Crisis Chronology

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SERBIA

12/25/2023

Police fire tear gas at protestors demanding the annulment of the election because of widespread fraud.

12/17/2023

Government reelected

Parliamentary elections. President Alexander Vucic announces that his populist Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) will win a majority, with 127 seats. The Socialist Party (SPS) loses half its previous strength. Serbia Against Violence (SPN), the main opposition group, does poorly, but its supporters, demand that their leaders fight back against alleged electoral fraud, some of which seem blatant. Opposition leader of the Green-Left Front objects to some voting irregularities. The election commission later announced that the SNS had won nearly 47 percent of the votes. The center-left SPN received 23.56 percent of the vote, followed by the Socialist Party of Serbia with 6.56 percent.

11/02/2023

Government calls snap elections for 12/17. The government has been criticized for its response to two mass shootings in 5/23, taken as evidence of a culture of violence.

02/28/2023

Serbia and Kosovo sign agreement to normalize their relations. The details are not yet clear and the agreement not yet signed. However, it does call for Serbia to acknowledge Kosovo’s official documents such as passports and license plates and not block Kosovo’s membership in international organizations. It does not have to recognize Kosovo as an independent country. Kosovo will “ensure an appropriate level of self-management” for its Serbian community.

12/30/2022

Serbs in northern Kosovo agree to dismantle barricades on roads after talks with President Vucic, who warns that tensions remain high.

12/26/2022

Kosovo closes two border crossings to Serbia.

12/25/2022

Increasing tension in northern Kosovo.

12/14/2022

Kosovo formally requests to become a member of the EU. Serbia objects and says it will ask the five member nations that do not yet recognize Kosovo to vote against the request.

11/24/2022

Serbia and Kosovo reach agreement brokered by the EU on license plates. Serbia will cease issuing license plates with markings indicating Kosovo cities, and Kosovo “will cease further actions related to re-registration of vehicles,” according to the EU.

11/01/2022

Kosovo insists that ethnic-Serb residents must surrender their Serbian-issued car license plates by 11/21 or be fined.

08/27/2022

Kosovo and Serbia sign freedom of movement agreement between the two countries.

06/28/2022

Albania, Bosnia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia frustrated at EU failure to allow them to proceed with their applications after many years of waiting.

06/06/2022

Putin warns of attacks on new targets if Ukraine receives advanced weaponry from the West. Foreign Minister Lavrov’s visit to Serbia is thwarted as surrounding nations refuse Russia passage through their airspace.

04/03/2022

Vucic reelected

In presidential voting today, Vucic is on track to win an outright majority of nearly 60%. Zdravko Ponos, a retired army general representing the pro-European and centrist Alliance for Victory coalition, is a distant second.

01/05/2022

US sanctions Serb leader Milorad Dodik, accusing him of undermining the stability of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

10/12/2021

Serbia increasingly militaristic in regard to the Serbian communities in neighboring states of Montenegro, Bosnia, and Albania.

09/27/2021

Hungary signs natural gas deal with Russia, to be supplied through Serbia and Austria, which will deprive Ukraine of substantial income from transit payments.

09/26/2021

Serbian troops on a heightened state of alert on the Kosovo border after Serbia accuses Kosovo of “provocations” by sending special police units to the border. Kosovo denies this.

09/04/2020

Serbia and Kosovo normalize economic ties in a ceremony in the US. Israel and Kosovo also mutually recognize each other as part of the agreement and Serbia will move its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem.

07/11/2020

Substantial protests for the fifth night against the government’s response to COVID-19 pandemic. Serbia has about 18,000 cases and 400 deaths. The protests began against the restrictive economic measures but evolved into anti-government protests.

07/06/2020

Talks between Kosovo and Serbia over tariffs resume.

06/25/2020

Kosovo PM Hoti cancels his trip to the United States to meet with Serbian representatives.

06/24/2020

Kosovo Pres Thaçi and nine other separatist fighters are indicted by the EU Special Prosecutor’s Office for war crimes and crimes against humanity during the Kosovo war.

06/21/2020

Ruling party gains in parliament

Ruling Progressive Pary (SNS) set to win large majority in parliament, perhaps as much as sixty percent, which would give it a supermajority in parliament and ease the prospects for an agreement with Kosovo. The opposition boycotted the voting as a risk to public health in the COVID-19 pandemic. Serbia has nearly 13000 cases and about 260 deaths.

04/05/2020

Kurti and Thaci blame each other for lack of response to COVID-19 after a new outbreak in northern Kosovo. Much of the area there is de facto controlled by Serbia and hospitals have been sending COVID-19 test results to Serbia rather than Kosovo. Thaci criticizes Kurti for not controlling the north and Kurti says he knows the situation and is reporting to the UN peacekeeping force, KFOR.

04/01/2020

Kosovo lifts all tariffs on Serbian and Bosnia-Herzegovian goods, a gesture toward reconciliation. The tariffs had been imposed when Serbia tried to block Kosovar access to international organizations in 2018. However, soon after, Kosovo demands new quality controls on Serbian goods entering Kosovo, which some, including the US, consider to be a smokescreen for maintaining the standoff with Serbia.

11/16/2019

Pres Vucic hospitalized with a heart attack.

04/13/2019

Protests against Vucic continue.

04/10/2019

Main Serbian Party, Srpska Lista says it will participate in northern elections, if only to prevent Albanians from winning. Srpska Lista leaders say that the destabilization of the Serb-dominated north is a goal of a secret agreement between Thaci and Serbia Pres Vucic, aimed at showing they have power in the region. They also call for protection for candidates because many politicians have been assassinated in Kosovo in recent years.

04/08/2019

Pres Thaci calls elections in northern municipalities, where Serbs are a majority. Mayors of four northern towns resigned in 11/18 to protest the imposition of tariffs on Serbian imports.

01/05/2019

Fifth week of protests against Vucic, who has said he would meet with the leaders of the protest.

11/17/2018

Mayors of four northern cities, all members of Srpska Lista, resign to protest imposition of 100% tariffs on Serbian imports. Similar tariffs were imposed on imports from Bosnia.

08/08/2018

Thaci says an agreement with Serbia might be reached in which several communities in southern Serbia might become part of Kosovo in what he calls a “border adjustment.”

08/01/2018

Kosovo Pres Thaci rules out any division of Kosovo.

07/26/2018

Vucic suggests that northern Kosovo, populated mainly by Serbs, be given to Serbia, and a southern Serbian town, Presevo, populated mainly by Albanians, be given to Kosovo.

07/18/2018

EU-brokered talks between Serbia and Kosovo on normalizing relations end without progress. Further talks will be held.

06/05/2018

Diplomat Zoran Lutovac, elected to head the Democratic Party, calls on the opposition to unite to help the country. He says he is open to discussions with the new opposition bloc Alliance for Serbia. Dragan Djilas, head of the alliance, says he expects to meet with Lutovac soon. The Democratic Party has been steadily losing ground to Vucic and his conservative Progressive Party.

01/16/2018

Key Kosovar Serb politician, Oliver Ivanocič is killed in Kosovo on the day that negotiators from Kosovo and Serbia are to meet to continue technical talks in Brussels. Ivanocič was born in the Kosovo region when it was part of Yugoslavia, and has been at odds both with Kosovo officials and Serbian ones. He was convicted of war crimes by EU judges but the conviction was overturned by an appeals court in Kosovo. Both governments condemn the killing.

11/20/2017

Serbian economy “overperforming,” says IMF, and government plans salary increases for state workers and pensioners.