Subscribe here: [ Ссылка ]
After many hours of talks, the two sides had not come to an agreement today, Vucic had accepted the proposals, while Kurti had not, I had expected that Kosovo would immediately suspend the next phases of replacing license plates and that Belgrade would not issue new plates, said Josep Borrell, the High EU Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy after the talks that took place in Brussels today, B92 reports.
Borrell also pointed out that solution was proposed, but since it was not adopted, he urged for its implementation because it would give time to find a sustainable solution to this issue.
"I will inform my colleagues in the European Union and international partners about the behavior of the parties in the talks and the lack of respect for international legal obligations, which especially applies to Kosovo. It is a particularly negative political signal," Borrell said.
He noted that this could not continue.
"We expect Vucic and Kurti to show leadership and normalize the situation," said Borrell, who repeated several times that the escalation of the situation in Kosovo had to be prevented.
The High Representative of the EU said that he would keep the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina high on his agenda.
Stay connected with us!
Facebook: [ Ссылка ]
Twitter: [ Ссылка ]
Instagram: [ Ссылка ]
#eudebates the unique initiative aiming to promote debate, dialogue, knowledge, participation and communication among citizens. #Vucic #Kurti #Borrell #Pristina #Belgrade #Serbia #Kosovo #Macedonia #Skopje #Macedonian #NorthMacedonia #Balkans #Македонија #Albania #BiH #Putin #Rama #Albania #EdiRama #Tirana #Bosnia #Bulgaria #NATO #Vucic #JosepBorrell
Ever since the war and the withdrawal of Serbian forces, Serbia has continued to operate a parallel state system, issuing documents, licence plates and other papers for Serbs in Kosovo.
In 2011, Kosovo and Serbia reached an agreement under which Kosovo would issue licence plates marked RKS for Republic of Kosovo and, in a concession to Serbia’s refusal to recognise its former province as a state, KS, denoting simply “Kosovo”.
In 2016, Kosovo extended the validity of KS plates for another five years but made the Serbian-issued licence plates for Kosovo cities illegal. Due to this, it was almost impossible to register such vehicles with RKS plates.
After this agreement expired in September 2021, the Kosovo government decided not to extend it, and police started to confiscate Serbian-issued licence plates.
The change angered local Serbs who blocked border crossings, until the dispute was temporarily eased by introducing a sticker system. A more permanent solution was supposed to be found by April 21 2022, but this did not happen.
The dispute escalated again in June, when the Kosovo government announced that drivers of all vehicles with plates issued by Serbia from June 10, 1999, until April 21, 2022, would have until September 30, 2022, to get RKS plates.
The changes triggered renewed tensions on July 31 when Kosovo Serbs set up barricades and Kosovo police closed the country’s border crossings.
Serbia’s Vucic and Kosovo Prime Minister Kurti discussed the issue at an unsuccessful meeting in August but found no solution. In October, Kurti announced that the license plates decision implementation was rescheduled to November 1 and that on November 21 fines should start.
