The Kosovo Serb List said on Thursday that it would walk out of all Kosovo institutions if the conviction of its official Ivan Todosijevic for what it says is a verbal offense is confirmed, the KoSSev portal reported.

Todosijevic, a former cabinet minister, was sentenced to two years in jail for “inciting national, racial, religious hatred, unrest and intolerance”. His lawyer Nebojsa Vlajic told the portal that his client was sentenced for a statement on the 20th anniversary of the NATO air campaign that “the cause of aggression was a so-called humanitarian disaster which Albanian terrorists invented”.

Serb List leader Goran Rakic told a news conference that he would call all Kosovo Serbs to quit their posts in the judiciary, police, prosecution and other institutions.

Rakic said that the sentence does away with the Kosovo Serbs’ right to speech, freedom of thought and right to say the truth.