 27 with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in Belgrade, saying they will no longer support Kosovo’s government.

The developments came a day after Marko Djuric was briefly detained after entering the ethnically divided town of Mitrovica because the authorities said he had entered the country illegally.

They also followed EU-brokered negotiations between the leaders of Kosovo and Serbia on March 23 that broke up without any reported progress on efforts to normalize relations.

Djuric, who is the head of the Serbian government’s office for Kosovo, was transferred to a court in Pristina before being expelled from the country.

Officers also fired tear gas to disperse a crowd of ethnic Serbs protesting against the arrest.

The incident has fueled friction between Serbia and Kosovo, a former province that declared independence in 2008 and is recognized as a sovereign state by well over 100 countries but not by Belgrade or Moscow.

In northern Kosovo, Serbs have parked trucks to block a key road linking them with the capital, Pristina.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said it ‘strongly’ condemned the incident in Mitrovica, alleging that it ‘aimed at intimidating Kosovo Serbs.’

EU foreign-policy chief Federica Mogherini made an urgent trip to Belgrade later on March 27 for talks with Vucic.

Mogherini’s spokeswoman, Maja Kocijancic, said the two would discuss ‘the future of the EU-facilitated dialogue’ between Serbia and Kosovo.

Mogherini earlier had called for restraint from both sides.

The EU-brokered talks in Brussels on March 23 ended without apparent progress toward a normalization agreement, which the EU wants completed by the end of 2019.

In a statement after the talks, Mogherini stressed that a comprehensive normalization agreement is a key condition for both countries to further their bids to join the EU.

With reporting by TASS

According to the latest poll by popular Serbian politics magazine New Serbian Political Thought, Serbs’ support for the idea of joining the European Union is continuing its downward slide, while support for an undefined ‘alliance with Russia’, or for the country’s neutrality, continues to grow.

Interviewed by Sputnik Serbia, Djordje Vukadinovic, the editor in chief of the independent magazine, revealed that “at the moment, according to our research, support for joining the European Union stands at about 47%. Among that figure, 25% is the ‘backbone’ which has always been (and will remain) in favor of the EU.”

Ultimately, he notes, “most respondents see in Europe a chance for a better future for the next generation, rather than a chance for themselves. However, undoubtedly, the number of Eurosceptics is growing.”

Interestingly, when the question is not a yes/no proposition, but an explicit choice between the EU and Russia, the answers change. Also speaking to Sputnik Serbia, Srdjan Bogosavljevic, country manager for the Ipsos Strategic Marketing market research firm, explained why this is so.

“When one asks people: ‘Are you for EU membership or for a union with Russia’, the ‘alliance with Russia’ option (whatever it means), receives 20% more support than the EU.”

“We are now finding,” Bogosavljevic explained, “that a large number of people support both the EU and Russia. But when we force them to choose between them, about 15% choose the EU, while 33% choose Russia, and 35% step out in favor of neutrality.”

In any case, Vukadinovic noted, “support for European integration has faced a slow but consistent decline. We see it drop from poll to poll, and now support is down to less than 50%.”

Noting that there has been a marked spike in Euroscepticism, the magazine editor explained that “when we talk about those who support the European Union, this is a broad but fragile group. Eurosceptics on the other hand are much more implacable – much firmer in their convictions. Of the 45% of respondents who support the EU, only about half of them can boast such firm convictions.”

“The rest are on the fence; after all, the ruling Serbian Progressive Party has evolved from a Eurosceptic to a ‘Euroreformist’ party, and voters followed their leader, who told them that it is necessary to join the EU.”

The Serbian Progressive Party emerged in 2008 as a result of a split with the Serbian Radical Party –a Eurosceptic party which at the time was the country’s leading opposition force.

Serbs Walk Out Of Muslim Kosovo Government, Block Road In North

With reporting by TASS

More Serbs Back Alliance With Russia as Support for EU Entry Falters

“When one asks people: ‘Are you for EU membership or for a union with Russia’, the ‘alliance with Russia’ option (whatever it means), receives 20% more support than the EU.”