Vogel: Serbia must show its people that it lost Kosovo 20 years ago

Vogel told Radio Free Europe that French President Emmanuel Macron “introduced a bucket of cold water” into the candidate countries' European aspirations from the Balkans, with the statement that the EU must first carry out internal reforms before accepting new members.

Vogel further stressed that it is disappointing that Kosovo's cause in the summit did not participate in Spain's prime minister, and that “all shows that the EU has not strongly reconfirmed their commitment to enlargement in the Balkans”, Telegrafi follows.

According to him, EU membership or the accession process is not a mechanism for resolving bilateral conflicts.

In the question that in Belgrade, they fear that the condition for Serbia's EU membership is the formal recognition of Kosovo, while any politician in Serbia would hardly be able to “gle this bitter pill in the future, Vogel thinks it is mandatory for Serbia formally to recognise Kosovo to join the EU.

However, according to him, it must accept a legally binding agreement within the framework of international law, which will enable Serbia and Kosovo de facto state, diplomatic and other relations.

This would not be a formal recognition of Kosovo's independence from Belgrade, but close to it”, he said.

For example, the two Germanys had relations similar to the state, but without mutual recognition. I think these issues are more or less semantic”, he said.

Serbian leaders should eventually address Serbian citizens and tell them what they already know. And this is that Belgrade has lost control over Kosovo 20 years ago, mainly because of the violence of Serbian authorities, which caused the resistance of Albanians”, he said.

He said that “after Serbia lost control over Kosovo, it was inevitable that it declared independence ten years ago”.

According to him, now is the time to know this reality.

When this happens, Serbia and Kosovo will be able to approach the EU”, Vogel said. /Telegraphy/