Kosovo was strategically important for the state, its elite and security with the Albanian population deemed as "unreliable" and concerns existed over possible future rebellions by locals that did not approve of its governance. The stance of Serbian political elite held that Kosovo was an late medieval Serb territory that after the Ottoman conquest had been settled by Albanians. Vasa Šaletić, the head of the governing body for the colonisation process described the process of displacing Albanians and purchasing their property as "a logical sequel to the liberation war", in which four Balkan states defeated the Ottoman Empire. Aiming to achieve a favourable political outcome, the state pursued various measures through violence and administrative avenues such as expulsions and replacing Albanians with another population. At the time in the Yugoslav census of 1921, Albanians formed the majority population of Kosovo at around 64 percent with some 72 percent belonging to the Muslim faith. Government sponsored colonisation of Kosovo and Vardar Macedonia was initiated in 1920 when on 24 September the Assembly of the Yugoslav Kingdom passed the "Decree on the Colonisation of the Southern Provinces of Yugoslavia".