Kurti has Lost the Plot in the North of Kosovo

Either way, however, the strategy of integrating the north into the rest of Kosovo is in disarray; the question now is whether Kosovo can hang on to anything more than nominal sovereignty over its rebellious municipalities.

It's a pity Kurti didn't read his history books on other intractable conflicts, like the one in Northern Ireland, where an armed revolt by Irish nationalists cost thousands of lives and caused absolute chaos before a UK government finally calmed the stormy waters by offering massive concessions.

Soldiers of the NATO-led international peacekeeping Kosovo Force (KFOR) stand guard in front of the municipality in Zvecan, Kosovo, 01 June 2023. At least thirty KFOR peacekeepers and fifty-two civilians were injured after clashes between security forces and ethnic Serbs broke out in Zvecan on 29 May 2023. Photo: EPA-EFE/GEORGI LICOVSKI

The same arguments raged in Northern Ireland as in Kosovo - about rule of law and sovereignty - but the UK government in the end dumped them, wisely it turned out, in the wider interest of peace and a return to normality.

Kurti hasn't taken that path, and probably cannot, having taken power as an ideologue who had denounced every preceding agreement reached between Serbia and Kosovo. Like many ex-student protesters, he remains obsessed with abstract ideas devoid of context. He seems uninterested in pragmatically facing the facts - one of which is that the northern Serbs are very confident in their determination to have very little to do with Kosovo, and enjoy the unambiguous support of a neighbouring state that is bigger and more powerful than Kosovo.

Kosovo would have been wiser leaving the northern Serb issue on the back burner, however inconvenient this might be in terms of...