Reactions are stirred after new signs on the streets of North Mitrovica

In North Mitrovica, the Ministry of Environment and Spatial Planning has put up signs with new street names, but this action has been opposed by the municipality. Its mayor, Milan Radojevic, has covered the signs with thin covers, calling the action provocative and illegal.

The Ministry of Environment and Spatial Planning on Wednesday installed new signs for some of the roads in North Mitrovica, inhabited mainly by Serbs.

But the mayor of this municipality, who belongs to the Serbian List, Milan Radojevic, along with several other people, covered them up by throwing blankets over themselves, which prompted the police to intervene.

At the entrance to North Mitrovica, signs with names such as "Zoran Djindjiq" and "Isa Boletini" were placed, while the acting minister, Fitore Pacolli, was also present. 

According to her, 88 streets were renamed by decision of the Municipal Assembly of this municipality last year, and that only the technical side was completed on Wednesday.

"This is a project that belongs to the ministry. So, whenever I, as a minister, do any project that I do, I do it as a minister, not with the municipality, because the municipality has already made this decision. So, this is a decision that the municipality has made, and I as a minister and the Cadastral Agency are obliged to do the technical work," she said. "So, to finance the project and to finish it, to implement it. So we are doing this. It is a technical work that we are doing."

Pacolli rejected claims that the placement of the signs is related to the upcoming elections or the election campaign. 

The renaming of the streets has been called illegal by the mayor of North Mitrovica, Milan Radojevic. According to him, the decision of the Municipal Assembly of the previous mandate has been repealed by the assembly members of the current mandate.

"Today we had another propaganda act by the Vetëvendosje Movement. As you can see for yourself, the signs were placed illegally, unlawfully and in violation of the decision of the Municipal Assembly of North Mitrovica. As is widely known, the Municipal Assembly of North Mitrovica on January 30 adopted a decision by which it repealed the preliminary act on the renaming of streets, because it was adopted in violation of the law, since no public debate had taken place, there was no multiethnic commission and no Serb had participated in the work of that commission. Therefore, those decisions were completely unlawful and illegal," said Radojevic.

The police have announced that they have not initiated any case for covering the signs, and the acting minister, Pacolli, has also issued a reaction on social media after the action.

"Exponents of this nomenclature, with the actions of the Serbian List, want to attack our Government. Both those there and those here seem to be greatly disturbed by the fact that we finally have a street in the north named 'Isa Boletini'," Pacolli wrote on Facebook.

The decision to rename dozens of streets in North Mitrovica was made at a time when this municipality was led by Vetëvendosje's Edren Atiq.