US President Donald Trump’s administration suddenly became involved in Kosovo just as the Western Balkan country entered the final stages of the parliamentary electoral race scheduled for this Sunday.
As incumbent centre-left Prime Minister Albin Kurti wraps up his campaign to win a clear majority for his second mandate, Washington’s harsh criticism could undermine his political standing in the country.
On Friday, Kurti told the press in Pristina that “Kosovo’s relationship with Washington is currently at its best level since its beginning.”
Richard Grenell, the former US envoy for Serbia and Kosovo in Trump’s first administration, replied on X, saying Kurti’s words were “delusional”.
“Relations have never been lower. Albin Kurti has been condemned by the first Trump administration, the Biden Administration, NATO, the EU, the US embassy, Anthony Blinken,” he said.
In a previous X post early this week, Grenell labelled Kurti as an “unreliable partner for Washington”.
US change of tone ‘bewildering’
For Kosovo and its Albanian majority, relations with the US have been vital since the conflict with Belgrade in the late 1990s, followed by a 1999 NATO intervention and the key leadership of the US military forces that waged war on Slobodan Milošević’s Serbia.
In Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, one can see boulevards and monuments dedicated to the prominent figures of the Clinton administration who took the initiative to intervene against Serbia.
To be on bad terms with the US would be a political loss for a Kosovar Albanian political leader, especially while the ethnic tensions with the Serb community and Serbia are souring, and the economic crisis is provoking growing resentment against the incumbent government.
“The Trump administration’s diplomatic offensive against the outgoing prime minister sounded rather worrying in Pristina after decades of excellent relations with the US,” said Eraldin Fazliu, political editor of Kohavision or KTV news channel.
“Grenell, who now has a quite important position in the Trump administration, has had a really bullying approach to Kurti these days.”
“We have seen that he interfered in our elections by basically saying that Kurti has not been a good partner to the US,” he added.
Serbs expect positives from Trump
Unlike in Pristina, where Washington’s new Balkans diplomacy provoked political disarray, in the Serb part of Mitrovica, there are hopes for a new season of good relations between the Serbs and the Trump administration, says Aleksandar Rapajić from a Serb NGO in Mitrovica.
“We expect that the new (US) administration will bring new power, fresh blood in this process and will start to find some solutions, and not just to have meetings and discussions. So, I can say that Serb expectations from Serb community in Kosovo is very high that this is going to improve their position in Kosovo”.
Belgrade and Pristina have failed to implement the Brussels agreements concerning the normalisation of their relations.
According to the 2013 Brussels accords, Serbia should take steps towards recognising Kosovo as an independent state. In exchange, Pristina is supposed to grant the Serbs living in Kosovo the right to create an association of Serb municipalities with a certain degree of autonomy.
The US contingent and the backbone of the NATO-led peacekeeping mission in Kosovo, KFOR, is based at Camp Bondsteel.
