Kosovo

The Jarinje and Bernjak border crossing points in Serb-dominated northern Kosovo remained blocked on Tuesday morning after local Serbs obstructed the roads with dozens of trucks in protest against changes to border regulations for vehicles with Serbian registration plates, Kosovo media reported.

Tensions soared Monday at the border between Kosovo and Serbia as Kosovo deployed additional police to implement a rule to remove Serbian license plates from cars entering Kosovo, while Serbs protested the move, AP reports.

The authorities deployed special police units on Monday morning in Serb-majority northern Kosovo after hundreds of Serbs blocked roads near the Jarinje border crossing point and in the municipality of Zubin Potok in protest at the government's decision to make them use Kosovo vehicle licence plates instead of Serbian ones.

Youth Initiative for Human Rights in Serbia and Kosovo on Monday called on the authorities in both countries to publish the details of a deal on revealing the contents of secret wartime archives that was reportedly made during negotiations in Brussels last week.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is visiting Serbia and Albania shortly before her long-lasting mandate as head of German's government comes to an end.

The gesture is seen as giving significance to the six Western Balkan countries, although none of them managed to join the EU club during Merkel's term, which began in 2005.

Kosovo police arrested seven members of the Social Democratic Party of Kosovo, PSD, after protesters tried to disrupt an event in Pristina organised by the Kosovo Specialist Chambers, which they accuse of denigrating the Kosovo Liberation Army's wartime struggle against Serbian forces.

Albin Kurti asked Serbia on Monday to open its state archives relating to the 1998-99 war in Kosovo, arguing that "as regards missing persons, the answer lies there [in Belgrade]".

Refugees fleeing the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan were flown in to Pristina airport on Sunday evening, where they received medical check-ups before being sent onwards to the town of Ferizaj/ Urosevac.

Albania, Kosovo and North Macedonia have expressed readiness to temporarily host an undefined number of Afghans fleeing their country after Taliban forces seized control over the weekend as the United States pulled out.

Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani declared Monday a day of mourning after 10 Kosovo citizens lost their lives in a traffic accident in eastern Croatia at Slavonski Brod, on their way home from Germany to Kosovo, where thousands of diaspora members from Western countries spend their summer vacations.