US Kicks Kosovo Out of Military Drills Over Its Treatment of Ethnic Serbs

The US ambassador to Kosovo, Jeffrey Hovenier, announced Tuesday that Washington was kicking Pristina out of the US-led Defender Europe military exercises over its treatment of the ethnic Serb population of northern Kosovo.

The move was a punishment for Kosovo trying to forcibly install ethnic Albanian mayors in three Serb-majority towns. The mayors won office in elections that were boycotted by the Serbs, who have never accepted Kosovo’s independence from Serbia, which was formally declared in 2008.

When Kosovo police used force against Serb protesters on May 26, Secretary of State Antony Blinken slammed the move and blamed Pristina for the tensions, a rare rebuke from the US, one of the staunchest supporters of Kosovo’s independence. Blinken said Kosovo’s actions “will have consequences for our bilateral relations with Kosovo.”