Kosovo launches first census in over a decade amid tensions

(ANSA-AFP) - PRISTINA, APR 5 - Kosovo authorities on Friday began carrying out the country's first census in over a decade, amid simmering tensions with the ethnic Serb community and uncertainty over their participation in the count. Census counts are delicate matters in many Balkan countries, where plunging birth rates, mass migration and ethnic tensions undercut efforts to provide accurate population figures. Kosovo officials have repeatedly delayed earlier counts. The Kosovo Statistics Agency (ASK) has conducted just one other count, in 2011, which was boycotted by the Serbs. That census put Kosovo's population at 1.8 million people. (ANSA-AFP).