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A member of Kosovo’s police special unit . Photo: EPA-EFE/VALDRIN XHEMAJ.

A Kosovo police special unit arrested four people in four locations in northern Kosovo on Friday morning as part of the investigation of the murder of Kosovo Serb politician Oliver Ivanovic.

The Kosovo prosecution said police also raided the home of Milan Radoicic, the vice-president of the main Kosovo Serb party, Srpska Lista, but he avoided arrest.

Radoicic was named as the real ruler of the mostly-Serb region of northern Kosovo by Ivanovic shortly before he was shot on January 16 this year in front of his party offices in the northern town of Mitrovica. Radoicic has not commented on the allegation.

“We can confirm that based on a court order, police have undertaken raids in Mitrovica North related to the continuation of investigations on the murder of O.I.,” Kosovo police said in a statament.

“Police units have raided four locations and arrested four people: three related to the investigation and one who resisted police,” the statement added.

Media reported that among those arrested are two Kosovo police officers, Dragisa Markovic, who worked on the case, and Nedeljko Spasojevic.

Serbian public broadcaster RTS reported that police also arrested two men called Sasa Djuric and Marko Rasic.

The sound of sirens woke up people in north Mitrovica around 6am on Friday morning during the police operation. Gunshots were also heard.

The vice-president of Srpska Lista, Igor Simic, accused Kosovo police of acting brutally during the operation.

The Serb mayor of North Mitrovica, Goran Rakic, called on NATO’s Kosovo force KFOR to come to the town and “explain to the people why they said yesterday they were keeping everything under control and that there was no movement of Kosovo special forces”.

After Kosovo police withdrew on Friday, Serbs started gathering in the centre of North Mitrovica.

РОСУ у Северној Митровици, слика од пре 20-так минута… pic.twitter.com/6FdMsP03Sw — Marko Jaksic* (@jaksicmarko) November 23, 2018

Another protest by Serbs from north Kosovo is also scheduled for Friday because of Kosovo’s decision to hugely increase import tariffs on goods from Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Kosovo on Wednesday increased taxes on Serbian and Bosnian imports from 10 per cent to 100 per cent, following a previous hike on November 6.

Meanwhile Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic called an urgent meeting with the heads of the Serbian Army and police and representatives of the Serbian government’s office for Kosovo.

The murder of Ivanovic, the leader of a Kosovo Serb party called Freedom, Democracy, Justice, was widely condemned by EU, Serbian and Kosovo officials.

He was seen as a political moderate who advocated coexistence between Kosovo’s Serb minority and Albanian majority.

However, he was being retried for ordering the murder of Kosovo Albanians in 1999 during the war in 1999. He pleaded not guilty.

Read more:

Slain Kosovo Politician Ivanovic’s Mother-in-Law Targeted

Ivanovic Death is Failure for All of Kosovo

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