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Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic denied his son had anything to do with a deadly armed attack on police in neighboring Kosovo last month that caused European shock waves, after Kosovar authorities cited documents found at the scene belonging to a close acquaintance of 25-year-old Danilo Vucic.
Kosovo police are still investigating what they describe as a “terrorist” operation with alleged Serbian support involving around 30 heavily armed gunmen at the Banjska monastery in a mostly Serb-populated northern municipality on September 24.
But Kosovar Interior Minister Xhelal Svecla on October 8 made public identity documents of a Serb he described as one of the younger Vucic’s “closest associates” and said investigators are looking for a possible link between Danilo Vucic and the attack.
One ethnic Albanian policeman died and another was injured before three Serb suspects were killed in the siege and firefight before many of the assailants reportedly escaped into the rugged terrain around Banjska.
Milan Radoicic, a Belgrade ally whose Serbian List is Kosovo’s main ethnic-Serb party, has admitted to organizing and taking part in the incident after spending two days in Serbian custody earlier this month. Kosovar police had shown images of him heavily armed among the monastery assailants along with identity documents from the scene. He is still thought to be in Serbia.
Svecla has shown documents found at the scene belonging to Milorad Jevtic, whom he described as “one of the closest associates of Danilo Vucic, son of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic.” He said the documents proved Jevtic “was in the unit that attacked Kosovo police.”
Svecla said Jevtic had accompanied the Serbian president’s son on four of his last five visits to Kosovo.
“It remains for security authorities and investigations to discover whether aside from Vucic and senior Serbian state structures, his son was also involved in the planning and organization of the terrorist attack in Banjska,” Svecla said.
President Vucic parried any suggestion of his son’s involvement and lashed out at Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti by name, suggesting he was “a coward” for “targeting” Vucic’s family.
“Danilo, of course, has nothing to do with anything, except that he loves Serbia and Kosovo and Metohija as its part, in accordance with the UN Charter,” the Serbian president said on social media alongside a photo of himself with his son.
Serbia rejects sovereignty for its former province, which it calls Kosovo and Metohija, since Pristina declared independence in 2008 in a move now recognized by more than 100 countries.
Danilo Vucic has been photographed alongside ultranationalist Serbs accused of ties to organized crime, prompting President Vucic to defend his son and lash out at media for intruding on his family.
In July, Serbia’s defense minister accused Kosovar authorities of trying “to humiliate” the younger Vucic at gunpoint after stopping his vehicle on the way to a commemoration days earlier of the epic 14th-century Battle of Kosovo, a source of Serb national pride.
In his post, President Vucic mentioned the June incident and went on to accuse Kurti of also “insulting” his daughter.
He repeated an accusation he leveled soon after the September 24 incident, saying Kurti and his government’s policies were “killing and terrorizing the Serbian people.”
Kurti, Svecla, and Kosovar President Vjosa Osmani have all alleged official Serbian involvement in the Banjska attack — a charge Vucic has vehemently denied.
As fears skyrocketed of a sharp escalation between the tense Balkan neighbors, Western officials earlier this month welcomed Serbia’s pledge to reduce its military presence near the border but also reinforced NATO’s KFOR peacekeeping mission in Kosovo.
Dozens of KFOR troops were injured in violence that accompanied Serb protests in Zvecan against the Kurti government’s attempt in late May to forcibly install ethnic Albanian mayors after elections in mostly Serb areas that were boycotted by all but about 4 percent of locals.
Sveclja said on October 8 that Jevtic was also among those who committed violence in May, unrest that prompted Pristina to outlaw two informal Serb groupings known as Northern Brigade and Civil Defense.
EU-mediated talks to normalize Serbia-Kosovo relations have foundered for more than a decade, and Vucic and Kurti have seemingly dug in further since EU officials touted as a breakthrough oral commitments each purportedly made in February.
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