{"id":11507,"date":"2025-08-22T13:50:41","date_gmt":"2025-08-22T12:50:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/?p=11507"},"modified":"2025-08-29T13:58:31","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T12:58:31","slug":"informer-alleges-albanians-behind-fires-in-medveda-and-lebane-prosecutors-office-denies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/2025\/08\/22\/informer-alleges-albanians-behind-fires-in-medveda-and-lebane-prosecutors-office-denies\/","title":{"rendered":"Informer Alleges Albanians Behind Fires in Medve\u0111a and Lebane \u2014 Prosecutor\u2019s Office Denies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\n

Original article<\/em><\/a> (in Serbian) was published on 20\/8\/2025; Author: Milica Ljubi\u010di\u0107<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

In recent weeks, dozens of fires have been recorded in Serbia, while neighboring countries are also battling blazes. Over the past two months, the southern part of Serbia has been particularly affected, including villages in the municipalities of Lebane and Medve\u0111a.The pro-government Serbian tabloid Informer used the recent fires in the two municipalities to claim they were set by members of the Albanian community. However, these claims rely solely on an alleged anonymous source cited by the tabloid. The Public Prosecutor\u2019s Office in Lebane told Raskrikavanje that, for now, they have neither suspects nor any information indicating that members of the Albanian community are behind the fires in Medve\u0111a and Lebane.<\/em>
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In several municipalities in southern Serbia, multiple fires have been recorded in recent weeks, including villages in the municipalities of Lebane and Medve\u0111a.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These fires have been used by the tabloid Informer to stoke ethnic hatred and divisions, claiming that the blazes in southern Serbia were deliberately set by members of the Albanian community, whom the tabloid derogatorily refers to as \u201c\u0160iptars.\u201d Both municipalities are situated in southern Serbia, close to Kosovo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA wildfire has engulfed the area between Lebane and Medve\u0111a, and the firefighters\u2019 efforts are being hampered by the fact that the arsonist setting the fires is right there,\u201d Informer wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The outlet cited \u201cunconfirmed reports\u201d and in its article published on August 18 further alleged that \u201c\u0160iptars are setting the fires.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe area between Medve\u0111a and Lebane is a multiethnic community, and as soon as firefighters put out one section, another one flares up. Every arson attack happened near Serbian houses,\u201d an \u201cunnamed source\u201d told Informer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Apart from this anonymous source, Informer provides no other evidence to support these claims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The alleged \u201cfindings\u201d of this tabloid \u2014 that members of the Albanian community are behind the fires \u2014 were rejected by the Public Prosecutor\u2019s Office in Lebane, which has jurisdiction over the two municipalities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a written response to Raskrikavanje, the Prosecutor\u2019s Office said that during 2025, a total of 16 fires were recorded in the villages of Lebane and Medve\u0111a municipalities \u2014 15 in Lebane and one in Medve\u0111a.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Prosecutor\u2019s Office added that, so far, \u201cthere are no suspects, nor any information indicating that the fires were set by individuals of Albanian nationality.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the statement, inspections were conducted in all cases with the presence of a fire protection inspector, while the prosecutor\u2019s office ordered the police to take measures to identify potential perpetrators. No additional findings have been reported so far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, as reported by<\/a> JuGmedia on August 16, dry grass and low vegetation burned in the village of Gornji Bu\u010dumet, which belongs to the municipality of Medve\u0111a, and several houses and auxiliary buildings were destroyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Medve\u0111a and Lebane are not the only areas hit by wildfires. In recent months, villages in Leskovac, Prokuplje and Vranje have also been affected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On August 12, Ju\u017ene vesti reported<\/a> that wildfires in southern Serbia had affected more than 1,500 hectares of forest, over 800 of which burned in the territory of Vranje.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In early July, a fire struck several villages in the municipality of \u017ditora\u0111a, with the village of Dubovo suffering the worst damage. As Ni\u0161ke vesti reported<\/a> at the time, about 300 houses were destroyed by fire in the villages of Donje Mom\u010dilovo, Konjarnik and Dubovo, prompting a state of emergency in the municipalities of Prokuplje and \u017ditora\u0111a.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyond Serbia, wildfires have also been raging in neighboring Montenegro in recent days. The Directorate for Emergency Situations said<\/a> that wildfires remain active in Danilovgrad, Budva and \u0160avnik, while the situation is being monitored in Podgorica and Nik\u0161i\u0107. Fires have also spread to parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia. According to reports<\/a> published<\/a> by several media outlets, firefighters are battling a blaze in the border area between Trnovica and Drijen, on the frontier between Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Translated in English using AI tools, then thoughtfully refined by a human editor.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Original article (in Serbian) was published on 20\/8\/2025; Author: Milica Ljubi\u010di\u0107 In recent weeks, dozens of fires have been recorded in Serbia, while neighboring countries are also battling blazes. Over the past two months, the southern part of Serbia has been particularly affected, including villages in the municipalities of Lebane and Medve\u0111a.The pro-government Serbian tabloid […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11508,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[316],"tags":[552,28,318,532],"class_list":["post-11507","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fact-checks","tag-manipulation","tag-serbia","tag-tabloids","tag-wildfires"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11507","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11507"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11507\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11509,"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11507\/revisions\/11509"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seecheck.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}