Joseph: When recognition is achieved by five EU nations, Serbia's will be less important

According to him, there are serious efforts for Kosovo to ensure recognition by the five EU states: Spain, Romania, Cyprus, Greece and Slovakia.

He says a signal to this is also the US envoy's statement to the Western Balkans, Gabriel Escobar, to Kanal Television 10 on October 19th, that “recognition from the five non-recognitional EU states is the most important that Kosovo can get from any process”.

At the same time, adds Joseph, “we have unconfirmed reports, but reports that the Franco-German proposal puts Kosovo's recognition to the centre by non-recognitional EU states”.

This proposal, on which Joseph is called, circulates into the media in Kosovo now a month and is said to be intended to ease the problem between Kosovo and Serbia.

Among other things, the proposal envisions that Serbia will not prevent Kosovo's membership in international organisations, in exchange for faster EU membership.

The proposal, according to reports, does not mention mutual recognition between Kosovo and Serbia, but recognition by the five non-recognising EU states.

Kosovo has declared independence in 2008, and the International Court of Justice has concluded it does not conflict with international law.

Joseph says the five non-recognising EU states, so far, have given Serbia an unfair advantage or power to block Kosovo in dialogue for normalising relations.

When you take power away from Serbia, you create the potential for what everyone wants. A fair negotiation. Nobody wants to humiliate Serbia, but the goal is a fair negotiation”, Joseph tells Radio Free Europe.

He adds that these recognitions would end the “game of Aleksandar Vuciqit”, president of Serbia, who, as Joseph puts it, claims that “wants fair compromise with Kosovo” and that “is Western partner”.

When recognition by the five EU nations is reached, Serbia's recognition will be inevitable and less important”, says Joseph.

New access to dialog

Kosovo and Serbia, with EU mediation, have started dialogue on normalising relations since 2011. The sides have reached dozens of agreements, but the implementation of most of them has stalled.

Kosovo insists that the final agreement with Serbia have mutual recognition at the centre, but Serbia opposes.

In recent weeks, there have been frequent visits by representatives of the European Union and the US to Kosovo and Serbia, with the aim of discussing dialogue.

Joseph says these visits signal an urgent sense of change in approach to this process.

This new approach to dialogue, he says, has also been proposed in an analytical report published by the Institute for Foreign Policy and Wilson Centre in Washington, in January of this year.

In this report, where there are authors from the Balkans, it is said that the “recognition of the Republic of Kosovo by non-recognition states would transform dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina led by the EU”.

According to this report, such a move would affect the stability of the entire Balkan region.

This report also outlines several steps on how a strategy led by the United States could ensure the required recognitions, working first with Greece.

Joseph says there are signals that this mindiness has confronted Kosovo- Serbia comes from the administration of current US President Joe Biden.

This is a huge change in perception and position from the United States and the Benden” administration, says Joseph.

According to him, “is completely possible” for concrete steps towards this plan to take place in the near future.

Joseph adds that the US has begun linking the situation between Kosovo and Serbia with the poor “cyst in Europe”, which has triggered the invasion of Ukraine by Russia.

He cites the fact that Serbia is one of the only countries in Europe that has not imposed sanctions on Russia.

“Should avoid illusions that [Aleksandar] Vuciq is [Western] partner or that Serbia is on the right side of the history”, says Joseph.

Problems with association and license plates: “being rewarded Serbia”

Two of the bilateral issues between Kosovo and Serbia, and among the most problematic, concern the Association of Serb majority municipalities and the shift of illegal car license plates in northern Kosovo.

Forming an association of ten Serb majority municipalities in Kosovo is envisioned with an agreement reached between Kosovo and Serbia in 2013.

In 2015, meanwhile, the parties have reached an agreement on principles to establish this association. But it has never been implemented, since, under a Kosovo Constitutional Court decision, there have been elements that conflict with the Constitution.

Since then, the EU has repeatedly reiterated the position that Kosovo and Serbia should implement all agreements reached in dialogue, including that for association. This is a constant request of the United States as well.

However, the Kosovo government opposes a single-ethnic association, while Serbia insists that it be formed and requires that executive competency be held.

Joseph feels that the key word on this matter is the sequence (reform of actions) rather than the content (like the appearance of Association).

He thinks it is Kosovo's obligation to implement this agreement, but adds that “cannot be finalised Kosovo Serbs' status without at the same time having a finalisation of the relationship between Kosovo and Serbia”.

The “in essence, there is a position of active hostility from Serbia for Kosovo. You cannot have a hostile neighbour and at the same time resolve the status of Kosovo Serbs, who are controlled by Serbia through the Serbian List [the largest political subject of Serbs in Kosovo]”, says Joseph.

In northern Kosovo, meanwhile, Serbs have less than ten days to reregister their cars with license plates Kosovo releases.

Since the post-war, in 1999, they drive cars with license plates leaving Serbia, which Kosovo considers illegal.

The Kosovo government has given two months for reregistering cars from September 1st to October 31st.

Since this issue, earlier, has been the source of tensions in the Serb-inhabited north, Escobar said it has sought to delay the reregistering deadline for about ten months.

Joseph thinks that this demand, either from the US or the EU, is unfair to become Kosovo, without balancing it with a requirement for rule of law in the north.

The problem is that those who create instability are being rewarded. It is not enough that the US and the EU just ask for a postponement of Kosovo. The problem is not [only] to avoid violence in the north, but rule of the law in Kosovo, including the north, and address the criminal structures in the north”, says Joseph.

In northern Kosovo, for years, parallel structures that are financed by the Serbian state are functioning.

We recall that in terms of the request to postpone reregisteration, the Government of Kosovo has said it owes “law enforcement, constitutionality and government decisions”.