LEPOSAVIC, Kosovo - NATO deployed over 100 troops in Kosovo's north in a response to violent incidents that have plagued the ethnically tense region, in a move that a top Serbian official called a provocation.

Serbia's top official for Kosovo Goran Bogdanovic said the force, which was deployed late Wednesday, is "trying to provoke the Serbs into reacting." He blamed NATO for waging "a propaganda war."

NATO troops backed by a local police force manned checkpoints on the main road linking Kosovo and Serbia to search for weapons. They searched passengers and car trunks for hidden weapons. Armored vehicles rattled on the sides as floodlights lit the potholed asphalt road.

NATO has some 10,000 peacekeepers stationed in Kosovo. The force moved into Kosovo in 1999 after bombing Serbia for 78 days to stop a brutal crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists. The former Serbian province declared its independence in 2008. Serbia maintains that Kosovo is part of its territory. Kosovo's north is nominally controlled by Pristina, but all decision are made by the region's Serb minority, with support from Belgrade.

Late on Wednesday, Bogdanovic stepped out of his car at NATO's checkpoint in Kosovo's northernmost tip, bordering Serbia and said he was on his way back from meeting local Serb leaders and stopped to see what the troops were doing.

"What is going on here," Bogdanovic asked the soldiers manning a checkpoint. "It's obvious that you want to provoke the Serb people."

The altercation between Bogdanovic and NATO troops, known as KFOR, points to the difficulties local and international authorities face in regaining control over the country's north where they are opposed by minority Serbs.

"This is a psychological propaganda war against the Serbs in the north of Kosovo," Bogdanovic told The Associated Press at the site, flanked by bodyguards and a local Serb leader. "This is the execution of orders of the so-called state of Kosovo."

He said local Serbs were "very upset, very worried" and complained they were not informed of NATO's plans.

The increase in security comes after a series of violent incidents between the majority ethnic Albanians and minority Serbs.

"There are too many weapons here in the region," said the spokesman for KFOR, Cpt. Hans Wichter. "We have to seize them, if we find them."

Wichter brushed aside Bogdanovic's comments saying the force had a mission to help people feel safe and move freely.

"We are here not to agitate people, but to provide security and people accept that," he said.

Kosovo and Serbia are smarting over EU-backed talks aimed at resolving Kosovo's contested status.

Kosovo authorities reject any talks that question its declaration of independence, while Serbia says it is after a compromise solution, keeping some sort of control over Serb-dominated areas.