American diplomat: Seal from 2012 has undermined efforts to normalise reports with Kosovo

The Serbian authorities' stance on sanctions imposed by the United States on Republika Srpska leaders has disappointed some diplomats in the US.

Michael Kirby, former US ambassador to Serbia, recalls some of the claims Serbian President Aleksandar Vuciq used in an effort to justify Serbia's reluctance, a candidate for EU membership, to join Western partners in sanctions against Russia for its invasion in Ukraine.

“President Vuciq hesitantly applied or imposed sanctions on any country or individual, linking it to the experiences of Yugoslavia and Serbia. This disgust gives him an alibi to act as if individuals or subjects sanctioned by the United States or the European Union are not responsible for wrongdoing. It is not necessary to accept that sanctions are appropriate to admit that the four recently sanctioned Republika Srpska officials actively sought to undermine the Dayton Agreement, weaken or threaten the state and Bosnia and Herzegovina government system”, says Kirby, who has held the ambassador post in Belgrade since 2012 to 2016.

BiH and RS officials were sanctioned in the weeks after the head of the Serbian secret police, Aleksandar Vulin, was on the same list that US authorities hold responsible for organised crime, corruption and even drug smuggling.

Kirby, in a comment to the Voice of America in the Bosnian language, has said that US sanction Vulin has attempted to halt any progress in efforts to normalise relations between Kosovo and Serbia, the Express broadcast.

Since 2012, Volin has been trying to undermine any progress in normalising relations with Kosovo. He held positions where his anti-Western stance hampered relations between the European Union and Serbia. I believe one of the reasons for such Volin statements is his awareness that a key element for membership in the European Union would be a full financial control of Serbian, current and past”, Kirby adds.

The Voice of America's negotiator emphasises that Serbia's behaviour threatens the position of a credit partner in the United States.

Vice President Vuciq is increasingly playing with elements of revanstism within the Serbian Progressive Party and Serbia, trying to somehow turn the time back into the period of the breakup of Yugoslavia”.

He says Vuciq thinks more about retaining power than about the welfare of the Serbian people.