Kosovo Ban On Serbian Dinar Risks New Crisis

Kosovo may be on the verge of a fresh crisis after the government prepared to ban the use of Serbian money this week, with a chorus of Western countries warning the move could ignite a firestorm

Pristina, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 31st Jan, 2024) Kosovo may be on the verge of a fresh crisis after the government prepared to ban the use of Serbian money this week, with a chorus of Western countries warning the move could ignite a firestorm.

The move is likely to spark the latest in a long series of conflicts with Kosovo's Serb minority.

The roughly 120,000-strong community has clung to the Serbian dinar since the brutal late-1990s war between Serbia and ethnic Albanian insurgents saw Serbian troops and government personnel withdraw from Kosovo.

Many Serbs in Kosovo work for Serbian institutions where their salaries, pensions, and other financial transactions rely on the dinar, rather than the euro which is Kosovo's official currency.

But according to a new set of regulations issued by Kosovo's Central Bank, beginning on Thursday "the only currency allowed to be used for carrying out cash payment transactions and in the payment system in the Republic of Kosovo is the euro".

Kosovo unilaterally adopted the euro as its currency in 2002, despite not being a member of the eurozone nor of the European Union.

Serbia has never acknowledged Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence, with the two sides perennially locked in bitter disagreements over the most minute bureaucratic matters in the former breakaway province, such as a recent spat over licence plates.