Country File: Kosovo

And as promised in our Serbia Country File, we’re taking up today the Kosovo question — whether the area commonly known as Kosovo is, in fact, the Serbian Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija; or is the independent Republika e Kosovës, as 111 UN members currently recognise…

… and our answer is, as around here our political stance is “you’re a country if you’re a UNESCO member,” Kosovo is not in fact a country!

However, it’s closer to being a country than any other not-country, as UNESCO membership was indeed recommended by the Executive Board, but fell three votes short of being ratified by the full membership, a unique experience in UNESCO history thus far.

That said, whether it’s legally a different country or not, the reality you’ll deal with on the ground is distinctly separate, so it merits a file of its own we figure, for when you want to visit tis 1 inscribed and 1 tentative World Heritage Sites:

Inscribed:
Medieval Monuments in Kosovo

Tentative:
Mt. Sara National Park

TCC and MTP both count Kosovo as a separately counted part of Serbia.
And remember our top tip from the Albania Country File: In Albania you can rent a car to drive everywhere except Serbia in the region, but in Kosovo you can only drive to Albania, and anywhere else you can’t drive to either Albania or Kosovo. So that makes Albania the best choice to start your Balkans trip!

Reference: