As announced on Friday, the Kosovo police will start implementing the first phase of the decision on license plates on Tuesday, November 1st. Starting today, they will first issue warnings to all owners of vehicles with Serbian, for the Kosovo authorities, "illegal" license plates with a mark. Along with the warning, Serbs from the north will also receive a request to contact one of the vehicle registration centers in order to replace their license plates with new "RKS" (Republic of Kosovo) letters.
At the administrative crossing of Jarinje, the Kosovo police handed out the first warning to a driver with a vehicle registered on KM plates a few minutes after midnight, reports RTS. Guidelines for re-registration on RKS plates are listed on the notice.
The Minister of Internal Affairs of Kosovo, Dzheljaj Svećlja, once again called on citizens who have plates "PR", "KM", "GL", "UR", "PE", "DA" and "ĐA" to re-register them and "successfully complete this process which directly contributes to public safety, traffic safety and the restoration of law and order". He "encouraged" citizens not to remain "hostages of political interests and criminal groups".
Although Svećljija announced what the reprimand for drivers with Serbian license plates would look like, it remained unclear who would enforce these warnings and subsequent fines.
Three phases
Regardless of the demands of the EU and the USA to extend the implementation of the decision on "RKS" plates for another ten months, the Kosovo Government definitely refused it on Friday. Instead of delaying, the authorities in Pristina decided to implement the decision in three phases.
This means that owners of vehicles with "illegal" plates, i.e. Serbs from Kosovo, until November 21, will receive warnings to re-register their vehicles with RKS (Republic of Kosovo) plates, from November 21 they will be fined 150 euros, and from April 21, 2023, drivers who do not have license plates as prescribed by the Kosovo authorities will have their vehicles be taken away.
As reported by the Kosovo media, before the start of the implementation of the first phase, the Special Unit of the Kosovo Police was stationed on the bridge between the northern and southern parts of Mitrovica. It is still not clear if this is a regular "mobile police patrol" or if the unit has something to do with the start of the license plate decision.
The Serbian List announced on Friday that Aljbin Kurti's decision to punish Serbs who possess "legal and legitimate number plates" will be the reason for "a fierce response and resistance from the Serbian people". They say that they are aware of the "true" intentions of Aljbin Kurti, which is "the continuation of the program of the Serbs".
From the Serbian List they say: "All those who think that our people will silently observe the disenfranchisement, the abolition of KM plates, i.e. freedom of movement and jeopardizing our survival, they are grossly mistaken".
SP/KoSSev
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