Pristina authorities thwart shipment of dinars for Serbs in Kosovo-Metohija

BELGRADE/JARINJE - The Pristina interim self-government institutions on Wednesday denied entry to Kosovo-Metohija to a shipment of dinars for payment of wages, pensions, social benefits and other incomes to Serbs in the territory, the National Bank of Serbia (NBS) said.

"In accordance with the years-long practice, an NBS vehicle transporting dinars came today to the Jarinje administrative crossing, where the cash shipment was supposed to be taken over by the vehicle of the Henderson company that is licensed for cash-in-transit services by the provisional Pristina institutions. However, the NBS vehicle was returned from the crossing without any explanation.

The dinars in question were headed for the NBS treasury vault in Leposavic," the central bank said in a statement.

"The NBS condemns today’s incident most strongly and urges for the immediate annulment of the discriminatory, unlawful and unprecedented measures introduced by the provisional institutions in Pristina in order to disable the transport and distribution of dinars to Kosovo-Metohija and thus deprive the Serbian population of basic conditions for life," the NBS said.

In a statement to Tanjug, the head of the Serbian government Office for Kosovo-Metohija Petar Petkovic said Pristina's move reflected an intent by its PM Albin Kurti to expel the Serbs from Kosovo-Metohija and continue a policy of ethnic cleansing.