Kosovo police fired tear gas on Sunday to disperse stone-throwing protesters who set alight police cars demanding the removal of a plant pot barricade on a bridge linking ethnic Albanians and Serbs in the divided town of Mitrovica.
Two policemen and two photographers received mild injuries as about 1,000 ethnic Albanian protesters pelted the police cordon with stones, an AFP reporter at the scene said.
Anti-riot police, backed by NATO-led peacekeepers, responded with tear gas and sealed off the bridge to prevent demonstrators crossing to the northern, Serb half of the town.
The protesters later set on fire two Kosovo police cars and two vehicles belonging to the European Union rule of law mission, EULEX.
They were angry over a three-year-old barricade put up by ethnic Serbs on the bridge over the river Ibar that separates the two communities.
Until last week, it was an unsightly mess of earth and concrete blocks -- a largely symbolic barrier that symbolised the angry refusal of ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo to merge with the rest of the country after it declared independence in 2008.
The pile was removed on Wednesday only to be replaced a few hours later by a line of plant pots with small fir trees, and the bridge was covered with a layer of soil which the local Serb mayor said would be used to create a "peace park".
The river separates the ethnic Albanians in the southern half of the town from ethnic Serbs in the north.
The 40,000 Serbs of north Kosovo have strongly resisted an EU-brokered deal signed between Kosovo and Serbia last year that accepted Kosovan control of the region. They have refused to recognise the government in Pristina and accused Belgrade of betrayal.
But left with few options, they grudgingly took part in Kosovo parliamentary elections for the first time earlier this month.
Serbia still does not recognise Kosovo's independence but implicitly agreed to accept the Pristina government's authority over the territory in return for the opening of EU accession talks.
There are a total of 120,000 ethnic Serbs living throughout Kosovo, a country of 1.7 million, but most are scattered in small communities away from the border.
Kosovo's independence has been recognised by more than 100 countries, including the United States and most of the European Union's 28 member states.
Kosovo police fired tear gas on Sunday to disperse stone-throwing protesters who set alight police cars demanding the removal of a plant pot barricade on a bridge linking ethnic Albanians and Serbs in the divided town of Mitrovica.
Two policemen and two photographers received mild injuries as about 1,000 ethnic Albanian protesters pelted the police cordon with stones, an AFP reporter at the scene said.
Anti-riot police, backed by NATO-led peacekeepers, responded with tear gas and sealed off the bridge to prevent demonstrators crossing to the northern, Serb half of the town.
The protesters later set on fire two Kosovo police cars and two vehicles belonging to the European Union rule of law mission, EULEX.
They were angry over a three-year-old barricade put up by ethnic Serbs on the bridge over the river Ibar that separates the two communities.
Until last week, it was an unsightly mess of earth and concrete blocks — a largely symbolic barrier that symbolised the angry refusal of ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo to merge with the rest of the country after it declared independence in 2008.
The pile was removed on Wednesday only to be replaced a few hours later by a line of plant pots with small fir trees, and the bridge was covered with a layer of soil which the local Serb mayor said would be used to create a “peace park”.
The river separates the ethnic Albanians in the southern half of the town from ethnic Serbs in the north.
The 40,000 Serbs of north Kosovo have strongly resisted an EU-brokered deal signed between Kosovo and Serbia last year that accepted Kosovan control of the region. They have refused to recognise the government in Pristina and accused Belgrade of betrayal.
But left with few options, they grudgingly took part in Kosovo parliamentary elections for the first time earlier this month.
Serbia still does not recognise Kosovo’s independence but implicitly agreed to accept the Pristina government’s authority over the territory in return for the opening of EU accession talks.
There are a total of 120,000 ethnic Serbs living throughout Kosovo, a country of 1.7 million, but most are scattered in small communities away from the border.
Kosovo’s independence has been recognised by more than 100 countries, including the United States and most of the European Union’s 28 member states.
