European Commission’s annual reports urge Serbia and Kosovo to implement normalization agreements, as both countries move in the opposite direction
The Commission’s annual reports on the countries aspiring to EU accession, published on Wednesday, called on Serbia and Kosovo to ‘to implement the obligations stemming from the Agreement on the Path to Normalisation and its Implementation Annex, as well as all past Dialogue agreements’. The Commission emphasised that Serbia’s progress on the rule of law and the normalisation of relations with Kosovo will continue to determine the overall pace of the accession negotiations., while calling on Kosovo to implement all past agreements without further delays or preconditions.
Why is this significant: The Commission’s call comes at a time when the leaders of both countries appear to be increasingly diverging from the dialogue.
Context: Earlier this week, the Serbian government announced its approval of a draft law aimed at organizing and empowering Serbian judicial bodies to prosecute criminal offenses committed in Kosovo, specifically targeting individuals involved in what the Serbian government called ‘the persecution of the Serbian population’.
On Wednesday, an EU spokesperson stated that these draft laws clearly violate Serbia’s obligations from the dialogue with Kosovo and contradict the country’s recent reaffirmation of commitment to the process. The spokesperson called on Serbia to reconsider this bill.
In Kosovo, Prime Minister Albin Kurti stated on Tuesday that as a prime minister, he cannot establish the Association of Municipalities with a Serbian majority, which is one of the primary demands for Kosovo under the normalization agreement with Serbia.
Kurti stressed that he had previously expressed his willingness to draft a statute for the Association himself in March 2023 in Ohrid, when Kosovo and Serbia reached an agreement on the annex to the Basic Agreement. “I offered to draft the statute on March 18, 2023, in Ohrid, but my proposal was declined. However, I want to emphasize that I am the prime minister of a democratic republic. Since Kosovo is a democratic republic, prime ministers do not create associations of municipalities,” Kurti stated.
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