VUČIĆ WRITES TO RUTTE, CALLS FOR PERSECUTION OF SERBS TO STOP AND IBAR BRIDGE OPENING TO BE HALTED

BELGRADE, AUGUST 20 /SRNA/ - Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić said he had sent a letter to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte calling on KFOR, in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 1244, to put an end to the terror against Serbs and to prevent the opening of the bridge over the Ibar River in Kosovska Mitrovica, and called on the international community to take steps to ensure that Priština implements the key provisions of the Brussels Agreement.

Vučić pointed out that the Serbian people in Kosovo and Metohija had been subjected to continuous persecution for the past five years, while the international community, including the EU, NATO, and everyone else, had remained silent. In a video posted on Instagram, he recalled that more than 800 ethnically motivated attacks against the Serbian population had been recorded over the past five years, and that during the same period 257 Serbs had been arrested. He said they were innocent, but had been beaten, mistreated, and terrorized by the so-called police forces of the so-called state of Kosovo. Vučić said that Serbian Armed Forces Chief of the General Staff General Milan Mojsilović had recently had a very difficult and unpleasant conversation with KFOR Commander Özkan Ulutaş. "We asked them not to open the bridge over the Ibar because it has always been a subject of dialogue. There was never any agreement. None of this would have happened if the West had respected what it signed in April 2013. Because they failed to respect it, because the Community of Serb Municipalities was not established and because the rights of Serbs were not respected, all these things are happening today," Vučić said. For this reason, Vučić said, he sent a letter to Rutte asking NATO to withdraw its support for the decision by the Priština authorities to open the bridge over the Ibar to traffic. "I believe he will judge that regional peace and stability are of great importance. We will continue our political struggle by every possible means. I do not rule out the possibility of convening a special session of the UN Security Council on Kosovo and Metohija, because the terror inflicted by Albin Kurti and Priština on the Serbian population must stop," Vučić said.