Acting Prime Minister Albin Kurti, in an exclusive interview for KosovaPress, also spoke about relations with the United States of America and the dialogue with Serbia in the upcoming mandate.
In September last year, the United States suspended the strategic dialogue with Kosovo. Kurti tells KosovaPress that all officials responsible for foreign policy are working intensively to lift the suspension of the strategic dialogue.
He emphasizes that they are in regular communication with the Embassy of the United States of America, in order to clarify all issues that are considered disputable. According to him, this approach aims to ensure excellent relations also on the diplomatic level.
“There has been a suspension of planning and preparations for the strategic dialogue. Through our official state channels, all state officials who bear responsibility for foreign policy are working intensively. We are in regular communication with the Embassy of the United States of America here in Prishtina, in order to clarify all issues that are open to discussion and, in this way, to maintain excellent relations on the diplomatic level, just as we have them in the fields of defense and security, but I would also say in development and energy, especially now that the compact program has continued, through which, from the Millennium Challenge Corporation, we are receiving a grant of 202 million dollars — not a loan, a grant — from the United States of America, for batteries with a capacity of 170 megawatts, which can store 340 megawatt-hours over two hours, given that renewable energy will continue to be our focus based on the strategy, with an additional 1,300 megawatts by the year 2031,” he emphasizes.
Kurti, whose party won over 50 percent of the vote in the December 28 elections, based on preliminary results from the Central Election Commission, insists that relations with the United States will remain strong.
Regarding the dialogue with Serbia in the upcoming mandate, Kurti says they will once again insist on the signing of the Brussels Basic Agreement and the Ohrid Implementation Annex, agreed upon in 2023.
In addition, he says that for the dialogue to continue, chief terrorist Milan Radojicic must be handed over to Kosovo’s security authorities.
“We are in favor of fully implementing them, but we have said that in order to have legal guarantees and an expression of goodwill, they must be signed. This has been refused by Serbia, even though the European Union, fully in its role as mediator, welcomes the Brussels Agreement and the Ohrid Implementation Annex. Now, in order for the dialogue to continue, we must implement the agreements. But for the dialogue to continue, of course, we need Milan Radojicic — the chief terrorist who killed our police sergeant, the hero of Kosovo, Afrim Bunjaku — to be handed over to Kosovo’s security authorities, given that there is a 160-page indictment from the Special Prosecution, together with 44 other paramilitaries, who attempted in Banjska of Zvecan to initiate a conflict of large proportions, from which they hoped Serbia’s intervention could be provoked to annex northern Kosovo. They failed. They also failed with the subsequent blowing up of the Ibër-Lepenc canal, for which there is likewise an indictment, and they will fail every time. However, a European good-neighborly agreement, based on the Brussels Basic Agreement and the Ohrid Implementation Annex, cannot move forward as long as Milan Radojicic, as we speak today, is closer to President Vucic than even his own close security detail,” he emphasizes.
Regarding membership in the Council of Europe, NATO, and even the European Union by the end of his third mandate, Kurti is more reserved, but says that Kosovo will fulfill all its obligations.
“Our aim is undoubtedly to join the Council of Europe. As Kosovo, we have fulfilled all our obligations. The very fact that we passed with 82 percent in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe shows that Kosovo has fulfilled its part. Now, some skeptical states remain, which use their influence. Meanwhile, I believe that we are a state that will first join NATO and then the European Union. We will do everything we know and can to move as quickly as possible. But as far as the European Union is concerned, first we need to receive the questionnaire from the European Commission, because we applied for membership three years ago, and at the same time we need candidate country status. Previously, we were the only country without visa liberalization — this was achieved in the previous mandate. Now we remain the only country that does not have candidate status, and this is something we must achieve,” he emphasizes. /KosovaPress/
