Remote confronting Kurti and Vuciqi, ahead of an eye-to-face meeting in Brussels

Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti and Serbia's president, Aleksandar Vuciq, will meet next Tuesday in what Kosovo Government chief says “is not a meeting of dialogue”. But negotiating between them has started at a distance with reactions and reactions.

The topic without which Serbia considers that dialogue makes sense is the establishment of the Association of Serb majority municipalities in Kosovo. Kurti, meanwhile, has said there can be no one-ethnic association.

“What will happen to the Association has both the petition of citizens and the then opposition actions, as well as the Constitutional Court's act. In Kosovo we cannot have one-ethnic association. So it is imperative to integrate all citizens, indiscriminately etnie”, Kurti said on Tuesday of the week he went on a visit to Business Park in Prizren.

The next day, Kurti was countered by the Serbian president, who said Belgrade's reaction would be a very powerful and tough “in terms of disrespecting the legal agreements signed in Brussels regarding the formation of the Serb majority municipalities in Kosovo.

Vuciq has also said he does not expect that at the meeting with Kosovo Prime Minister Kurti, he is required to recognise Kosovo's independence.

“If he does not want to talk about the Association of Serbian municipalities, but for us to recognise Kosovo, then he does not have to come (to Brussels)”, Vuciq has indicated.

Vuciqi's request for Association, Kurti has retaliated by demanding the opening of archives with information on the fate of the missing from the recent war in Kosovo. Kurti also mentioned this request Monday at a meeting with Martin Schuepp, the regional director for Europe and Central Asia at the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Meanwhile, his party, the Vetevendosje Movement, said through a Facebook post that this would give family and society peace.

“1639 is a large, much larger number when it comes to people, persons, loved, family, who continue to be extinct, still undiscovered. Serbia has archives because the crimes were committed by the Serbian state, so it would also have to open them and share the information needed to clear the fate of the found. This would give family and all society now more than two decades to know about their fate. Our government will continue to demand the opening of the archive and will postpone this issue to each major European centre and beyond ocean”, said LVV's Facebook post.

US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Palmer, said on Friday (June 4th) that the final goal of the United States is to achieve mutual recognition between Kosovo and Serbia. However, he has left open the possibility that Washington will support other modalities of the comprehensive agreement, if they agree on both sides.

Our “Vision is that Serbia and Kosovo are members of the European Union. But how can the two EU member states be if they don't know each other? This (continual recognition) would pave the European way for both countries. For this reason, the United States views bilateral recognition as the best way to achieve this”, Palmer has told Serbia's N1 television.

In the question whether there is a <x0Plan B”, or the possibility of reaching an agreement but not including recognition, the American diplomat replied:

The Agreement can be anything both sides agree on. Our goal is to encourage parties to sit at the table and represent what their red lines are, what they can and cannot do. We do not determine the agenda, nor do we determine the” result.

On the other hand, the European Union's minister for dialogue, Miroslav Lajcak, does not mention mutual recognition as part of the final agreement between the two countries intended to achieve.

The dialogue will continue on Tuesday, June 15th, European Union spokesman Peter Stano announced today. This will be the first meeting between Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti and Serbia's president, Aleksandar Vuciq.

But last week, Kurti said there can be no dialogue on this meeting.

We think that the future dialogue with the other side needs a platform and strategy. We haven't sat at the table with the other side yet can't therefore talk about any kind of dialogue”, Kurti said.

He stressed that meeting with Vuciqi will only be discussion on the format and performance of talks to be held in the future.

The mid-June meeting that has been warned is not meant to continue the old or old dialogue. But it is a discussion on the format and performance of discussions in the future”, he said.

Although he came to power insisting that dialogue with Serbia is not his priority, Albin Kurti had accepted the session when the prime minister was elected that no progress can be made in any other area unless there is progress in dialogue. Before this session, he did not consider the matter his priority. He believed that citizens have chosen to deal more with other issues, which included managing pandemic, fighting crime and corruption, and opening new jobs.

In his exhibition unveiled to MPs, Kurti said he could not and would not make any compromise with Serbia, though the US and the EU cite compromise almost every time when they talk about reaching the final Kosovo-Serbia agreement.

No progress can be made in any other area unless there is progress in this area. We need dialogue on the return of nearly 3 billion euros of pension pensions stolen from Serbia for the return of over 400m euros stolen from electricity misuse, addressing war damages, debts and successes. So the dialogue that addresses and solves existing problems, not creates new problems. Without recognition of the reality of independent Kosovo and the acceptance of the truth on the part of Serbia, there can be no normalisation of relations between the two peoples and between the two states”, Kurti said.

Kurti's statements after the elections that dialogue is his priority had concerned authorities in Berlin, Paris and Washington, who is Kosovo's top international sponsor. The State Department has said they want to encourage Kosovo's new government to make negotiations with Serbia a priority on the road to international recognition. So far, Kurti has shown little contempt for compromises in negotiations with Belgrade. Yet, they always remind him that he must do so.