Serbia, Albania and Kosovo advance security co-operation

Serbia, Albania and Kosovo advance security co-operation

The countries make incremental steps to improving relations.

The Brussels agreement between Belgrade and Pristina has led to improvements in security since being implemented a little more than a year ago, but experts said it also provides opportunities to address outstanding security-related challenges.

The Serbian government gave Pristina a list of 337 policemen to work in Serb-dominated northern Kosovo, as stipulated in the agreement, and nearly 300 of them have been hired.

"Additional training for those policemen is conducted at the Kosovo Academy for Public Security, and then they are sent to work in the municipalities where they live," Maja Belos, researcher at the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy, told SETimes.

Another 800 other Serb policemen living outside northern Kosovo cannot be integrated into the Kosovo police, officials said.

Those who were integrated still work with lower ranks than what they had in the Serbian police, said Slavisa Arsenijevic, head of the Kosovo and Metohia department at the Serbia Internal Affairs Ministry.

"That is why colonels and captains patrol the streets. Moreover, payment of salaries is conditioned on obtaining a Kosovo identification card that is not quickly obtainable," Arsenijevic told SETimes.

Arsenijevic said not including Kosovo in regional initiatives against organised crime presents a security challenge. Moreover, the Serbia and Kosovo police forces co-operate indirectly through UNMIK, and there is no Belgrade-Pristina agreement for extradition.

"Still, contacts between the two police forces do exist, but they need to be made official through an agreement and establish...