r/europe • u/MarktpLatz Lower Saxony (Germany) • Aug 28 '17

What do you know about... Kosovo?

This is the thirty-second part of our ongoing series about the countries of Europe. You can find an overview here.

Today's country:

Kosovo

Kosovo is a partially recognized state in the balkan. It belonged to the Ottoman empire from the 15th until the beginning of the 20th century. After being part of Yugoslavia for most of the 20th century, Kosovo unilaterally declared independence in 2008. It has been recognized as a country by 111 nations, but Serbia refuses to recognize it as a souverign state. Notable european countries refusing to recognize Kosovo include Spain (because of separatist movements in Spain), Greece and Russia (there are several more, you can check the list linked).

So, what do you know about Kosovo?

Major thanks to /u/our_best_friend, who took care of these threads during my absence.

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31

u/[deleted] Aug 28 '17 edited Nov 22 '19

[deleted]

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u/ectoban Europe Aug 29 '17

I'm guessing that you haven't been to Kosovo since the war. I don't know what the media tells you in Serbia, but there's been quite alot of change in Kosovo since the war. sure as hell isn't comparable to Afghanistan.

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u/[deleted] Aug 29 '17

I've been only in passing. There is really no reason for me to go there, everybody is leaving actually.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '17

"Mitrovica is somewhat resembling civilization"

You've never been to Kosovo.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '17

I sure was. Maybe my standards for civilization are too low.

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u/Linquista Kosovo Aug 28 '17

Mitrovica is somewhat resembling civilization

Because of the Serbs? You people really are a beacon of civilization

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u/[deleted] Aug 28 '17

mitrovica used to be one of the richest parts of Kosovo, due to this

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u/bureX Serbia Aug 29 '17

I haven't met a Serb, Croat, Hungarian or anybody else who has said nice things about serving their military duty in Kosovo (or western Macedonia) during Yugoslavia.

I didn't ask questions, but I did hear stuff like "unwelcome", "trash" and nasty things said about the behavior of the local populace. Can't pinpoint what was their major issue, but maybe somebody else can shine a bit of light on this.

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u/[deleted] Aug 29 '17 edited Aug 29 '17

When I was first deployed, before the breakup of Yugoslavia, we were tasked with helping the Interior Ministry deal with the huge drug and weapons smuggling problems. As such, we went on patrols trough the hellhole, mostly along the Albanian border.

The problem in rural Kosovo is that these people aren't doing anything save for goat herding or something. So, they aren't just harboring these smugglers, but these people are actually their champions. It's not the doctors, lawyers, engineers that have the highest social status and the respect of their peers, it's the smugglers and other criminals. Their carrier reaches apex if they're recruited by a crime organization abroad, families of people "working" abroad for somebody important are the most influential.

This is evidenced at highest levels of their government right now, where ex criminals are actually the leaders of their country.

Blood feuds are a thing there. When somebody wrongs you, it is up to your family/clan to take revenge, absolutely no law enforcement involved. Families are large, and innocent people regularly get hurt. Think gang wars mixed with some medieval honor shit.

Domestic and sexual violence is rampant, both against women and children. Hell, I've seen even too much animal abuse there. One squad from my unit actually intervened in an incident where a was molesting a women, which led to pretty much the entire village turning against them, and one soldier ended up being stabbed pretty badly, with the rest barely escaping.

Naturally, they saw as as a hostile force that is only there to keep them down, arrest and kill their children. I don't think they even have a particular aversion to us being Serbs or Christians or anything. They simply had a problem with us being there to enforce the laws.

That's what they wanted to achieve with their insurgency in the first place. The most powerful criminals got together and started an insurgency because they understood, or were promised, that they can have a chunk of territory for themselves to do whatever they fuck they want.

It was such a shocking experience for me. There is nothing like that in other rural parts of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Slovenia, anywhere. Yet, you go 300 km South from Belgrade, and holy shit.

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u/getinthezone Aug 29 '17

Maybe if Yugoslavia invested in it and didn't see Albanians as second class citizens, it wouldn't be such a mess now.

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u/petardik Slovenia Aug 30 '17

LOL. Yugoslavia gave them everything for free. What else could they demand ? You can't get respect if you act like animal.

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u/York_Villain Aug 30 '17

Yeah! They even had their police beat my relatives for free.

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u/Illyrian22 Albania Sep 01 '17

Blood feuds are a thing there. When somebody wrongs you, it is up to your family/clan to take revenge, absolutely no law enforcement involved.

That was the case from much of Northern Albania tbh those laws derive from Kanuni which were written by a catholic nobleman Leke Dukagjni in the time of Skanderbeg. These laws were used so people wouldnt have to use the ones from the Ottoman invaders , they were largely practiced by catholics and muslims in northern parts of Albania and parts of Kosovo. While they made sense in medieval times they clearly have nothing with modern society obviously barbaric backwards laws. Im surprised that was allowed to be practiced in Yugoslavia under the commies in Albania it wasnt even the most rural villages didnt dare to do blood feuds

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u/[deleted] Aug 29 '17

From the Albanian viewpoint the JNA was a "foreign" army that they could not identify with it. I wouldn't say it was viewed as an occupation army but it was not welcome. Also I've met plenty of Albanians who spoke very negatively of their time in JNA and that there was animosity between Albanians and non-Albanians (Mostly Macedonians. Serbs, and Montenegrins).

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u/Linquista Kosovo Aug 29 '17

Serb? Croatian? Hmmmm...

I meet Germans, Hungarians, Americans and Italians regularly. Just a few days ago when I was rock climbing I net these Germans who had a good impression. Same with the others.

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u/[deleted] Aug 29 '17

[deleted]

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u/Linquista Kosovo Aug 29 '17

Idk about that but I often see cars with Macedonian plates and never hear anything happening to them. I have no idea why that would happen.

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u/[deleted] Aug 28 '17

I guess the Serbian population plays a part in it.

It's not that those cities are actually great, it's that everything else is Afghanistan to me.