Kosovo police seize plates, harass journalist

16 January 2011 | 16:43 | Source: B92, Tanjug

GRAČANICA -- Kosovo police (KPS) has continued to seize new Serbian license plates which have Kosovo cities' letters inscribed on them. (Beta, file) Citizens of north Kosovska Mitrovica so far use the new Serbian license plates, while it is impossible to drive vehicles with Serbian plates south of the Ibar River. Kosovo police harassed Saturday at the Končulj administrative border crossing near Bujanovac journalist and member of the Republic Broadcasting Agency (RRA) Živojin Rakočević over new license plates issued by the Serbian Interior Ministry and bearing the letters of the southern Serbian town of Vranje. Rakočević and his family were subjected to humiliation and insults over the new plates, which a KPS officer confiscated and later gave back. He told KiM Radio that he had entered Kosovo on January 4 with the new plates, and that he was leaving the province when police had stopped him for a regular inspection at the administrative crossing. “A policeman come out and immediately started removing the plates without warning. He threw them into the room he had come out from and told me that driving with these plates was forbidden. It was clear he was annoyed by the plates and an officer named Hoti told me ten times that these plates could not be used in the state of Kosovo,” he said. Kosovo Serbs choose to register their vehicles in nearby Vranje and Novi Pazar in southwestern Serbia for safety reasons, because these towns are not perceived as hostile in Kosovo.