NATO to deploy more forces to Kosovo

31/05/2023

The NATO soldiers wearing full riot gear are standing in front of the municipal building in Zvecan, northern Kosovo on May 30, 2023, a day following clashes with Serb protesters demanding the removal of recently elected Albanian mayors. The situation in northern Kosovo remained tense on May 30, 2023, as ethnic Serbs continued to gather in front of a town hall in Zvecan after violent clashes with NATO-led peacekeepers left 30 soldiers injured. (Photo by AFP)

NATO soldiers and International military police secure the area near Zvecan, northern Kosovo on May 30, 2023, a day following clashes with Serb protesters demanding the removal of recently elected Albanian mayors. The situation in northern Kosovo remained tense on May 30, 2023, as ethnic Serbs continued to gather in front of a town hall in Zvecan after violent clashes with NATO-led peacekeepers left 30 soldiers injured. (Photo by Armend NIMANI / AFP)

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DPA

Brussels

NATO is to deploy additional forces to Kosovo after 30 members of its KFOR unit were injured in violent clashes, the Western defence alliance announced on Twitter.

According to military sources in Brussels, a contingent of about 700 soldiers is to be sent to the Balkan country. Currently about 3,800 troops of the NATO-led protection force KFOR are stationed in Kosovo.

The deployment “is a prudent measure to ensure that KFOR has the capabilities it needs to maintain security,” said Admiral Stuart B. Munsch, the commander of NATO’s Allied Joint Force Command in Naples, Italy.

“The violence must stop, and all sides must stop taking actions to undermine the peace in any and all communities of Kosovo,” Munsch added.

Eleven Italian and 19 Hungarian KFOR soldiers were injured on Monday in violent clashes with Serb militants in northern Kosovo.

“Such attacks are totally unacceptable” the alliance’s Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoana said in Brussels, adding that the “violence must stop immediately.”

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31/05/2023