While Americans are used to tears (and jeers) in The Capitol as politicians go about their 'business', none of that compares to the behavior of lawmakers in Kosovo this morning.
As The Irish Times reports, [4] three opposition lawmakers were arrested in Kosovo on Monday amid chaotic scenes in parliament, filled once more with tear gas in a fresh protest against an accord with former master Serbia.
Opposition MPs have been disrupting the work of parliament for two months by releasing tear gas in the chamber each time it tries to sit.
[5]
They are demanding the government revoke a deal, brokered by the European Union, to grant minority Serbs greater local powers and the possibility of funding from Belgrade. They also oppose a border demarcation deal with Montenegro.
Opposition supporters have rioted several times on the streets of the capital, Pristina, heightening the sense of a young country in crisis almost eight years since it declared independence from Serbia.
Caught on tape...
Government lawmakers met alone in the afternoon after the earlier disruptions, which, as AP reports, [6]garnered the following response from the locked-out opposition...
"In a country with no opposition in the parliament, there is no parliament and it cannot be called a democracy," said main opposition Self-Determination Movement lawmaker Aida Derguti.
In a statement, the European Union called for a return to dialogue in Kosovo.
"This kind of violent obstruction is neither acceptable nor will it solve any problem for the citizens of Kosovo," it said.
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Don't worry though - As US Secretary of State John Kerry is due to visit Kosovo on Wednesday in a gesture of support for its development as an independent state, 16 years after a U.S.-led Nato air war to halt the killing and expulsion of ethnic Albanians by Serbian forces. Parliament Speaker Kadri Veseli urged the opposition not to disrupt parliament this week, when he arrives... grab your popcorn.
