Currency Crackdown in Kosovo Turns the Screws on Ethnic Serbs
- Kosovo Premier Kurti has banned the use of Serbian dinars
- Serbs say move will cut them off from pensions and welfare
People protest the ban on the use of Serbian dinars in North Mitrovica, Kosovo, on Feb. 12.
Photographer: Matteo Placucci/NurPhoto/Getty Images
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A Fiat van was stopped by police on a Saturday morning this month in a sleepy Serb community near Kosovo’s border with Montenegro. The vehicle and 4 million Serbian dinars ($37,000) were seized.
But the cash wasn’t contraband in any conventional sense — and the vehicle belonged to Serbia’s postal service. The drivers were making payments to Serb welfare and pension recipients, a task that’s now become illegal under new rules laid out by Kosovo’s government to make the euro the country’s sole currency.