Green: Kosovo conflict - Serbia shaped my view of the Balkans

The US Special Presidential Representative for Kosovo-Serbia Dialogue Richard Green has named two agreements reached days ago between Kosovo and Serbia in Berlin as small.

In an interview for Hughes, Greenell has said that despite progress made, the road to normalising Kosovo-Serbia reports is over.

I think that when you're in the middle of something like the Kosovo-Serbia talks, then you tend to understand that things are different and change. And we've reached some small deals. But I still see that the road ahead is too long in our efforts to normalise relations. But now we've made some progress, say Green.

He has indicated he is willing to discuss with Pristina and official Belgrade as soon as Trump has asked him to prove whether Kosovo and Serbia were ready to reach an agreement.

Special Emissar says that after the discussions there have been in Kosovo and Serbia, he has seen that the parties want normalisation of relations on the economic level, the desire that Greenell says has later defined the goals for normalising the market between the two states, putting the airline and railway in first order.

When President Trump asked me to prove whether the leaders of Kosovo and Serbia were interested in reaching any kind of agreement, I started negotiations. My first meeting has been with the business community on both sides, and what I've discovered is that they really wanted to normalise relations on the economic level. And so we set the goal of how to normalize the market. What we realized was that airlines and railways normalized. We wanted them to have a first Pristina-Belgrade flight after 21 years. So we started work on that and were able to reach a deal. Trump's real goal is to exploit the economy to advance political processes”, Grenelli said, broadcasting Express.

Greenell has also spoken in this interview about the recent war in Kosovo. He says that when he started his political career, the Kosovo- Serbia has been one of the hottest topics facing Bill Clinton and NATO at the time.

Richard Green says the conflict and war that took place during the 1990s has shaped views of the Balkans and Europe, and according to him it is already an honor as it lies in a position aimed at hiring parties.

When I started my political career this was the hottest topic the Clinton administration was working on, and NATO was involved in it. I think it was really a conflict and war that fascinated my thinking about the Balkans and Europe. So it's an honor to be here trying to reconcile the parties”, he adds further.

Grenelli says that in a typical style of Trump administration, they are pushing the parties forward to reconcile through an authentic American idea.

The special host has demanded that political problems in Pristina and Belgrade be put aside until an economic moment is created.

But I think, in the typical style of Donald Trump's administration, we're pushing the parties to agree, and we're trying not to have this kind of American idea that's imported, but let's say President Vucic, Thaci and Albin Kurti, do you have the political will to move forward, create jobs for young people and change the economy? And I think the answer is yes, even though the political situation is difficult. I keep telling the parties we're trying to concentrate on the economy and try to create jobs for young people so they don't leave the region. Let's put political problems on one side until we create a moment in the economy”, Green is finished.