PM Kurti: Putin is obsessed with Kosovo

Exclusive interview for The Geopost with the Prime Minister of the Republic of Kosovo, Mr. Albin Kurti:

The Geopost: Mr. Prime Minister, thank you very much for this interview given to Geopost. The Russian aggression in Ukraine started a year ago, how much has the Balkan mosaic changed since the beginning of this aggression and the reflection of this war in the Balkans?

KURTI: Thank you for the opportunity to address your viewers and welcome to the Prime Minister’s office.

The six countries that are in the Western Balkans not yet integrated into the European Union, all of which have been put before the most important test, precisely on February 24 of last year when Russia’s aggression and unjustified invasion of Ukraine took place, in this test, it was clearly seen that 4 countries are clearly against the Russian Federation and for the liberation war of Ukraine, whose victory is another name for peace there, Albania, North Macedonia, Kosovo and Montenegro, while Serbia did not impose sanctions, did not condemn the aggression, and this was also conditioned on Bosnia and Herzegovina because Republika Srpska there, it has the right to veto and practically controls the foreign policy, although the Bosniaks and Croats are to impose sanctions on the Russian Federation, it is precisely the Republika Srpska that is a genocidal creature which made such a thing impossible.

It is not surprising, because while the Kremlin aims to realize the Russian world or “Ruski Mir”, Serbia, Belgrade aims to realize the Serbian World, which is another name, a euphemism for the great Serbia.

In the 20th century, Yugoslavia was created as a platform for a greater Serbia, and at the end of the 20th century, Yugoslavia was destroyed as a platform for a greater Serbia. The destruction of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, although they were not similar in character because that of the Soviet Union was generally done peacefully, unlike Yugoslavia, the consequences and the result are very similar, there we have the Russian Federation with satellite states around, or pseudo -states, there is Belarus, there is Crimea and Donbass, there is Trans-Dniester in Moldova, then there is South Ossetia and Abkhazia and so on. Similarly, here in our region, the destruction of Yugoslavia brought Serbia to the center with its tentacles, Republika Srpska in Bosnia, pro-Serb parties in Montenegro, especially the Democratic Front, illegal parallel structures in northern Kosovo and the Serbian Orthodox Church everywhere and with considerable influence in North Macedonia. So the collapse of the Soviet Union produced a large octopus centered on the Russian Federation, while the destruction of Yugoslavia produced a small quadruped, since it has half the tentacles and is smaller than the parent octopus. And this truth, which is historical and cultural, came to the fore like never before, exactly after the Russian invasion and the military aggression in Ukraine, so it’s not that we understood something new or learned something new, but what was there became known to everyone.

The Geopost: Mr. Prime Minister, everyone thought that Serbia, after the Russian aggression in Ukraine and this ongoing war, it will position itself in favor of the West, that is, turn its back on Russia. Where is Serbia today, is this likely to happen?

KURTI: I remember very well last March when we in Kosovo were told, please, spare Serbia, Belgrade, the president from the rhetoric of harsh criticism, because after April 3, when there will be held elections in Serbia, they will change their orientation and will be completely directed towards the west. It didn’t happen, so we have to learn some lessons, the expectations that existed for the current president from the western side have not been realized, who would have thought when the military invasion of Russia took place in Ukraine, it has been 1 year and 4 months and still Serbia remains the only country in Europe that does not impose sanctions on Russia, on the contrary, last year, in September on the sidelines of the United Nations summit, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Serbia (at the time) Selakovic, and that of Russia Lavrov make an agreement for coordination in foreign policy.

So, when the general assembly of the United Nations took place like every year at the end of September, they used the American territory for a coordination agreement between Belgrade and Moscow. Not only did they not sanction him, but on the contrary, they did this. And let’s not forget that there was another very negative element from Serbia, and this is at the end of last year, the appointment of Aleksandar Vulin, the most pro-Russian man on the political scene in Serbia, as the head of the Serbian intelligence and secret service BIA.

So, he who was once the vice-president of the “Jul” party, which was led by Milosevic’s wife, Mira Markovic, today leads the secret service and he is praised for being the inventor of the term “Serb World”, so, the agreement with the Kremlin on the politics of foreign affairs in New York in September and then in December, the appointment as the head of the Serbian BIA of Aleksandr Vulin, have clearly shown us that Serbia, not only is not changing direction, but on the contrary is intensifying its activity and functioning in the direction of old, where they consider the Russian Federation the main ally and partner.

The Geopost: With this pro-Russian Serbia, where is Kosovo with the hybrid war that is happening, is there regional coordination and how much regional coordination should be to counter this hybrid war?

KURTI: During the last years, both in the media and in politics, but also in the academic world, there has been a lot of discussion about hybrid war, thinking that hybrid war is a substitute for war, but the Russian invasion in Ukraine showed that hybrid war is not a substitute for war, it is a preparatory stage for war and it depends on us how successfully we face the hybrid war so that there is no war.

Today, in the Balkan region, Sputnik is headquartered in Belgrade. Since April 2012, there is a so-called “Russian Humanitarian Center” in Nis with dozens of agents and spies who are precisely the bearers of this hybrid war.

So, the hybrid war in the Western Balkans has its center, which is Serbia, namely Belgrade and Nis. Now, that Russian humanitarian center in Nis is not closing, and despite calls from the West, it continues to be more and more active, on the other hand, the Russian ambassador in Belgrade, Aleksander Bocan Harchenko, organizes weekly receptions for students in Belgrade, for intellectuals, for journalists and in this way it fills them with the Russian narrative about geopolitics, about history and so on, because the hybrid war is not only about fake news, it is about fake history, so they want to make it a revision of history in which case the interpretation of the past is done by them in a special way, because fake news passes, but false narratives about people’s histories of war and peace are very problematic because they are like the history books that teach the new generations, in this way they prepare them for new wars.

We in Kosovo are in close communication and cooperation with our western partners, with the United States of America, with the European Union, the United Kingdom, especially with NATO, NATO is the platform with which we mostly cooperate snd agree on dealing with hybrid warfare. But the hybrid war is launched by Serbia because Serbia is with Russia, so the hybrid war is not accidental that it is launched by a country that has given 56% of its oil industry to GASPROM, 51% of the shares of the gas basin in Banatski Dvor in Vojvodina, which is the largest in South-Eastern Europe, has also given it to GASPROM, it has opened the way and they have their representative headquarters LUKOil, Rosatomi, ROSCOSMOS, VTB Banka, ZberBank and so on and let’s not forget the joint military exercises, there were only 2 in 2012 between Serbia and Russia, while in 2021 they were 104. From 2 to 104 in less than a decade. It means that what happened today has been prepared for years and we must now be very alert, very careful, but at the same time very united and strong. We must speak clearly and decisively, we must act to be active because any tolerance, any generosity on our part will be perceived by the northeastern autocrats, the northeast of our country is Serbia, our neighboring country which does not recognize us, the northeast of the European continent, the European Union is Russia, which also fights the European Union, so there is a similarity between the relationship between Kosovo and Serbia and the European Union and the Russian Federation.

So, these are the reasons why the hybrid war has its origin in Serbia, and I would also have emphasized on this occasion the historical aspect, since in 1999, when we were liberated, on June 9, the Kumanova Agreement was signed, where the Serbian general Svetozar Marjanović signed the capitulation to the British general Michael Jackson, and on June 10 is Resolution 1244, on June 12 NATO troops had to come to Kosovo, on June 20 the last Serbian soldier should leave. But on the evening of June 11, a young Russian officer named Yunus-bek Yevkurov, who came from North Ossetia and had participated in wars in South Ossetia or Asia, later will participate in Chechnya, this is him which brings 206 Russian soldiers from Bosnia and Herzegovina, with 30 armored vehicles, through “Mother Teresa” road here in Pristina and they go to Pristina Airport to arrive before NATO enters and from there it was almost a confrontation between the British NATO troops on one side and the Russian troops under the leadership of Yunus-bek Yevkurov on the other side where the compromise that was reached was that Russia would not have an operational area in Kosovo like Germany was based in Prizren , Italy based in Peja, the United States of America, Ferizaj and Gjilan, Prishtina, Great Britain, meanwhile, Mitrovica, France, so as these countries had operational areas that covered them, Russia retreated, it would not have one, but the number of its soldiers increases to 650. In 2003, during the Albanian protests, the last Russian soldiers were expelled.

Why did I mention this case, I mentioned this case because two months later Putin comes to power in Moscow, in August 1999.

On June 17, 2001 I was in prison, in Cuprija, Serbia, when I saw that Putin has visited Pristina International Airport and met Russian soldiers and recently on December 8, 2021, which is two and a half months before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Yunus-bek Yevkurov was appointed as number two in the Russian army. Sergei Shoigu, Minister of Defense, responsible for the strategy, while Yunus-bek Yevkurov number two for the operation. So, Putin is obsessed with Kosovo, and he has a lot to do with 1999 and NATO’s intervention. He is extremely indignant that Kosovo is an example of the success of NATO intervention, of democratic state building and economic development, while he is very happy that the Western intervention in Afghanistan and Iraq was not so successful. And here Kosovo makes a big contrast, so he would like Kosovo to fail like Iraq and Afghanistan. However, Kosovo is an independent and increasingly powerful sovereign state which does not retreat or submit to Serbia as a client regime of Moscow and the Kremlin.

The Geopost: Mr. Prime Minister, let’s go back to the daily events in the north, The Geopost team has identified the writings, the Z symbols on the police and KFOR cars, yesterday we had the opportunity that journalists from Russia Today Balkans were also present in the north, some media have also presented some members of the Wagner group. On the other hand, KFOR, the KFOR commander denies the presence of Wagner in the north of Kosovo. What is the official part of all this?

KURTI: It is clear to me that Russia is interested in the destabilization of the Balkans and for this it uses Serbia. But on the other hand, Serbia is also ready to constantly harass its neighbors, sometimes Bosnia and Herzegovina, sometimes Montenegro and sometimes Kosovo, because only in this way can it avoid attention from the internal crisis it has, because no nation can stay long without freedom.

Citizens in Serbia are not free because Serbia is not a democratic country, even Freedom House says it is a hybrid regime. In my opinion, it is pure autocracy, therefore the crisis in which the autocracy is, because the peoples and the citizens want to be free, of course it will be possible to alleviate some by causing problems in the neighborhood.

Now, the fact that it says it should cause problems, we should not give in just so they don’t cause problems. If they want to cause problems, we must resist their tendency, but not on the condition of our submission. In this aspect, there is no doubt that both the Night Wolves and the Wagner’s have been in the Balkan region, they are in Serbia and we have data that they were in the north of Kosovo during the month of December and now we are also collecting the data on their eventual impact in the attacks on May 26 and 29 against our police, NATO soldiers and journalists. It is generally about people who, not only are criminals who have committed crimes, but openly say that they would commit crimes again. Specifically, one of the slogans chanted on May 26 was “Kill, kill”.

These are not peaceful protests, burning police cars, shouting “Kill, kill” with gangs orchestrated from Belgrade who are paid from there and receive their directives from there, these are not peaceful protesters. Therefore, these people, these extremists, 5 of them are in prison, while we have also identified 13 of them with certainty that they are such people in whom the Kremlin sees its chance, since it is about the ideology of the Serbian national-chauvinist extreme right, which worships both Milosevic and Putin. So, this adoration of Milosevic and Putin as an ideology, as figures of their ideology, is of course very tempting for genocidal terrorist paramilitary groups like Wagner. What we have seen in Zvecan, it is a kind of fascist militia which also had Serbs who are policemen in Serbia and have come to make a mess in Kosovo.

There are three categories of citizens in these violent riots, the first category is the “Civil defense” which also includes policemen from Serbia, elements of the Russian gendarmerie, who are fans of Russia, and so on. The second category is public administration workers who are forced to go to the so-called protests because otherwise they lose their jobs. The third category is the workers in the private companies of some of the smugglers, the main criminals such as Milan Radojcic and Zvonko Veselinovic, who are forced to go to the square in front of the municipality and be violent, meanwhile, at their place of work in private companies of these multimillionaire criminals, they are registered as they have taken days off. These are the three main categories. Now, some citizens may have come as individuals, but the rates make it a negligible minority.

It is these three categories that are making these riots and they are making these riots because they see that Kosovo is a sovereign state, that Kosovo has professional police, that we are a democratic country that is developing, while they want the division of Kosovo, they want it the fragmentation of Kosovo, this is their clear intention, territorial exchange was the name for the division of Kosovo, which would also entice some Albanians to join it. Those from this failed project have not given up in the form of an idea. But this idea, to come to expression, can only be done through violence.

Once it was able to express itself through talks, for territorial exchange and division of Kosovo, today this idea can only be expressed through violence and we are seeing this and we must repel this and for this we need the help of our international partners and friends, the United States of America, the European Union, NATO, the Kingdom of United and so on.

We will make it, we will be successful and I am very optimistic about this, but we must be together, strong, steadfast because the situation has never been clearer, because nothing more and nothing less is needed than the rule of law and constitutionality in about 1/6 of the territory of Kosovo that is above the Ibër River.

Prime Minister, let’s finally stop at the European Union and the United States of America here. The citizens of Kosovo have probably seen a disagreement with them these days. Kosovo is a pro-European and pro-American state, does the prime minister of Kosovo guarantee the citizens that these relations will develop in the best way?

KURTI: I am in constant communication with the QUINT ambassadors in Kosovo, and of course, when the electoral process was known, which we had postponed for four months in the four municipalities in the north, when the result was known, when the oath was known, we had no other choice except for the mayors to start work at their place of work. If the mayors were to start work in private houses, this would be a reinforcement of illegal parallel structures. We cannot make parallel structures to parallel structures. So we were in a difficult situation, where we didn’t have an ideal solution, but nevertheless I think we did well and we are very grateful for all the help and support that they have given us and are giving us. Sometimes there may be some difference in approach, sometimes there may be some difference in tactical elements, let’s say, of the operations that we conduct, and in terms of values, goals, interests, beliefs, visions, we have absolutely no difference with the United States of America and the European Union. /The Geopost/