Wrote: Fatbardh Dema
Through a post, it was claimed that population registrars together with the Kosovo Police (KP) have gone to the northern part of Kosovo and that anyone who refuses to register will be punished.
This claim was published yesterday (August 1) on the social media "Telegram" by the Serbian-language account "BUNKER".
What did hibrid.info find?
After research conducted through online search engines, hibrid.info has not found any information published by credible sources regarding this claim.
Link to the post published on Telegram by the "BUNKER" account:
The post published by the "BUNKER" account on Telegram, translated into Albanian:
In the northern part of Kosovo, the registrars go along with the so-called Kosovo Police and anyone who refuses to register will be punished.
Such information has not been found published by any media outlet (see here). Also, in recent days, neither the Kosovo Police nor the Kosovo Agency of Statistics, which are mentioned in the above post, have announced anything regarding the population census in the northern part of Kosovo. (see here and here)
What the acting director of the Kosovo Agency of Statistics, Avni Kastrati, had to say regarding the penalties for those who refuse to register
Kastrati also announced the percentage of the population that remained unregistered according to preliminary data and the implementation of penalties against them.
"The preliminary data we have received is about 0.02 percent of the population that has remained unregistered. We estimate that 99.8 percent have been registered. This is a good thing, because very few countries in the world manage to exceed 98 percent. If in the end, when we make the quality and inclusiveness report, it is confirmed that Kosovo manages to register over 99.8 percent, which we assume, it will be among the top countries with inclusiveness. Those who have remained unregistered, we will look to implement the law and we believe that only those who have refused will have penalties according to the law, but those who have not had the opportunity for various reasons, have not been in good health or something else, no measures will be taken".
Kastrati from ASK did not include Serbs on the issue of punishment, when talking about fining natural persons according to the law, since they constitute a different issue. (here)
"Kosovo will have just over 1.6 million resident inhabitants, quite a few. They will be fined in the coming months and years when they need support from institutions, for documentation and other issues… If you did not participate in the registration, you have a chance to win a grant, if you are not registered you do not count on being able to win that grant, otherwise as a first step you have to go and pay the penalty for not participating in the registration. Legal – there are two representatives of institutions who have come out with positions against the registration. They will be fined according to the law. As for individuals, I'm not talking about the Serbian community in the north, those who did not participate, because that's a different issue, but the rest of the communities in the south, "We estimate that the maximum is around 2000 or 2500 who did not participate in the census, but a large part of them, for various reasons related to work, studies, health aspects, were not residents at the time of the census. In September we will have a more detailed analysis, we do not have the data on how many were refused."
Analyze:
Through a post on Telegram, the Serbian-language account "BUNKER" claimed that population registrars, together with the Kosovo Police, have gone to northern Kosovo, and that according to this account, those who refuse to register will be punished.
After verifying the facts, hibrid.info has confirmed that such information has not been found published in any credible media.
In addition, neither KP nor ASK, in recent days, have published any information about the population census in the northern part of Kosovo.
On July 21, the acting director of ASK, Avni Kastrati, had said that the institution he heads did not include Serbs on the issue of punishment, when talking about fining individuals under the law, since they constitute a different issue.
Based on its working methodology, hibrid.info assesses this claim made by the "BUNKER" account on Telegram as "Fake News".
Reasoning:
The “Fake News” rating is given to informational content that is entirely fabricated or that contains factually incorrect claims or information. Content that is rated as fake news can be defined as having been created and distributed with the intent to misinform the public, i.e., to present a claim that is completely false as fact.