Kosovo to hold snap elections in June

Kosovo will soon hold its third parliamentary election in a year and a half. Prime Minister Albin Kurti was able to form a government in February, but now there's a political deadlock over who shoud be elected president.

Kosovo's political crisis shows no signs of ending: The country's parliament failed to elect a new president on Tuesday after a ruling by the Constitutional Court set that date as the final deadline.

If a new president had not been elected by April 28, parliament had to be dissolved — and that is exactly what happened. Kosovo will now hold another election in June — the third since February 2026.

The latest crisis was triggered because Albin Kurti, the prime minister and head of the Self-Determination (Vetevendosje) movement, was unable to reach a consensus with opposition parties on a joint candidate for the presidency. Vetevendosje won around 5% of the vote in the last election at the end of December 2025.

Now that the parliament has been dissolved, Kurti's government, which was only formed in February, is in office only on a caretaker basis.

Kurti and Osmani split

Vjosa Osmani, who served as Kosovo's president for five years between 2021 and early April 2026, had originally intended to run for a second term. But she did not have the support of her prime minister, even though the two of them had been considered the hope for Kosovo's new political leadership five years ago.

Kurti did not explicitly state that he would not support Osmani for another term. He simply justified his lack of backing by saying that he could not secure more than 66 votes for her election. That is the number of seats his party has access to, with the governing parties and non-Serbian minorities in parliament. But it takes at least 80 votes out of a total of 120 to elect the president.

Osmani openly stated her intention to seek re-election when her term came to an end on April 4. She told local media outlets that at the time she had "Kurti's support" and that he had promised her he would support her.

"You are the best president of the 21st century," she said he had told her. But later the situation changed: "I then received a new assessment from Kurti that the Vetevendosje parliamentary group and he personally would no longer support me."

In an extraordinary session on April 28, Kurti nominated a candidate from civil society, the doctor and human rights activist Feride Rushiti. But opposition parties boycotted the vote.

Kurti and Osmani 'ambitious and competitive'

Naim Rashiti from the Balkans Policy Research Group told DW that the partnership between Kurti and Osmani had never been "natural" but more "a kind of ad hoc electoral alliance."

He added that both politicians were "very ambitious and competitive, towards others and each other, and often hold opposing positions on political goals."

He pointed out that the two had generally agreed on domestic policy but had their differences over foreign policy. 

"In the international arena, the inconsistent political positions of both sides often led to confusion," he said. "The president frequently acted as a sort of shield or damage-control figure. She often took the lead in foreign policy without conducting proper consultations."

Ehat Miftaraj, a political analyst at the Kosovo Law Institute (IKD), told DW that Kurti was perceived as being a "less predictable actor" than Osmani, who was seen to be more cooperative toward international partners.

Kurti, on the other hand, had at times adopted a more confrontational stance: "This has not only led to tensions between the two leaders but has also raised questions at the international level regarding the coherence and consistency of Kosovo's foreign policy."

Slowing down EU integration and dialogue with Serbia

The fact that Kosovo has been unable to achieve political and institutional stability for the past year and a half is hindering both reforms demanded by the European Union and the EU-brokered dialogue with Serbia.

"While the frequent elections show that Kosovo is a functioning democracy," Miftaraj said, "they also show that the country has restricted capabilities of advancing its strategic interests."

"As a result, Kosovo's position in the dialogue [with Serbia] is weak and focus on rule of law and on [EU] integration processes has waned. Kosovo is devoting more energy to managing internal crises than to advancing its agenda for European integration," said Miftaraj. "With the European Union's new strategy related to the Growth Plan, Kosovo, which continues to lag in the region, will most likely lose hundreds of millions of euros in financial support."

This article was translated from German.