Tensions are not falling in the north of Kosovo with a Serb majority. Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani has just announced the holding of early municipal elections to replace the four mayors who resigned en masse on 5th November. The Lista Srpska, the pro-Serbian party led by Belgrade which monopolizes all the mandates of the community, immediately announced its boycott.
The tension has not gone down since the start of the license plate crisis, more than a year ago. The dialogue placed under the aegis of the EU is broken between Belgrade and Pristina and each camp is mounting the pressure by throwing the blame on the other. Earlier this week, the director of the NGO Aktiv, which promotes dialogue between Serbs and Albanians, was abused by Kosovar police.
Kosovar associations at the bedside of victims in Ukraine
How to support victims of war rape? The question has arisen since the Russian invasion of Ukraine and brings back painful memories to thousands of Kosovars, raped during the 1998-99 armed conflict. For more than twenty years, the Kosovar NGO Medica Gjakova has accompanied these victims, to free their speech and fight against stigmatization. These caregivers are now helping associations in Ukraine to better manage these traumas. Reportage.
When the Russian strikes hit kyiv, Maya understood that her country was literally invaded. She managed to leave Ukraine with her mother and her dogs to take refuge in Serbia. On February 24, something inside her snapped. Since then, she clings to continue to live. His story is part of a series of ten notebooks of Ukrainian, Russian and Belarusian exiles who came to live in Serbia.
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, Serbia has played the same balancing act between Russia and the European Union. At the risk of losing everything, including European funds and Western investors who keep the country afloat. Cross interview to understand why.
The war in Ukraine encourages the Balkan countries to find alternatives to gas. Romania will borrow an additional $3 billion from the United States to build two new nuclear reactors in Cernavoda. In Doicești, work on the site planned to host the first “mini-modular reactor” has begun, in defiance of the local population.
Will Albania sell its water to the dry south of Italy ? In any case, this is the project revealed by several Italian media in recent days. According to Corriere Della Sierra, the water would be transported from Albania to Puglia via a pipeline lying at the bottom of the Adriatic. No official reaction has yet taken place.
Nataša Pirc Musar becomes Slovenia’s first president
Renowned lawyer, former journalist and novice in politics, Nataša Pirc Musar, who stood as an independent candidate against the ultra-conservative of the Slovenian National Party Anže Logar, won the second round of the presidential election on 13th November, supported by the progressive side. Portrait.
In Bosnia and Herzegovina, hope after the general elections in October is fading. More than six weeks after the general elections, the political parties are negotiating at all levels to form the institutions. In this game of power, all coalitions are permitted. Big winners, the ethno-nationalist parties of Dragan Čović and Milorad Dodik lead the way, while many voters feel they have been used, with no real improvement possible. To analyse.
Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia soon in Schengen?
On December 8 and 9, the European Council must in fact decide on the integration of Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia. If the European Commission urges the 27 to validate the entry of these last three countries to have joined the EU, several Member States oppose it. On January 1, Croatia will in any case switch to the euro. And this is disrupting the real estate market: prices are soaring and sales are increasing, but above all, an exceptional number of properties are purchased cash.
Europol tightens the screw against trafficking on the “Balkan route”. Drugs, weapons, human beings. For many years, the “Balkan route” has been the route for all types of traffic. At the end of October, Europol led Operation Empact, which mobilized 16,000 police officers from 38 countries. Enough to send a strong message to criminal groups and their relays in the institutions before the possible accession of three new countries to the Schengen area.