Acting Prime Minister Albin Kurti has said that Serbia understands better than ever before that Kosovo is a state, even though it continues to refuse recognition.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Kurti also accused opposition parties, saying that due to their lack of cooperation the country went to elections twice last year. He stressed that the people of Kosovo, according to him, refuse to return “to the era of corruption.” He added that the contributor to instability in the region, through Serbia, is the Russian Federation.

“Of the four neighbors that we have as the Republic of Kosovo, three recognize us. Only Serbia does not, and it does not seem that it will do so anytime soon. Even so, I think they understand better than ever that we are another state. Reality has changed a lot. But what needs to happen is for their dream of returning to be extinguished. Likewise, a contributor to this is the Russian Empire, or what is now the Russian Federation. The Russian Empire does not want neighbors, but it is impossible not to have neighbors,” he said.

At the same time, Kurti accused the opposition regarding the new elections, underlining that their lack of cooperation led to new elections and to a good result for him, in which he received over 51 percent of the vote.

“First of all, we did not go to new elections because we wanted to. That was not our goal, but a consequence of the lack of cooperation with the opposition. We won in February with 42.3 percent, but that was not enough. We tried everything. We tried to meet with one or two opposition political parties. One of them did not want to meet, one of them wanted the position of speaker of parliament with only three MPs. Then they did not accept our proposed name for speaker, even though we replaced that name dozens of times; the opposition still said ‘no’ to all of them. Then I replaced my own name with my deputy in the party, Glauk Konjufca, who had been speaker of parliament and would become the next deputy prime minister and foreign minister. Again they said no. So, throughout 2025, it was clear to the people that we did not have a government not because we did not win the elections, but because no one wanted to cooperate with us. Therefore, I think that if I had wanted new elections, people would have punished me. I did not want new elections, but if new elections were there, it was better to be ready. So there were consequences from the opposition’s lack of cooperation, not from any zeal of mine for new elections,” Kurti added.

On the other hand, Kurti said that during his governing mandate he inherited a situation of endemic corruption, and therefore, according to him, the people of Kosovo refuse to return to that condition in the future.

He emphasized that no one within his government cabinet even has the slightest imagination of being involved in corruption at any level.

“We inherited a situation in which corruption was endemic. There is strong resistance and resilience among people never to return there again. Therefore, our hope is the people; that they will notify the system and the public about the corruption they encounter. No one, absolutely no one within the cabinet of ministers has even the slightest imagination of being involved in corruption at any level, therefore we must lead by example,” he concluded.

The Vetëvendosje Movement won 51.11 percent of the vote in the elections held on December 28.