Gouillon: 81 attacks on Serbs registered in Kosovo-Metohija since Kurti's rise to power

BELGRADE - The director of the Serbian government Office for Public and Cultural Diplomacy Arnaud Gouillon said on Tuesday the Office had summarised all data on attacks on Serbs in Kosovo-Metohija in an English-language map it had sent to foreign media organisations and diplomats to give them a clearer picture of developments in Serbia's southern autonomous province.

Speaking to Pink TV, Gouillon said the map was based on information obtained from the government Office for Kosovo-Metohija.

He noted that Kosovo-Metohija Serbs had been constantly targeted by attacks since the 1990s but that the violence had intensified since Albin Kurti's rise to power as PM of the provisional institutions in Pristina.

Since that time, 81 attacks on Serbs have been registered but no one has been held responsible, Gouillon said.

"They (the attacked Serbs) are people who have been beaten up, wounded by gunshots and bomb blasts. On Christmas Eve last year, we had a case in which Stefan and Milos Stojanovic were wounded by shots from an automatic rifle. That is something that is impermissible in early 21st century in the heart of Europe. A large number of the perpetrators of that terror are members of the 'Kosovo' police forces. Almost all of them are at large and are still threatening with guns," Gouillon said.

The main problem that none of the 81 attacks have been tried and punished, he said.

"Forty-five of the 81 attacks were committed by civilians, ethnic-Albanian extremists without uniforms, while 36 were committed by extremists wearing uniforms of the so-called Kosovo police," Gouillon said, noting that this was a great disgrace to entire Europe and to all those in charge in the Autonomous Province of Kosovo-Metohija - above all, representatives of the international community who should maintain order and security for all citizens in Kosovo-Metohija.

Those are racist attacks aimed at intimidating the Kosovo-Metohija Serbs, reducing the Serbian factor in the north of the province and expelling the Serbs from their ancestral homes through a model of a silent "Operation Storm" and by creating impossible living conditions for the Serbs, he said.

"Under the Rome Statute, creating impossible living conditions falls under grave war crimes against humanity. From the international community and all those in charge in Kosovo-Metohija, we expect to see legal consequences for ethnic Albanians so that the situation on the ground can change," Gouillon said.