The 'big five' in Kosovo and Serbia, in an effort "to save the dialogue"

2023-10-12 14:50:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

The 'big five' in Kosovo and Serbia, in an effort "to save the

The last dialogue meeting between Kosovo and Serbia on September 14, 2023.

According to diplomats in Brussels, the purpose of the visit to Kosovo and Serbia by the representatives of the five main countries is to "save the dialogue process" and the Agreement towards normalization, reached earlier this year.

On October 21, representatives of the United States, Germany, Italy, and France will accompany the representative of the European Union for dialogue, Miroslav Lajcak, to the meetings in Kosovo and Serbia.

According to diplomatic sources in Brussels, the purpose of the visit is to push forward the implementation of the Agreement towards normalization and the Annex for its implementation.

After the last round of high-level dialogue on September 14, the high representative of the bloc, Josep Borrell, has said that both sides are violating the obligations of this agreement. But, during this meeting, Borrell said that the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, did not accept a sequencing plan for the implementation of this agreement.

This agreement, of 11 articles, provides, among other things, a level of self-management for the Serbian community in Kosovo and mutual recognition of state symbols, while asking Pristina and Belgrade to also implement all previous dialogue agreements .

"All these countries are kind of guarantors of the deal and nobody wants to see it fail. The only way for the situation to stabilize in the long term is progress in the process of dialogue and normalization", said a source in Brussels.

Sources in Brussels said that "it is necessary to engage the big EU countries alongside the United States of America to save the dialogue as the power of the EU representatives in this regard would not be sufficient".

The visit to Kosovo and Serbia by the group known as the "Big Five" is the first since the September 24 attack against the Kosovo police in Banjska, Zveçani.

A group of armed Serbs attacked the Kosovo police, killing Sergeant Afrim Bunjaku. During the clashes, authorities said three attackers were also killed.

Kosovo has blamed Serbia for the attack, but Belgrade has said it had no hand in it. The responsibility for organizing the attack was taken by Radoicic, who resigned from the post of vice president of Lista Serbe, the main party of Serbs in Kosovo that has the support of official Belgrade.

The US and the EU have strongly condemned the attack. Borrell described the attack as terrorist.

Now the EU and the member states are waiting for the results of the investigations to see who planned the attack, who helped the attackers, and then they will decide on eventual measures.

Right now, there are punitive measures against Kosovo, due to previous tensions in the north of Kosovo, but the EU has not ruled out the possibility of imposing sanctions on Serbia./ REL