The parliament of Kosovo has voted to demolish a concrete wall, deemed to have been erected as an act of defiance by the small Serb community in the northern city of Mitrovica.<br /><br /> The ethnic minority Serbs began constructing the wall earlier this month, calling it a technical support barrier against a landslide.<br /><br /> The government however, was not convinced.<br /><br /> Edita Tahiri, Kosovo Minister for dialogue with Serbia said: “This wall was intended to destabilise the situation in Kosovo, and we will not let Serbia’s intentions come to fruition.”<br /><br /> She also said that a grenade was thrown at a government office in northern Mitrovica on Wednesday night, but it did not explode.<br /><br /> The wall was built along the river Ibar, which bisects Mitrovica – the city with the largest Serbian population in Kosovo. <br /><br /> Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, although Belgrade does not recognise this.<br /><br /> The war in the Albanian majority region ended in 1999, putting to an end the deportations and ethnic cleansing carried out under then-Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic.<br />
