Ambassador Costet puts it straight: Washington deal remains in effect

Costet has mentioned the statement by new US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who at the hearing before Seant, praised the work done by Donald Trump's administration in the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue.

“Last week, during the hearing for confirmation before the US Senate, Tony Blinken, who is President Biden's elected to the post of Secretary of State, said he applauds the work that has been done by Trump administration for Kosovo and Serbia. This is in the context of the answer to the question everyone's asking: is Washington's deal still in effect? Does Beden's administration aim to continue the work done by preliminary administrations? And the basic answer to these two questions is yes.”, Costnet said, citing even some changes that may be made in the future.

He stressed that the US's fundamental, strategic goals for Kosovo are not essentially changing, regardless of whether the Democrats are in power.

“We consider Washington's agreement in effect, until there is any possible change that can be made in the future and I expect we will continue to work on the work done earlier. It is very important for your viewers to know that the basic, strategic goals of the US for Kosovo and its neighbours are essentially the same, whether the Democrats or Republicans controlling the government. I think we can look back in the last 20 years and agree on this”, Costett said on Tuesday in RTK.

He further showed what the US wants from Kosovo, which he said the Democrats and Republicans agree on.

What do we want? We want peace within Kosovo between communities in Kosovo and peace between Kosovo and its neighbours. We want to see better economic integration between Kosovo and its neighbours. We would like to see more economic opportunities for all Kosovo citizens and would like to see strong pledges to rule the law, fighting corruption. These are all things that the Republicans and Democrats --” agree to, said Costett.

The US ambassador expects the coming weeks in Washington to have busy discussions on the policies the US will pursue in the Balkans, while saying the institution he is running will also be part of.

Now, in the coming weeks and months, I am sure there will be busy discussions in Washington about specifics for Balkan policies. Whether we want to keep this or that initiative; whether we want to start new initiatives and the embassy is part of this 48x1> discussion, Costet said.

About a week ago, in the U.S. Senate, the Committee for Foreign Affairs before the senators had released Joe Biden's State Secretary-elect Antony Blinken, who had answered questions that concerned US foreign policy. It also discussed the work done by Donald Trump administration in Kosovo-Serbia dialogue through Special Envoy Richard Green.

Republican Senator Ron Johnson had put the Pristina-Belgrade negotiation work on the agenda and what Richard Green has done in the process. He said the process of dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia has been moving until Donald Trump's envoy, Richard Green, has evolved into negotiations. According to him, the idea of economic advancement has been hit since Grenelli was hired to have a political impasse between the two states.

“The situation was not moving forward until Ric Grenelli was introduced, and he came up with his idea, and he said there's a lot of things that we can agree on, but we can agree on is economic advancement, and that's a very good thing”, Johnson said.

Johnson's words even hired Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

“He said he applauded the work done by the Trump administration in the process of dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade, and stressed how administration will try to push Kosovo forward.

The “You mentioned work in the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue. I certainly applaud them. The president-elect has spent a lot of time in these countries in the past. And I think that he shared the same conviction about things we can do to help Kosovo move forward, and hopefully Serbia's movement before”, Blinken has said.