Kosovo Serb leader shot dead in northern town

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Serbian politician Oliver Ivanovic has been shot and killed outside his party offices in Mitrovica, Kosovo. In the wake of the murder, which happened on Tuesday, Belgrade broke off the EU-sponsored talks with Kosovo.

"For the Serbian state, this is an act of terrorism and we’ll address it accordingly,” Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said from Belgrade.

Vucic said the government is asking to participate in the investigation, saying he wants to get to the bottom of this “assassination.”

Tuesday's incident was not the first time Ivanovic was the victim of violence. Just a few months ago, his personal car was torched in an arson attack in the northern part of Kosovska Mitrovica.

Kosovo police officers and forensics experts walk past the crime scene where the leading Kosovo Serb politician Oliver Ivanovic was killed in a brazen drive-by shooting in Mitrovica on January 16, 2018. /AFP Photo‍

"It is a question of what they wanted to achieve with his assassination,” said political analyst and MP Milovan Drecun.

“We can’t rule out that someone had been planning this for a long time, and wanted to delay the process of the normalization of relations, currently being held in Brussels, as well as postpone the creation of a Serbian municipalities association in Kosovo.”

Despite his moderate political views, 15 years after the NATO intervention in Kosovo, Ivanovic was arrested for alleged war crimes committed in 1999.

In the subsequent trial, he was first sentenced to a five-year prison term, but a higher court later overturned this verdict.

Kosovo declared its independence after the NATO bombardment of Serbia in 1999, and is supported by the US and the EU. Half of the world’s nations refuse to accept Kosovo’s secession, including Russia, China, and India.