Situation. Pristina is named Prishtinë/Prishtina in Albanian and Приштина/Priština in Serbo-Croatian (pronounced "prish-ti-na" in both languages). The municipality has a population of 205,000, about half of whom live in the city centre. 99% of the inhabitants (Pristinians) are Albanians. Pristina is the capital of the district of the same name (470,000 inhabitants) and the capital of Kosovo. The city is located 34 km south of Merdare (crossing point with Serbia), 40 km south-east of Mitrovica, 83 km northeast of Prizren, 83 km east of Peja/Peć, 93 km north of Skopje (Republic of Macedonia).Description. The most recent and smallest capital of the Balkans is evolving very quickly. It already has everything of a great size: an international airport, a lively city centre, full of cafés and restaurants, shops, hotels, but also traffic jams and the highest urban pollution in Europe. However, it has only a few really interesting places to visit, apart from two unmissable sites in the surrounding area: the monastery of Gračanica and the battlefield of Kosovo Polje. Long dominated by Prizren, Pristina only emerged as Kosovo's first city in the 1970s. Since then, it has lost its multi-ethnic character (40,000 Serbs left in 2004) and became the capital of the newly independent state of Kosovo in 2008. While unemployment remains high (more than 20% of the working population), the local economy has been boosted by a strong presence of international organisations (NATO, EU, UN...) and by money from the diaspora. As a result, construction sites have been relentless since the end of the Kosovo war (1998-1999), with new business and residential districts emerging from the ground each year. However, Pristina is easy to visit: the city centre and the old town are tiny and concentrate most of the restaurants, shops, cafés and places of visit. Allow a maximum of two days to discover it.Geography and climate. Located at an altitude of 562 m, the city extends over 572 km2 between the Kosovo Plain (to the west), the Goljak Mountains (to the northeast), the Šar Mountains (to the east) and the Gračanica Lake (to the southeast). It is crossed by three small rivers, the Priština, Veluša and Prištevka, which were covered in the 1950s and 1970s. The climate is described as humid continental with a slight maritime influence. In summer, the average temperature is 26-27°C and in winter, snowfall is frequent and the average temperature in January, the coldest month, is about 3°C. But it is also in winter that the peak pollution from the two neighbouring coal-fired power plants climbs.

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Prishtinë. Hélène VASSEUR
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