page_title: Preševo
section_title: Stele controversies 2012–13
hierarchical_section_title: Preševo / Politics / Stele controversies 2012–13
caption_attribution_description: English: Municipal square Preševo, Serbia Српски / srpski: Општински трг, Прешево, Србија
context_page_description: Preševo is a town and municipality located in the Pčinja District of southern Serbia. It is the southernmost town in Serbia and largest in the geographical region of Preševo Valley.
  Preševo is the cultural center of Albanians in Serbia. According to the 2002 census, the town of Preševo had a population of 13,426 people, while the municipality had 34,904 inhabitants. Albanians form the ethnic majority of the municipality, followed by Serbs, Roma and other ethnic groups.
context_section_description: On 21 November 2012, the municipality council of Preševo erected a stele in the center of the town honouring members of the former UÇPMB, who died during the Preševo Valley Conflict from 1999 to 2001, causing a public outcry throughout Serbia. The Prime Minister of Serbia, Ivica Dačić, said about this incident: "It's best that they remove it themselves, because this is a needless provocation, nowhere else in Europe can a memorial plaque be erected to those who are members of terrorist organizations and those who were directly involved in the murders of police officers and soldiers". 
  He called for the removal of the stele to 17 January, then several Albanian politicians and organizations responded with criticism. Mayor of Preševo Ragmi Mustafa said that the stele shows the identity of the Albanians in the region and announced that it would end the cooperation with national authorities of Serbia if the monument were removed. Serbian Minister of Defence Aleksandar Vučić announced that they will act in frame of the law in connection with the controversial stele, and that no one can act against the for all the same applicable constitution and seeks the reason in ethnicity. He added that Serbia wants peace but will respond to any provocation.
  Deputies of the Assembly of Kosovo Rexhep Selimi and Nait Hasani, a former member of the Kosovo Liberation Army (UÇK), threatened armed conflict if the institutions of Serbia removed the memorial plaque. 
  The former U.S. diplomat, United Nations regional representative of Kosovska Mitrovica Gerard Gallucci said: "Serbs, do not fall for provocations like this with the memorial plaque in Preševo". President of the National Assembly of Serbia Nebojša Stefanović explained that it is unacceptable that in Serbia there is a memorial plaque to a terrorist organization and those who killed the citizens of Serbia. He added that is not an ethnic conflict, but the problem is the honoring of those who killed Serbs with a memorial plaque in Serbia. Nevertheless, a member of the Coalition of Albanians of the Preševo Valley, Jonuz Musliu, which has one seat in the Parliament of Serbia, said that the stele would not be removed. However, the stele was removed by a bulldozer which was guarded by members of the Serbian Gendarmery on 20 January 2013. Despite threats from various Albanian nationalist organizations, there were no incidents during and after the removal.
  As a first reaction, the former commander of UÇPMB, Orhan Rexhepi, made the separatist statement that this is a "historic day", because "Preševo and Bujanovac will be a part of Kosovo." Ragmi Mustafa, Preševo's Mayor, confirmed shortly afterwards that the Albanians want a union with Kosovo for a long time.
  The former president of the National Council for Cooperation with the Hague Tribunal and a minister in Serbian government Rasim Ljajić responded and said that the Preševo valley will not be part of Kosovo or may be because the Albanian representatives from southern Serbia do not have the support of the international community. He also warned against the exploitation of the situation by the Albanians. The operation of the Serbian police broke into the local population from turmoil. During the day, several hundred people gathered at the site of the stele laid flowers and candles in memory of the fallen UÇPMB members. The Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha announced that "the Albanian government calls the international institutions to stop this action", even though the U.S. had already announced earlier that it is an internal affair of Serbia, which should solve their elected representatives.
  On the evening of 20 January, a group of Albanians who protested against the removal of the stele gathered in Đakovica. Some of them tried forcibly to enter in the Serbian monastery of the Holy Virgin, where several nuns still live, but the attack would prevented from strong associations of the KFOR. On the night of 21 January, it overlapped to the Serbian enclave Goraždevac, were the monuments of the Serb victims of the NATO bombing in 1999, and the Serbi
caption: Town center of Preševo
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