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Kosovo holding early general elections

Sunday, 06 October 2019 10:52 AM [ Last Update: Sunday, 06 October 2019 10:57 AM ]

A man using crutches walks to cast his ballot at a polling station in Pristina, Kosovo, on October 6, 2019. (Photo by AFP)

People in Kosovo are voting in early general elections, following the resignation of the Kosovan prime minister over alleged war crimes in the late 1990s.

The Sunday vote to elect 120 lawmakers came after prime minister Ramush Haradinaj resigned following a request from a Hague-based court to question him over crimes against ethnic Serbs during and after the 1998-99 war.

A file photo of Kosovo’s former prime minister Ramush Haradinaj (by Reuters)

Haradinaj is running for an independent seat.

Two other main candidates are law professor and MP Vjosa Osmani, and Albin Kurti, a former protest leader who organized rallies against Serbia.

In this photograph, taken on September 11, 2019, Vjosa Osmani, a candidate for prime minister from the opposition party Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), is seen speaking during an interview with AFP in Pristina, Kosovo. (By AFP)

Kurti’s supporters have given him the nickname the Che Guevara of Kosovo.

Ten seats will go to Kosovo’s roughly 120,000 Serb minority, who have a right to veto constitutional changes.

Leader of the Vetevendosje Party and parliamentary elections candidate for prime minister Albin Kurti speaks to journalists after voting, at a polling station in Pristina, Kosovo, on October 6, 2019. (Photo by AFP)

Kosovo is home to around 1.8 million people, but another 700,000 are estimated to live abroad, mostly in Germany and Switzerland.

The Kosovan diaspora, which has its own ministry, is also a hefty economic force, sending home more than 900 million dollars in 2018.

At home, Kosovo has one of the youngest populations in Europe, with roughly half of its citizens being under the age of 25.

More than 90 percent of Kosovans are Muslim.

Kosovo’s 2008 independence from Serbia is recognized by most governments, but not by Belgrade.

The European Union (EU) — for whose membership Serbia has applied — sees tensions between Belgrade and Pristina as a major threat to regional stability and is pushing for a normalization of relations between them.

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