Serbian armed forces were on "the highest level" of alert, Defence Minister Milos Vucevic said late on Monday, amid the Balkan country's increasingly strained relations with neighbouring Kosovo over recent shootings and blockades.
Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, but Belgrade refuses to recognise it and encourages 120,000 ethnic Serbs to defy Pristina's authority, especially in the north where they make up the majority.
The Serbian army has been put on heightened alert over tension with Kosovo several times in recent years, with the last time being November after claiming that drones entered Serbian airspace from its breakaway province.
On December 10, Serbs in northern Kosovo set up barricades to protest against the arrest of a former policeman suspected of being involved in attacks against ethnic Albanian officers.
The blockades have coincided with a rise in reported shootings, the latest coming on Sunday evening, according to Nato-led peacekeeping force Kfor.
"Serbia's president … ordered the Serbian army to be on the highest level of combat readiness, that is to the level of the use of armed force," Mr Vucevic said.
He said President Aleksandar Vucic also ordered the special armed forces to be increased from the existing 1,500 troops to 5,000, Vucevic said.
Serbia's Interior Ministry also announced "all units [will] immediately come under the command of the chief of general staff".
The orders from Mr Vucic come after army chief Gen Milan Mojsilovic was sent to the border with Kosovo on Sunday.
Northern Kosovo has been especially on edge since November, when hundreds of ethnic Serb workers in the Kosovo police and the judiciary, including judges and prosecutors, walked off the job in protest against a decision to ban Serbs living in Kosovo from using Belgrade-issued licence plates.
The policy was scrapped by Pristina but the mass walkouts created a security vacuum.
Pristina tried to schedule December 18 local elections in Serb-majority municipalities, but they were postponed after the announcement caused widespread outrage and the main Serb political party said it would stage a boycott.
Then on December 10, the former policeman suspected of involvement in attacks against ethnic Albanian officers was arrested, outraging ethnic Serbs who erected barricades that paralysed traffic around two border crossings.
Just hours after the barricades were erected, Kosovar police said they were victims of three gun attacks on one of the roads leading to the border.
Kfor, which has increased its presence and patrols in the region in recent months, said the latest bout of violence came on Sunday, when shots were fired in the direction of Latvian soldiers embedded with the force, Kosovo's Defence Ministry tweeted.
Kfor said it was investigating the incident, in which there were "no injuries or material damage".
Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic said last week the situation with Kosovo was "on the brink of armed conflict".
Kosovo's security council, which met on Monday, blamed Serbia for the latest deterioration in relations, saying its northern neighbour "is acting with all available means against the constitutional order of the Republic of Kosovo".
Serbs comprise about 120,000 of Kosovo's 1.8 million population.
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Five out of five stars
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League semi-final, first leg
Bayern Munich v Real Madrid
When: April 25, 10.45pm kick-off (UAE)
Where: Allianz Arena, Munich
Live: BeIN Sports HD
Second leg: May 1, Santiago Bernabeu, Madrid
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(All games 4-3pm kick UAE time) Bayern Munich v Augsburg, Borussia Dortmund v Bayer Leverkusen, Hoffenheim v Hertha Berlin, Wolfsburg v Mainz , Eintracht Frankfurt v Freiburg, Union Berlin v RB Leipzig, Cologne v Schalke , Werder Bremen v Borussia Monchengladbach, Stuttgart v Arminia Bielefeld
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Best Academy: Ajax and Benfica
Best Agent: Jorge Mendes
Best Club : Liverpool
Best Coach: Jurgen Klopp (Liverpool)
Best Goalkeeper: Alisson Becker
Best Men’s Player: Cristiano Ronaldo
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Kooora – Best Arab Player: Abderrazak Hamdallah (Al-Nassr FC, Saudi Arabia)
Player Career Award: Miralem Pjanic and Ryan Giggs
Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
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The Voice of Hind Rajab
Starring: Saja Kilani, Clara Khoury, Motaz Malhees
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MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League semi-final, first leg
Barcelona v Liverpool, Wednesday, 11pm (UAE).
Second leg
Liverpool v Barcelona, Tuesday, May 7, 11pm
Games on BeIN Sports
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Investing or establishing a business in Germany offers you a residence permit, which eventually leads to citizenship. The investment must meet an economic need and you have to have lived in Germany for five years to become a citizen.
Italy
The scheme is designed for foreign investors committed to making a significant contribution to the economy. Requires a minimum investment of €250,000 which can rise to €2 million.
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Residence Programme offers residence to applicants and their families through economic contributions. The applicant must agree to pay an annual lump sum in tax.
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Start-Up Visa Programme allows foreign entrepreneurs the opportunity to create a business in Canada and apply for permanent residence.
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The calling app is available to download on Google Play and Apple App Store
To successfully install ToTok, users are asked to enter their phone number and then create a nickname.
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Farage on Muslim Brotherhood
Nigel Farage told Reform's annual conference that the party will proscribe the Muslim Brotherhood if he becomes Prime Minister.
"We will stop dangerous organisations with links to terrorism operating in our country," he said. "Quite why we've been so gutless about this – both Labour and Conservative – I don't know.
“All across the Middle East, countries have banned and proscribed the Muslim Brotherhood as a dangerous organisation. We will do the very same.”
It is 10 years since a ground-breaking report into the Muslim Brotherhood by Sir John Jenkins.
Among the former diplomat's findings was an assessment that “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” has “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
The prime minister at the time, David Cameron, who commissioned the report, said membership or association with the Muslim Brotherhood was a "possible indicator of extremism" but it would not be banned.
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
