Kosovo visa waiver not in EU agenda in December

A diplomatic source of a European bloc member state in Brussels told dtt-net.com that in the draft agenda of the December 6th and 7th meeting of justice and interior ministers the issue of visa removal for Kosovo does not figure.

“Discriptions are still being held at the technical level. The current draft agenda did not include visa liberalisation”, dtt-net said. com diplomat who asked not to be identified to the public.

In July of this year, the European Commission (KE) had proposed to EU member states that Kosovo be removed from the visa regime, since the country has met all the required conditions.

In September this EC proposal also backed the European Parliament (PE), but most of the European bloc's member governments are now fearing that lifting visas for Kosovo and the media echo that this decision would have on their public opinion would be bad and would negatively affect their political parties on the eve of the EP elections, held in May.

Kosovo is the only Western Balkan country whose EU has not removed visas for three months in the Schengen area.

The visas were removed from Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia in 2009, while Albania and Bosnia were removed a year later.