Prime Minister Albin Kurti has accused a criminal gang from northern Serbia with government ties of being behind a deadly attack at an Orthodox monastery in Kosovo in remarks Belgrade quickly rejected as "blatant lies."
Kurti accused Serbian Defense Minister Milos Vucevic of heading the gang, which he called the "Novi Sad clan" after the Serbian city of Novi Sad, of which Vucevic was mayor from 2012 to 2022.
Tensions between Belgrade and Pristina have spiked since September 24, when some 30 armed Serbs stormed the village of Banjska in Kosovo's predominantly ethnic Serbian north and barricaded themselves in a Serbian Orthodox monastery.
Police recaptured the monastery after a shoot-out in which three attackers and a Kosovar police officer were killed.
The clashes were among the worst since Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008. They came as the European Union and United States were trying to mediate and finalize years-long talks on normalizing ties between the two Balkan states.
"The paramilitary and terrorist attack in Banjska in Zvecan [municipality] was organized by the Clan of Novi Sad. It is headed by the minister of defense of Serbia, Milos Vucevic," Kurti wrote on Facebook, where he also compared Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic to a mafia boss.
Kurti offered no evidence to back up his claims and did not elaborate.
Serbia has denied any role in the attack and the Defense Ministry in Belgrade immediately rejected Kurti's claims, calling them "heinous and blatant lies," and appealed to the international community to act to stop the "incendiary and dirty" campaign by Kosovo's leadership.
Serbia and its former province of Kosovo have been at odds for decades. Their 1998-99 war left more than 10,000 people dead. In 2008 Kosovo declared independence, which Belgrade doesn't recognize.
Both Serbia and Kosovo hope to join the European Union but their difficult relations have disrupted progress toward accession. Brussels has make normalizing ties a condition for moving forward with their membership bids.
The leaders of the bloc's 27 members are expected to express "concern" about the security situation in northern Kosovo at their summit on October 26-27, according to the draft conclusions of the summit, seen by RFE/RL's Balkan Service.
The document, which is not final and is yet to be approved by EU leaders, will condemn the attack in Banjska and will call for the perpetrators to be brought to justice and for Serbia to "fully cooperate."
Kosovo has accused Serbia of orchestrating the September 24 "act of aggression" and claims that Belgrade intended to annex northern Kosovo after the attack.
Serbia has denied the allegations and said it suspected an ethnic Serb leader from Kosovo, Milan Radoicic, was responsible for the clashes.
Radoicic has admitted to organizing and participating in the events that sparked clashes with Kosovar police and was briefly detained, questioned, and released in Serbia earlier this month.
EU and U.S. envoys visited Kosovo and Serbia on October 21, urging the sides to resume dialogue on normalizing relations before the bitter tensions result in more violence.
The EU put forward a 10-point plan in February to end months of political crises between the two sides. Kurti and Vucic gave their approval at the time but expressed reservations, which have not been resolved since.
Kosovo has called on Europe to place sanctions on Serbia, which it blames for the September 24 attack, saying no further talks could be held and demanding higher security measures from Western powers for fear of an increased presence of Serbian military forces along its border.
Amid the heightened tensions, NATO has reinforced KFOR, which normally has a troop strength of 4,500, with an additional 200 troops from Britain and more than 100 from Romania.