Kosovo Police Probe Threat to BIRN Team Filming Disputed Property

Kosovo Police have said they will investigate an implied death threat made to a BIRN Kosovo team on Tuesday when they were trying to film in a southern town.

"The prosecutor has been informed while police units are investigating the case," the police report on Thursday said.

Police started investigating after the case was initially closed by a prosecutor on Tuesday. Prosecutor Anton Hasanaj said he saw no elements of a criminal offence.

He also closed the case by phone without reading the statements of the journalists concerned and questioning a suspect behind the threat.

BIRN Kosovo journalist Arbisa Shefkiu and cameraman Denis Sllovinja were threatened and not allowed to film a public space in the Bekim Sylka area of the southern town of Rahovec/Orahovac.

They wanted to film the area after locals told BIRN that a public space in the neighbourhood had been turned into a private parking space without the approval of the municipal assembly.

The BIRN Kosovo camera crew and journalist were stopped and threatened by two people who did not give their names.

"Check out because you can still live while you are young," a man told cameraman Sllovinja who caught the threat on camera as well as the two men trying to stop the crew filming.