Citizenship in Post-Conflict Kosovo

Abstract

The recent developments of the refugee crisis have shaken Europe but many forgot that it all happened with the Kosovo Albanians leaving their land in the winter of 2015 and heading to EU. They have been the first passengers on the immigration route leading to EU after many others followed them creating a big immigration crisis. The reasons for this crisis are various and we will focus on the case of Kosovo and thus try to help understanding it. Years ago Kosovo citizens started leaving their country legally with Serbian passports and this has created a worrying effect in the EU. As an outcome Serbia was forced to issue a different kind of passport to its citizens in Kosovo. In fact Serbian citizenship belongs to each and every citizen of Kosovo, in fact they are all dual citizens. The problem was that the Serbian government issued passports of a different kind to its Kosovo citizens and that way prevented them from using the visa free travel to EU. This case of discrimination is coming together with the somewhat forceful pushing of the Kosovo citizenship onto the Serbian minority in North Kosovo.