Belgrade delegation going to Brussels: Continuation of dialogue, focus on ZSO and missing persons

Illustration: Shutterstock

The Belgrade delegation is traveling to Brussels today, where they will over the next two days hold talks with representatives of the European Union and the temporary institutions of Pristina, during meetings at the technical level of the dialogue, which is scheduled for Thursday. As the director of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija, also one of the members of the Belgrade delegation, has said, the agenda will not include the issue of mutual recognition, as is being insinuated in Pristina, but economic cooperation, missing and displaced persons and Pristina's obligations assumed under the Brussels Agreement.

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The negotiations are a continuation of the dialogue that was restarted last week after a 20-month stall, when Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Prime Minister of the provisional institutions Avdulah Hoti met with EU representatives in Brussels.

In addition to Djuric, who is leading the delegation, Belgrade will be represented in Brussels by the Republic Commissioner for Migrants Vladimir Cucic and State Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and President of the Government Commission for Missing Persons Veljko Odalovic.

The delegation of negotiators from Pristina will be represented by Deputy Prime Minister of so-called Kosovo Drita Selmanaj and the head of the Pristina delegation in the working group on the issue of missing persons, Ibrahim Makoli.

It is possible that a member of the leadership of the Democratic Alliance of Kosovo Skender Hyseni will also participate. As previously mentioned in the Pristina media, he has been appointed as coordinator of Pristina's temporary institutions in the dialogue with Belgrade.

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Commenting on such announcements, Djuric said that the Pristina delegation should not be underestimated and that he is a man with vast political experience.

He added that Hyseni was an ally of Ibrahim Rugova in 1989 and one of the leaders of the separatist movement for the secession of Kosovo, as well as that he was the minister of foreign affairs immediately before the declaration of Kosovo's independence.

Topics of conversation

As Djuric announced on the eve of his trip to Brussels, they will primarily discuss how to return the market of Kosovo and Metohija, from where Serbian goods have been banned for more than 20 months. He said that the second topic of conversation would be missing persons from Kosovo and Metohija, of which there are about 1,500, and pointed out that families of the missing of all nationalities deserve to know the truth about what happened to their loved ones.

"Also, there will be discussion about creating preconditions for the return of expelled and displaced persons from Kosovo and Metohija," said Djuric and added that the delegation from Belgrade will ask what Pristina has done over the past 20 years to enable return and compensation for more than 40,000 expelled people.

Photo: Tanjug/Dragan Kujundzic

One of the topics will be the Community of Serb Municipalities (ZSO) and the issue of respecting Pristina's obligations from the Brussels Agreement.

"What we saw in previous days, which is a consequence of their internal nervousness, is that they are most directly trying to lie about the content of the talks. They can only dream that, either with President (Aleksandar) Vucic or at any other level, they can attempt to talk about forcing Serbia to recognize Kosovo," said Djuric.

(Telegraf.rs)