For decades, the Serbian parallel education system in Kosovo has functioned outside the authority of Kosovo’s institutions, deliberately rejecting cooperation and continuing to operate with Serbia’s curriculum and textbooks. These are not neutral materials – they spread hostile narratives against Kosovo, falsify history, and indoctrinate generations of students with anti-Albanian propaganda.
A report from 2010 already confirmed what we all know: these textbooks violate Kosovo’s Constitution, undermine equality, and poison interethnic relations. Yet, despite repeated warnings, nothing has changed. Even today, schools in the Serbian language operate fully under Belgrade’s control – 131 of them – continuing the same destructive practice.
ECMI experts suggest that Kosovo could consider a German-Danish model of minority education, which balances cultural rights with legal integration. But unlike Denmark and Germany, here we face a deliberate refusal from Serbia and the Kosovo Serb leadership to even sit at the table. This is not about education rights – it is about maintaining political control through indoctrination.
The textbooks tell students that the KLA were “terrorists,” that NATO’s intervention was “illegal aggression,” and that Serbian forces were merely “neutralizing the situation.” They erase massacres of Albanian civilians, deny war crimes, and glorify the aggressors. This is not education – it is state-sponsored denial.
Kosovo’s institutions have the legal right and responsibility to ensure that every child, regardless of language, is educated with materials that respect truth, equality, and the Constitution. Allowing Serbia’s curriculum to dominate in Kosovo is a betrayal of justice and of our future.
It is time to stop tolerating Belgrade’s parallel system of manipulation. Kosovo must act decisively, with international support, to dismantle this machinery of lies and replace it with a fair, constitutional, and inclusive education model.
