Kosovo’s prime minister urged the Serb minority not to boycott the country’s first elections since independence from Serbia, calling yesterday’s vote a key test for his new nation.
Some ethnic Serbs appeared to be heeding his call and participated in an election at which there was no major unrest or allegations of fraud by mid-afternoon.
Tensions between rival ethnic Albanian parties, fears of fraud and a likely boycott from the Serb minority had marred the run-up to the elections for city council and mayors in 36 municipalities across Kosovo.
The vote is the first to be fully controlled by Kosovo’s authorities and is seen as a way of proving Kosovo’s viability as a state following its contested declaration of independence from Serbia.
Previous elections were run by the United Nations. The UN took control of Kosovo from Serbia in 1999 after Nato waged an air war against Yugoslavia to prevent the Serb forces’ brutal crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists.
So far, 63 states have recognised Kosovo, including the US and most countries in the EU including Ireland. Serbia has vowed to block further recognition and has Russia’s support.
Election authorities said voter turnout by midday was slightly over 15 per cent, but gave no ethnic breakdown. Some Serb voters could be seen casting ballots in areas surrounded by majority Albanians.
Senior officials from Serbia have called on Kosovo’s Serbs not to vote and the call was reinforced by the influential Serb Orthodox Church which also runs the churches inside Kosovo.
Momcilo Trajkovic, a Serb leader and mayoral candidate in a Serb enclave just outside Pristina, cast his ballot saying the act was a sign of better times for the dwindling minority. “This vote here shows that . . . the fear . . . is loosening its grip,” he said, referring to pressure from other Serbs not to vote.