Serbian officials cancel Kosovo festival in Belgrade

(ANSA-AFP) - BELGRADE, JUN 28 - Serbian authorities on Thursday banned a festival highlighting the cultures of neighbouring Kosovo, just hours before the event was due to begin. There has been animosity between Serbia and its former province, Kosovo, since a war in the late 1990s when Kosovo sought to break away. Kosovo declared independence in 2008, a move Serbia has refused to acknowledge because it considers Kosovo the nation's historic homeland. The annual "Good Day" festival, which takes place simultaneously in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, and the Kosovar capital, Pristina, highlights Kosovo's Serbian and ethnic Albanian communities. This year's festival was scheduled to start Thursday evening with a performance of the play "Father and Father" in Belgrade. But Serbia's Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said "no gatherings will be permitted" at the festival venue, according to an official statement. (ANSA-AFP).