Balkans | Serbs boycott local elections in northern Kosovo

KosovoLocal elections held in four Serb-dominated municipalities in the north of the country were held on Sunday, with low participation due to a Serb boycott.

Kosovo’s Central Election Commission announced that turnout in the local elections, in which 45,000 voters are eligible to vote, remained at 3.47 percent.

The decision to hold early local elections was taken after the resignation of the mayors of the northern Kosovo cities of Leposavic, Zubin Potok, North Mitrovica and Zvecan in November last year, along with the decision of the Serbs to withdraw from Kosovo’s institutions.

Only 10 candidates participated in the elections, one of them being Serbs, and according to statements by Petar Petkovic, director of the Serbian Government Office for Kosovo, only 13 Kosovo Serbs voted in the elections. The Serbian government claimed that the winner of the elections is the Kosovo Serb people, because by boycotting the elections it showed that it opposes the occupation.

Petkovic described the elections as undemocratic and illegitimate, and said that the election data also means defeat for the international community, which announced that it would recognize the election results.

Kosovo’s Interior Minister Celal Svechla (Jelal Svechla) stated that the elections can be described as a victory in terms of security and legal aspects, but this cannot be said in political terms.

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