By Al Ahed Staff, Agencies
Serbian defense Minister Milos Vucevic announced that his armed forces were on “the highest level” of alert, highlighting the Balkan country’s increasingly strained relations with neighboring Kosovo over recent shootings and blockades.
The Serbian army has been put on a heightened state of alert over tensions with Kosovo multiple times in recent years – the last time in November after the government announced that several drones entered Serbian airspace from Kosovo.
“Serbia’s president … ordered the Serbian army to be on the highest level of combat readiness, that is to the level of the use of armed force,” Vucevic said in a statement on Monday.
He further added that president Aleksandar Vucic also ordered the special armed forces to be beefed up from the existing 1,500 to 5,000.
Serbia’s interior ministry also announced that “all units [will] immediately come under the command of the chief of general staff”.
These orders from Vucic come after army chief general Milan Mojsilovic was dispatched to the border with Kosovo on Sunday.
“The situation there is complicated and complex,” Mojsilovic said Sunday.
Northern Kosovo has been especially on edge since November when hundreds of ethnic Serb workers in the Kosovo police as well as the judicial branch, such as judges and prosecutors, walked off the job.
Serbian prime minister Ana Brnabic said last week the situation with Kosovo was “on the brink of armed conflict”.
But Kosovo’s security council – which met Monday – blamed Serbia for the latest deterioration in relations.
It accused Serbia of “acting with all available means against the constitutional order of the Republic of Kosovo”.
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