Witness: Serbia arrests three policemen from Kosovo and Pristina, accusing it of kidnapping them

Serbia announced on Wednesday the arrest of three Kosovo policemen suspected of crossing the border, while Pristina accused Belgrade of kidnapping them on its soil.

This incident is the latest in the tense relations between the two parties after weeks of escalation in northern Kosovo, where thirty members of the NATO force were wounded at the end of May during clashes with Serb demonstrators.

Serbia, with the support of its Russian and Chinese allies, did not recognize the independence declared by its former province in 2008 after a decade of bloody war between Serbian forces and Albanian separatists.

Belgrade said it had arrested three Kosovar policemen wearing military uniforms and carrying machine guns, GPS, maps and other equipment.

The head of the Serbian Office for Kosovo Affairs, Petar Petkovic, told reporters that “the terrorist gang was arrested today at 12.38 pm in the region of Central Serbia, in the village of Nelitsa of the municipality of Rasca.”

Nielica is located about six kilometers from the border with Kosovo.

In a video released by the Serbian police, masked men are shown leading a group of handcuffed men. The Kosovo government denied Belgrade’s accusations, saying its police had been kidnapped.

The provincial police said that the elements belong to a unit responsible for border control, and they went missing after reports of masked and armed men entering the area.

Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti accused Belgrade of kidnapping the three policemen, saying that this could be an “act of revenge” after the arrest of the leader of a Serbian paramilitary group on Tuesday.

“The entry of Serb forces into the territory of Kosovo is an act of aggression and aims to escalate and destabilize,” he said on Facebook.

Kurti confirmed that the incident took place in the municipality of Leposavic, north of Kosovo, adding, “We demand the immediate release of the two kidnapped policemen.”

Tensions have escalated between Belgrade and Pristina since the inauguration of Albanian mayors in May in four towns in northern Kosovo that are majority Serb.

These city council members were elected in April during municipal elections that were boycotted by Kosovo Serbs.

Since the Kosovo War and the Declaration of Independence, relations between Belgrade and Pristina have gone through successive crises.

About 120,000 Serbs live in Kosovo, a third of them in the north, which has a total population of 1.8 million, the vast majority of whom are Kosovo Albanians.

The Serb minority remains largely loyal to Belgrade and refuses to recognize the sovereignty of Pristina, and some observers say Serbia is using Kosovo Serbs to stir up tension.