Belgrade: Serbia’s President Aleksandar Vucic discussed the issue of his country’s autonomous province of Kosovo and Metohija on Friday with representatives of the EU, the US, France, Germany and Italy in an attempt to resolve the frozen conflict between Belgrade and Pristina amid frequent tensions in the province.
The meeting here was attended by the EU Special Representative Miroslav Lajcak, the US’ Deputy Assistant Secretary overseeing policy towards the countries of the Western Balkans Gabriel Escobar, the advisors on foreign and security policy to the French President and German Chancellor, Emmanuel Bonne and Jens Plettner, respectively, and the diplomatic adviser to the Prime Minister of Italy, Francesco Talo.
“What we agree on is that a frozen conflict is not a solution and that when you have a frozen conflict, it is only a matter of time when someone will unfreeze it and when irresponsible individuals will collapse the peace and stability of the entire Western Balkans,” Vucic said after the meeting, according to the statement of the President’s office.
In 2022, the fragile dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina was interrupted by tensions around the validity of Serbian identity documents, travel documents and license plates, which resulted in Serbs quitting Kosovo’s institutions and protests, Xinhua news agency reported.
The Serbian President expressed Serbia’s willingness to consider the “plan proposed in September 2022” in light of “problems and challenges that would be put before our country if we did not agree with the proposed plan”.
According to the version leaked to the media, the aim of the proposed plan is to achieve “full normalisation” of relations between Belgrade and Pristina.
