Kosovo’s Prime Minister Avdullah Hoti has presented his government’s framework for the dialogue with Serbia at the Academy of Sciences.
Hoti stated that the dialogue will be led by the Prime Minister, Kosovo’s territorial integrity will not be negotiated , and the dialogue will be based on the country’s constitution.
He clarified that from Kosovo’s perspective, the final deal with Serbia should guarantee Kosovo’s recognition by Serbia, the five EU member states that haven’t recognized it, and the UN seat. All open issues, including the missing persons, should be discussed.
“An agreement without mutual recognition is meaningless, and not temporary mutual recognition, but mutual recognition that provides us with a seat at the UN and provides us with recognition from the five EU countries that have not yet recognized us,” Hoti stated.
The first important decision of the Hoti Government was to remove trade reciprocity measures with Serbia, imposed by the previous government, in order to meet their condition to sit in talks. Now Kosovo products exported to Serbia cannot bear the name of the country, and Serbian products don’t have to address the name of Kosovo as the country of destination. From a Serbian perspective, this means that Kosovo is just a part of Serbia.
However, despite the Kosovo government meeting their request, Serbian leaders have implied that though they are open to resume the dialogue, it won’t result in recognition of Kosovo. Furthemore, they have reaffirmed that Serbia won’t stop its campaign to lobby countries to withdraw recognition of Kosovo and block its membership in international organizations.
