Serbia observes national day of mourning after clashes in Kosovo

Serbia on Wednesday observed an official day of mourning as the country cancelled sporting events and lowered flags to half mast, with a minister calling the Serb gunmen killed in Kosovo over the weekend "martyrs". 

The killing of a Kosovo police officer and an ensuing gun battle at a monastery in a village close to the Serbian border marked one of the gravest escalations in the former breakaway province in years.

Three Serb gunmen were killed in an hours-long firefight with Kosovo police, after they ambushed a patrol near the village of Banjska and later barricaded themselves at an Orthodox monastery. Kosovo authorities had earlier said four gunmen were killed in the melee but later put the number of dead at three.