Politics Kosovo indicts 45 Serbs for last year's terrorist attack

The Special Prosecutor's Office in Kosovo has indicted 45 Serbs who were allegedly involved in a terrorist attack in the north of the small Balkan country almost a year ago. Among the accused is Milan Radoicic, who led the bloody action and was a leading Kosovo Serb politician at the time, said the head of the special prosecutor's office, Blerim Isufaj, in the Kosovo capital Pristina.

On September 24, 2023, a 30-strong, heavily armed Serbian commando unit took up position in the village of Banjska near Mitrovica and fought with the Kosovo police. Three Serbian attackers and a Kosovar police officer were killed. Radoicic and most of the other attackers then fled to Serbia. A few days later, Radoicic confessed to having led the group.

The businessman is considered a close political ally of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic. The Serbian public prosecutor's office launched an investigation against him after the incident in Banjska. However, neither he nor anyone else from the fighting force that fled to Serbia has yet been held legally responsible there.

Was Radoicic supposed to instigate an uprising?

The Kosovar authorities suspect that Radoicic wanted to instigate an armed uprising among the Kosovo Serbs in order to annex northern Kosovo, which is almost exclusively populated by Serbs, to Serbia. According to Pristina, the large number of weapons, including heavy weapons, that the terrorist group left behind when it fled, points to this.

Kosovo, which is now almost exclusively inhabited by Albanians, seceded from Serbia in 1999 with the help of NATO and declared independence in 2008. More than 100 countries, including Germany, recognize its independence. However, Serbia has still not come to terms with the loss of its former province and is reclaiming it for itself.