Kosovo's difficult steps towards visa liberalisation

Emrush Ujkan, professor of European Law, tells Radio Free Europe that this process is designed to take about six months, in hopes that these two decision-making levels will decide Kosovo to obtain visa liberalisation.

However, according to him, the European Commission's positive recommendation puts Kosovo ahead of other steps, which should be taken until a decision by two other European Union decision-making levels. According to him, Kosovo institutions should be aware of the country's citizens that free movement in the Schengen area does not imply the right to employment and the right to stay longer than 90 days.

All these steps will have to be taken by state institutions and the different framework of non-governmental organisations, which should sensationalise our citizen. Our state or our institutions, simultaneously, must take adequate measures to adapt our state institutions to what is the Schengen area. This means that citizens should be equipped with biometric passports, which state organs release. All these are measures that should be taken in this period, until the achievement of final decision”, Wolfani said.

But, Avni Mazrek, professor of European Law, speaking of Radio Free Europe, estimates that until a visa liberalisation decision for Kosovo, the process will be passed on even to two levels, which, according to him, are not easy. However, according to him, the most difficult step for Kosovo will be reaching a positive decision on visa liberalisation by the European Union Council.

The most difficult step will be the final decision, that is, the decision at the stage of the European Union's political decision-making, where the position of states is required. It means ministers of member states who will vote, either against or against. This is the most difficult stage for Kosovo, because of the system of how the visa decision is made. There is the system of qualified majority, which has several instruments within it and that the position of states determines the qualifications of the needed majority for Kosovo”, Mazrek stressed.

Professor Wolfan has similar thoughts. According to him, despite the fact that the decision in the European Union Council will be taken by qualified majority, it remains to be seen what Spain's decision will be there. Mazrek emphasises that Spain can be overvoted with a qualified majority, but it is a state within the Schengen area, which does not recognise Kosovo passports, and this could make it difficult to implement in practice the decision on visa liberalisation for Kosovo.

The European Commission's <x0.>Opinion, in May 2016, has had nothing to do with, in very real terms, what was the border demarcation agreement with Montenegro and how much it had to do with the fact that Spain, then, has not been convinced that it could allow Kosovo citizens to move freely to the Schengen area, as long as it does not recognise the passports issued by the institutions of the Republic of Kosovo. I think that's the main issue, which we wish it was already over, but that I think this is the main challenge”, Wojan said.

Meanwhile, Professor Mazrek has expressed the opinion that positive recommendation by the European Commission, policymakers in Kosovo will try to use it for political gain. According to him, the visa liberalisation process for all member states and those that have benefited from this process, especially the countries of the Western Balkans, is more technical than political process. But, according to him, in the case of Kosovo, it has acted differently.

“Given that visas are critical issues for Kosovo citizens, because one third of Kosovo's citizens live outside Kosovo, and visas have been a problem for free movement of people, and therefore the European Union has used some conditioning mechanisms for Kosovo, which it did not recognise before. Therefore, this process has become more of a political process, despite the fact that this process would not have to be, but the technical process of meeting certain technical criteria related to the security of human movement, respectively, with the security of people going through that state already becoming part of the Schengen” area, Mazreku said.

However, Kosovo institutional leaders have stressed that the European Commission's positive recommendation is the first step leading up to the vote for liberalisation in the European Parliament and an approval by the European Union's Council of Interior Ministers. If these three procedures are successfully completed for Kosovo, then, according to them, the expectations are for the final decision to be made sometime late this year. /rel