Serbian troops on alert at border with Kosovo

(Representative photo)

Serbian troops were on a heightened state of alert yesterday after the government in Belgrade accused neighbouring Kosovo of “provocations” by sending special police units to the border. Already tense relations between Serbia and its former breakaway region have worsened since the ethnic Albanian-led government there dispatched the police units last Monday to an area mainly populated by ethnic Serbs, who reject the government in Kosovo’s capital Pristina. The deployment came as hundreds of ethnic Serbs have staged protests against a rule to require drivers with Serbian registration plates to put on temporary ones when entering Kosovo – a “reciprocal measure”, according to Pristina. Hundreds of Serbs in Kosovo have been protesting and blocking traffic with trucks on the roads leading to two border crossings. “After the provocations by the (special police) units ... Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic gave the order to heighten the alert for some Serbian army and police units,” the defence ministry in Belgrade said. Serbian fighter jets could again be seen overflying the border region on Sunday after several sorties on Saturday, an AFP correspondent reported.