Thaci has or has legitimacy to lead dialogue with Serbia

Bekim Colak, chief of President Thaci's cabinet, tells Radio Free Europe that the president's leadership with foreign policy, in which dialogue with Serbia enters, is the obligation stemming from the country's Constitution and laws in force.

“Dialog for normalising relations between the Republic of Kosovo and that of Serbia is an issue of foreign policy, with which the president is constantly dealing throughout the years”, Colak said.

Regarding the legitimacy of Kosovo's representation in political dialogue with Serbia by the country's president, opposition party MP Vjosa Osmani has questioned.

Days ago it has stressed that President Thaci is leading the process of dialogue without being mandated by the Assembly of Kosovo.

Unfortunately, President Thaci thus far negotiates without being mandated to lead this process. First, the president has no implementation mechanisms to implement the agreements reached. On the other hand, which is even more important for the Parliament as a legislative body, there are no constitutional mechanisms to oversee the work or even the president's failures in this respect, if he guides this process”, Osmani has said.

On the other hand, Memli Krasniqi, chief of the Democratic Party of Kosovo Parliamentary Group, this party within the ruling coalition, speaking of Radio Free Europe, does not consider it necessary at all to give the mandate from the Parliament to Kosovo's president for the leadership of the dialogue process with Serbia.

I think it is absurd to say that the president must give the Parliament a mandate, for something that gives the mandate to the Constitution of the Republic of Kosovo. We, like the PDK, think that the Assembly should be involved in the process of dialogue through regular information of its organs, in the course of negotiations, as well as in the topics discussed and also in the issues Kosovo should present there. But, in this context, we expect there will be a willingness by other partners, whether in power or in opposition”, Krasniqi says.

However, Colak stresses that if there is any request from Kosovo's Parliamentary Groups, which in any form may be complementary in the role and mandate that it could give to the president of Kosovo regarding its leadership of the dialogue process with Serbia, it would be welcome.

“So, I invite parliamentary groups to, if they see it necessary, issue a resolution that clarifys in some form the framework within which the future dialogue at the highest political level will continue. But, as I said, whatever circumstances, this process will lead the president of the Republic of Kosovo”, Colak said.

However, European Union officials have warned of the possibility of a meeting of two presidents -- Kosovo and Serbia's Hashim Thaci and Alliance Vuciq -- during March. However, an invitation to such a meeting has not yet arrived at the Kosovo Presidency Office.