EU envoy tells Kosovo and Serbia to return to dialogue

FILE PHOTO: Austria's Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (not pictured) welcomes EU Special Representative for Belgrade-Pristina Dialogue Miroslav Lajcak to the Western Balkans conference at the Chancellery in Vienna, Austria June 18, 2021. REUTERS/Lisi Niesner/File photo

PRISTINA (Reuters) -The European Union Special Envoy Miroslav Lajcak urged Serbia and Kosovo to return to dialogue on normalising ties to avoid a repeat of last month's violence in northern Kosovo.

Tensions between Belgrade and Pristina have run high since Sept. 24, when around 30 armed Serbs stormed the village of Banjska in Kosovo's predominantly Serb north and barricaded themselves into a Serbian Orthodox monastery.