Slovenian President visiting Belgrade: there is political will to preserve peace – EURACTIV.com
Slovenian President Borut Pahor visited Belgrade, where he met with his Serbian counterpart Aleksandar Vučić and discussed the political will to preserve the European view of the Western Balkans and stability.
“The war in Ukraine does not contribute to peace and stability in the Western Balkans, and Vučić and I agree that regardless of all the mistrust and bilateral issues in the Western Balkans, there is enough political will to preserve peace and the European perspective,” Pahor told reporters.
He said he believed all regional leaders would be able to agree on three central issues. “The first is to speed up the accession negotiations of Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Albania to the EU, grant candidate status to Bosnia and Herzegovina, and fulfill the EU’s obligations regarding visa liberalization,” he said, not mentioning Kosovo.
Slovenia recognizes Kosovo’s independence, declared in 2008 after a bloody 1998-1999 war that killed thousands of Kosovo Albanians and displaced 1.5 million, and even has an embassy in Belgrade. Serbia, however, rejects this and insists on the belief that it is a province that should be returned to Belgrade’s control.
Regarding the Serbian position on the EU sanctions against Russia, Pahor said that he believes that Belgrade will think more about the sanctions if Belgrade has a reliable European future, and not only condemns the war in Ukraine.
“I do not support the decision of the Serbian president not to impose sanctions against Russia, but I can understand it. I think that this decision would be helped by a greater, more decisive will in Brussels for faster admission of the Western Balkan countries to the EU,” he said.