March 6 (Reuters) - Kosovo's President Vjosa Osmani on Friday dissolved parliament and called snap elections after lawmakers failed to elect a new head of state within a constitutional deadline.
The parliament had until midnight on Thursday to choose a president before Osmani's term ends in April, but opposition parties refused to participate in the vote. Under the Balkan country's law, failure to elect a new president triggers snap parliamentary elections.
The move extends a political deadlock in Kosovo, which is Europe's youngest nation and has aspirations to join the European Union. It had no functioning government for most of last year as the fractured parliament failed to elect a speaker for months.
The next elections will be the third in just over a year. Kosovo already held a snap election on December 28 after failing to form a government following the February 2025 poll.
"A parliament that cannot elect a president cannot continue indefinitely to drag out the process as is being attempted," Osmani said in a statement. “No one should wish for another political cycle, especially at this moment when the country needs stability."
Osmani is due to meet political parties on Friday before setting an election date.
A resounding election win by Prime Minister Albin Kurti's Vetevendosje party in December looked likely to end the stalemate. At the time, many political analysts believed that the opposition would participate in votes to elect the president.
However, although Vetevendosje won enough seats in the parliament to form the government it failed to secure the opposition's participation required to elect the president.
The opposition parties have asked for a consensual candidate, but Kurti has nominated his foreign minister, Glauk Konjufca.
(Reporting by Fatos Bytyci; Writing by Antonis Pothitos and Ivana Sekularac; Editing by Tomasz Janowski and Edward McAllister)
