Sorensen meets Petkovic and Bislimi on the dialogue's work plan
The EU envoy held separate Brussels meetings with the Belgrade and Pristina negotiating teams aimed at agreeing a work plan for the months ahead.
European Union Special Representative for the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue Peter Sorensen on 13 May held separate consultations in Brussels with the heads of the two negotiating teams, the Director of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija Petar Petkovic and Kosovo’s chief negotiator Besnik Bislimi. The aim of the meetings, Sorensen said on X, was to chart a work plan for the dialogue for the coming months within the European-mediated normalisation process, the European Western Balkans portal reported the same day.
According to the published agenda, Sorensen set out three items for the two delegations: drafting a concrete work plan, further activities in the normalisation process, and implementation of agreements already signed. The talks did not cover specific texts; rather, according to the European External Action Service, they stayed at the level of an indicative work programme. The heads of the two delegations at leadership level did not take part, which in diplomatic terms signals that the dialogue remains at the technical stage.
After the meeting, Petkovic told Belgrade media that he had alerted Sorensen to “almost daily political and institutional pressure” on Serbs in the north of Kosovo, and that he had set out Belgrade’s position on preserving peace and stability in the region, the Pravda Balkan portal reported. An hour later, according to the KoSSev portal, chief negotiator Bislimi said Petkovic, after agreeing the content of a statement, had “made inaccurate claims” and “broken the agreement” on jointly framing the messaging out of Brussels.
Why has a leaders’ meeting been off for months?
EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas said in late April that the “permanent electoral cycle in Kosovo” is the main reason for the absence of a fresh leaders’ meeting between Aleksandar Vucic and Albin Kurti, the European Western Balkans portal notes. After the February parliamentary elections in Kosovo, government formation is taking place under Kurti’s limited mandate, which on the Brussels side makes it harder to enter substantive, rather than procedural, negotiations.
From the Serbian government, Foreign Ministry State Secretary Dejan Stojanovic said Belgrade is “ready to continue the talks at any moment”, but that a result requires implementation of the 2013 Brussels Agreement, principally the part on the Community of Serb Municipalities. From the opposition, Vladeta Jankovic of the People’s Party said Belgrade has “for years formally been waiting for a counterpart” and that the public at home should see the concrete proposals the Serbian team is tabling in Brussels.
From the Brussels corridors, according to unnamed diplomatic sources cited by the weekly Vreme, the meetings with Petkovic and Bislimi ran between 90 and 120 minutes and took place in smaller Commission working rooms, a signal that the mediator wants to keep the dialogue at a low protocol profile at this stage. Over the same period Sorensen held consultations with representatives of the French, German and Italian diplomatic missions in Brussels, with a particular focus on the financial component of the normalisation process. The Quint, the informal group of Western countries tracking the dialogue, has announced a meeting at the level of special representatives on 22 May in Berlin to discuss financial support for concrete steps on the ground.
The next item on the calendar is the EU-Western Balkans summit on 5 June in Tivat, which could provide the occasion for an informal meeting of Vucic and Kurti under the mediation of European leaders. The Montenegrin Foreign Ministry, as the host, said the summit programme has been drawn up in coordination with Brussels and includes working sessions by clusters. From the Pristina side, Kosovo’s caretaker prime minister said he would attend, while Belgrade has announced the presence of the president and the foreign minister. Whether that encounter turns into a working meeting or remains a protocol exchange is a question that will be settled in the days before the summit.
