On the morning an Italian general replaced a Turkish one at Film City, Belgrade told him which flag he answers to. The bridge and Deçan handovers were decided by the North Atlantic Council, not by either man.
Drizan Shala | 14 October 2026
A NATO mission changed commander this morning. Belgrade spent the morning explaining which decisions the new one is expected to revisit.
The decisions are specific. In June, NATO announced that KFOR would be reduced over the following year from about 4,700 troops to between 3,000 and 3,500, with fewer static tasks. In August the mission began withdrawing its permanent presence from the main bridge over the Ibër and integrating Kosovo Police into the security arrangements at the Deçan monastery. On 15 September the outgoing commander briefed the North Atlantic Council on the process and called it conditions-based and reversible. NATO’s published position is that every adjustment to KFOR’s posture is decided by the Council. None of it was Özkan Ulutaş’s decision, and none of it becomes Roberto Vergori’s.
Miloš Garić, a member of Serbia’s state media regulator, told RTS this morning that an Italian commander is good news for Serbs because Italian soldiers held the bridge and the monasteries “all these years,” while the Turkish general “followed the policy of his state, which supports Kosovo.” Ibro Ibrahimović, adviser to a deputy prime minister, told Newsmax Balkans that Ulutaş “was anything but an impartial mediator,” that his tenure brought “a significant expansion of Turkish influence,” and that the first test for Vergori is whether the bridge withdrawal stands: “whether only the names of commanders change, or the policy itself.” A security researcher quoted by Kosovo Online said Ulutaş “was more a Turkish general than a KFOR commander” and expected the Italian to have “more of an ear” for Serbs.
The three statements relocate a Council decision into the person of the commander, attach it to his nationality, and set a benchmark for his first weeks. If Vergori continues what the Council approved, the record is prepared: the Italian betrayed Serbian trust. If anything is paused for any operational reason, the record is also prepared: the Italian corrected the Turk. Either outcome is reported as a national choice by a national officer, and NATO’s chain of command disappears from the story. The audience is Rome, Naples, and the Serbian community in the north, which is being told its safety depends on the passport of the man at Film City rather than on the mandate of the mission.
The President of Serbia announced the end of military cooperation with Turkey over its arms sales to the Kosovo Security Force. The chair of the Assembly committee on Kosovo asked in August why “the Turkish general” allows weapons into Kosovo under Resolution 1244. Srpska Lista demanded an urgent meeting with Ulutaş over the bridge. Today’s commentary is the same campaign changing its object: the outgoing commander was attacked for his nationality, the incoming one is being recruited for his.
Pristina hears this with a specific memory. There is a story told at senior level about the morning of 24 September 2023, in which the President called the KFOR commander during the Banjska attack and was brushed off by a man not yet awake. KFOR has never confirmed it. The commander, asked publicly who he spoke to that morning, said “everyone necessary.” That is the whole public record. The story circulates because three years of being told that KFOR commanders answer to capitals have made it believable.
And the commander that morning was Angelo Michele Ristuccia, from Italy. The flag Belgrade trusts most was in command when thirty armed men crossed from Serbia. The passport test fails on Belgrade’s own evidence.
Vergori inherits a Council decision, a published timetable and a mandate that names all communities. The defence of that position belongs to NATO: a change of commander is not a change of policy. Nothing on the record shows Belgrade running a directed operation here; what the record shows, in public and on the first day, is Belgrade probing whether the Alliance will let the nationality of its officers become a lever on its decisions. That is the hybrid question.
