Ultranationalism Ethnic hate stoked on the football terraces of Serbia

In the away stand of the creaking Čika Dača stadium, a hooded and masked football fan summoned the crowd to get on their feet and raise their hands. "Three, two, one..." the man counted down through his megaphone.

- Pjotr Sauer

"Kosovo is Serbia," a few hundred fans yelled in unison, just before the match kicked off.

The away supporters were members of Delije, the Red Star Belgrade's notorious ultras, who have long had a reputation for extraordinary violence and hardline nationalist views. To watch their team play, the fans travelled on a recent Saturday to the industrial city of Kragujevac, a 90-minute drive south of Belgrade.

Their pro-Serbia chants were applauded and repeated by the fans. of the home team, Radnički 1923, sitting on brick seats on the other side of the stadium. Later, Delije unrolled a banner that read: "When the army returns to Kosovo." Few places in the Balkans reveal the volatile ethnic politics of the region as much as football stadiums, where supporters regularly chant slurs that recall those employed during the ethnic cleansing drives of the 1990s.

"We need to finish them off, stop dragging our feet," said a talkative, skinny Red Star fan during halftime, declining to give his name.

He was not referring to his team's opponent but to the ethnic Albanian population that declared independence from Serbia 15 years ago, almost a decade after a guerrilla uprising against Serbian rule. With much of the game spent ducking firecrackers, the actual football match appeared secondary.