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VoA: Voting process for Kosovo's parliamentary elections ends

Politiko 2025-02-09 20:25:22

VoA: Voting process for Kosovo's parliamentary elections ends

At 19:00, parliamentary elections ended in which twenty-eight political entities with 1,280 candidates competed to secure seats in Kosovo's 120-seat parliament. Thousands of domestic and international observers, including over 100 envoys from the European Union and 18 from the Council of Europe, attended the process at over 940 polling stations, which remained open from seven o'clock until 7 pm.

About 40 percent of the nearly two million registered voters cast their ballots in the election that followed a tight campaign by political parties, which for a month pledged to increase wages and pensions, improve education and health services, and fight unemployment in Europe's poorest country.

The election, the 9th consecutive election since the end of the 1998-99 war that ended with NATO intervention, was seen as a test for Prime Minister Albin Kurti, whose party won by a resosote 2021 result and was put on the hunt for another term. This is the first time since Kosovo's declaration of independence in 2008 that Kosovo's parliament has met its full four-year mandate.

Today's vote will determine who will lead Kosovo in talks on normalizing relations with Serbia, which have long stalled. The United States and the European Union have urged both sides to implement an agreement reached nearly two years ago under which Kosovo must establish an Association of Serb-majority municipalities, while Belgrade recognize Kosovo's de facto independence.

Prime Minister Albin Kurti has been criticised by Western powers for his government's actions in the serb-majority north of the country. The European Union continues to maintain punitive measures against Kosovo since June 2023 due to tensions in the north. But talks with Serbia did not find much room in the campaign before the elections.

Ten of the 120 seats in Kosovo's parliament are reserved for parties of the Serb community, ten more for other minority communities. About 100,000 Serb citizens with the right to vote had the opportunity to choose between the political parties from the community. Serbian analysts said there was greater democratic pluralism in this election.

Opposition parties criticized the Kurti government for relations with allies specifically with the United States, which, during the administration of former President Joe Biden, warned that the actions of Kosovo authorities in the Serb-majority north of the country had affected the quality of the partnership and warned Pristina that disagreements hindered their commitment to help Kosovo advance towards Euro-Atlantic integration.

The issue of these relations became a subject of discussion these days after two posts on social network X by President Trump's envoy for special missions Richard Grenell, who in the first administration was the special envoy for the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue. Relations are at a low point, though the Kosovo government insists they are very good.

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