The future Community/Association of Serbian Municipalities (ZSO) should be formed very quickly, said Serbian First Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic.
According to him, it will represent “the first political authority of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija since 1999.”
Asked whether the ZSO was “a step towards a partition of Kosovo,” Dacic told the Belgrade-based TV Pink this was “not being discussed at the moment.”
“It is now the first autonomous form that is lower than what we call a province,” said Dacic.
Speaking about the membership negotiations with the EU, the minister said that the organization has “fallen behind” because Serbia “prepared all chapters for opening last year, something that has also been concluded by the European Council.”
“We were waiting for the adoption of a political decision, for which, I think, the conditions exist to be taken now,” Dacic said.
He then added he “expects it to happen quickly, not next year” while “the most realistic option is that the Second Conference is held by the end of the year, since the first was held in January last year.”
Speaking on about the migrant issue, Dacic said that foreign ministers of the European Union will be meeting on Friday and Saturday.
He added that the meeting in Luxembourg will consider “the general situation in Europe,” while a conference, initially planned for September, has been postponed for the second half of October, “which shows there is still no right solution.”
He also said a session of the European Council has been scheduled for mid-September.
According to the foreign minister the migrant crisis “will not end soon – because there are millions of migrants moving to Europe, and the EU will have to respond.”
“The problem is that all these migrants, who come to us, are not registered anywhere,” said Dacic.
He noted that Serbia has been facing the issue for several years and has received more than 90,000 requests for asylum, while 44,000 people in the country still have the status of refugees, in addition to the 220,000 internally displaced persons from Kosovo.
Dacic pointed out to the problem of double standards – “because now Serbia is asked to draft an action plan for addressing the migrant crisis, as if Serbia caused the migrant crisis.” According to him, “bilateral relations with Hungary have not been spoiled.”
