OSCE condemned attacks on journalists in Pristina

VIENNA - OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Dunja Mijatovic condemned on Monday the attacks on journalists reporting from the protests in Pristina last weekend.

In its release, OSCE said that on January 24, unidentified individuals attacked and abused journalist Aleksandra Jovanovic and cameraman Bojan Kosanin employed in the Radio Television of Kosovo (RTK), as well as Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) correspondent Vladimir Milic, who were reporting from the protest in Pristina.

According to media reports, the attackers attacked the journalists with sticks and stones and tried to steal their equipment.

Any mode of violence against journalists is unacceptable and needs to be treated as an attack on the society as a whole, Mijatovic said and underscored that the incident needs to be looked into as soon as possible and the attackers need to be brought to justice.

The attack on reporters in Pristina was condemned by the Journalists' Association of Serbia, the Association of Kosovo Reporters and the Journalists' Association of Kosovo-Metohija.

In Saturday's demonstrations in central Pristina, the ethnic Albanian protesters demanded the dismissal of Aleksandar Jablanovic, Kosovo's minister for return and communities, and a law converting Trepca Mines into a public enterprise that would be controlled by Pristina.