Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, announced that he has postponed fines for vehicles with Serbian license plates for another 48 hours.
An agreement could not be reached in the meetings of the leaders of Kosovo and Serbia, mediated by the European Union (EU), in Brussels, the capital of Belgium, yesterday. US Ambassador to Kosovo Jeff Hovenier demanded that Kosovo delay the imposition of fines on vehicles with Serbian license plates due to failure to reach an agreement. Prime Minister Albin Kurti, who declared that he accepted Hovenier’s request for a 48-hour delay, said that he was ready to work with the EU and the USA to solve the problem within the next 2 days.
Serbia DOESN’T ACCEPT IMPLEMENTATION
Kosovo administration, in response to Serbia’s practices towards Kosovo citizens, decided to ban the vehicles with Serbian license plates from entering the traffic within the framework of reciprocity principles and started to warn the drivers of these vehicles as of November 1st. Kosovo announced that disputed license plate holders will be fined 150 euros from November 21 until January 21, 2023, test plates will be issued between January 21 and April 21, 2023, and vehicles whose license plates have not changed will be completely banned from traffic as of April 21, 2023.
Kosovo Serb parties, supported by Serbia, on the other hand, do not accept the decisions of the Kosovo administration regarding Serbian identity cards and plates, as they continue to see Kosovo, which declared its independence unilaterally in 2008, as a region under Serbia.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, in his address to the nation last night, defined the 150 euro fine to be imposed by the Kosovo administration on vehicles with Serbian license plates as “extortion” and said that Serbs have no obligation to pay this fine.
