Byzantine Blog

EU Mission Not Welcome on Serbia’s Territory

Serbian Minister for Kosovo-Metohija Slobodan Samardzic said today that Serbia has sent a clear message to the EU that it most vigorously opposes the arrival of an EU Mission to Kosovo-Metohija. Such a move would mean the beginning of the implementation of the plan proposed by former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, charged by the German intelligence agency BND of taking bribes to recommend severing of the Serbian province to the UN Security Council.

In a statement to the Tanjug news agency, Samardzic said that Serbia sent an equally clear message saying that the issue of the new mission can be solved only after a compromise solution to the future status of the southern Serbian province is reached at the UN Security Council.

Ignore at Your Own Peril

“We expect that the EU acknowledges the reasons for Belgrade’s principled stance that an EU Mission is not welcome on Serbia’s territory. It will be very bad if the EU ignored the Serbian stand and made an illegal decision to send an EU Mission to implement Ahtisaari’s rejected plan. Such a decision would cause serious problems in the relations between Serbia and the EU,” stressed Samardzic.

Kosovo-Metohija Minister’s stern warning echoed equally firm notice issued by the Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica a day before.

Serbian Premier said on Tuesday that EU heads of state and government need to bear in mind Serbia’s position that it is completely unacceptable and an insult to the dignity of Serbia to offer a trade off for the unilateral declaration of independence of Kosovo and Metohija.

“Our message to the European Union is that it is necessary that Serbia be respected just as any other free and sovereign state, which at any rate means that the European Union has to fully observe the internationally recognized borders of our country,” Kostunica told Tanjug.

Does the EU Want Serbia as a Partner or as an Enemy?

Kostunica said that whoever has the intention and wants Serbia to be its partner has to know that Serbia accepts partnership only as a whole, and not as a state broken into two parts.

“We expect the EU to respect Serbia’s position that a EU Mission cannot come to Serbian territory in Kosovo and Metohija without a new UN Security Council resolution that would determine a compromise solution to the status of the Province. The arrival of a EU Mission would mean the beginning of the implementation of the rejected Ahtisaari plan and the beginning of implementation of unilateral independence. That is why Serbia firmly rejects in advance such an illegal decision to send a EU Mission,” Kostunica said.

“In our view, it is useful that the EU knows Serbia’s position when it decides about the country’s fate,” Serbian Prime Minister said.

Leon Kojen: No Agreement with the EU as Long as it Backs Dismemberment of Serbia

Former adviser to the Serbian President Boris Tadic and Coordinator of the State Negotiating Team Leon Kojen has recommended a resolution to be offered for adoption by the Serbian Parliament which would tell the European Union that Serbia will not sign a Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) as long as the most powerful EU states insisted on backing the amputation of the southern Serbian province of Kosovo.

“Such a move would show the European politicians that they have to choose between Serbia and its province of Kosovo, which they do not think is the case. On the contrary, they seem to be under the impression that Serbia should only be offered ‘a European perspective’ and little financial assistance so that it tacitly reconciles itself to losing Kosovo,” Kojen said in an interview for the Wednesday issue of the Belgrade daily Vecernje Novosti.

He holds that the government and the parliament should decisively reject the offer and say that Serbia could sign the SAA, which Brussels is offering now, only in case that the EU guaranteed its territorial integrity.