• Dialogue without a direct meeting between the delegations (Koha)
• Kurti: Mistake some Muslim-majority countries don’t recognize Kosovo (media)
• Kosovo government building lights up in colors of Ukraine flag (media)
• Putin calls for recognition of Crimea as Russia, compares it to Kosovo (RFE)
• Haziri proposes internal dialogue before new phase of talks with Serbia (media)
• Surroi: Agreement with Serbia not expected to be finalised this year (RTK)
• Kosovo murder trial witnesses nervous about accusing Serb gang (BIRN)
• COVID-19: 158 new cases, one death (media)

Dialogue without a direct meeting between the delegations (Koha)

The meeting between the Kosovo delegation and the EU Special Representative Miroslav Lajcak on Tuesday in Brussels focused on the missing persons, license plates and the energy. There were also talks about a peace treaty between Kosovo and Serbia. The chief negotiators, Besnik Bislimi and Petar Petkovic, held separate meetings with Lajcak and there was no tripartite meeting.

Diplomatic sources in Brussels told Koha that there were discussions about the implementation of agreements reached so far and the future steps in the normalisation of relations between Kosovo and Serbia. Sources said the meetings served to see if there enough readiness from the parties for a high-level meeting between Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic. Both parties said they are ready for such a meeting, but the EU insisted that if the meeting were to happen it needs to produce concrete results. Sources also said that the high-level meeting will depend on the meeting of the chief negotiators and if the parties will approximate positions on several important issues.

Petkovic said in an interview with Serbian media that he does not see how the dialogue in Brussels can continue if the Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities is not formed.

Kurti: Mistake that some Muslim majority countries don’t recognize Kosovo (media)

Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti said in an interview with Arab News that it’s a big mistake that some of the countries with Muslim majority population are not recognizing Kosovo. “I think they have been misinformed by Serbia and some of them do this because they keep some close links with the Russian Federation. However, I would urge all the countries in the world for the sake of long-term peace, sustainable security and recognizing the right of people to freedom and self-determination, to recognize the independence of Kosovo. In a way, those that don’t recognize the independence of Kosovo with or without intention, they fall prey to supporting Serbia from the time of Milosevic, who committed genocide in Kosovo. So they should distance themselves from Serbia which wanted to exterminate the Albanian people from Kosovo,” Kurti said.

Kosovo government building lights up in colors of Ukraine flag (media)

Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti said on Tuesday evening that the colors of the national flag of Ukraine will illuminate the government building as a sign of solidarity in light of recent turmoil.

“No matter how dark the times or how hard the struggle, history favors the just. In this critical time for the Ukranian people we lit up the building of the government to show the solidarity of the people of Kosovo with the people of Ukraine,” Kurti said in a Twitter post.

Putin calls for recognition of Crimea as Russia, compares it to Kosovo (RFE)

Russian President Vladimir Putin has called for the international recognition of Crimea as part of Russia and compared it to Kosovo, the news website reports. In a speech on February 22, Putin said that the annexation of Crimea should be recognized as a legitimate reflection of the choice of local people. The annexation of Crimea, following the holding of a referendum that has been described as rigged by the international community, has been widely condemned by Western powers and considered a violation of international law. This happened almost nine years after NATO intervention against the Serbian army targets ended the almost two-year war. Over 10,000 people have been killed in the war and thousands more have gone missing. The International Court of Justice ruled in 2010 that Kosovo’s independence “does not violate international law.”

Haziri proposes internal dialogue before new phase of talks with Serbia (media)

Deputy leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), Lutfi Haziri, said on Tuesday that there should be internal political dialogue before Kosovo enters into a new phase of dialogue with Serbia.

Haziri criticized the Kurti-led government for hesitating in the process and for failing to build supporting teams and mechanisms. He argued that regional crisis can have an impact and slow down the process of dialogue, which he argued, is crucial for Kosovo.

“The parliamentary majority has the support of the opposition for the dialogue, but this support is not infinite. We cannot say that we support their hesitation and lack of trust. We support the government in being insisting and creative and not condition the dialogue with secondary issues,” he said.

Surroi: Agreement with Serbia not expected to be finalised this year (RTK)

Publicist Veton Surroi said in an interview with RTK on Tuesday commented on the course of dialogue with Serbia and the Association/Community of Serb-majority municipalities. Asked if there will be a final settlement between Kosovo and Serbia this year, Surroi said that not necessarily and that if timelines are set, they need to be respected and usually the compromises that are made in such cases are not always good. “But from Kosovo’s side there is no compromise that would threaten Kosovo’s constitutional order,” he said.

Surroi was asked what Kosovo’s compromise in the dialogue would be as both Lajcak and Escobar in their recent visit to Kosovo said there would not be a Serbian Republic in Kosovo. “I don’t think this should be elaborated in public and let alone speculate on this. But the Community of Serb-majority municipalities has entered the discussions as an attempt by Serbia to establish a third tier of government between the central and local government,” Surroi said. “Unfortunately, the agreement was signed by the Kosovar side and it was adopted in the Assembly, and this agreement today falls in contravention with the Constitution.”

Kosovo murder trial witnesses nervous about accusing Serb gang (BIRN)

Witnesses at the trial for the murder of the Kosovo Serb politician Oliver Ivanovic expressed reluctance to repeat previous testimony in which they accused alleged members of a Serb criminal gang of wrongdoing.

Two witnesses at the trial for the 2018 killing of Kosovo Serb political party leader Oliver Ivanovic at the Pristina Basic Court on Tuesday showed reluctance to confirm previous testimonies they gave to the prosecution in which they named alleged members of organised criminal groups that operate in the Serb-dominated north of Kosovo.

The first witness, Radmila Rajcic, said in the testimony she gave to the prosecution in December 2018 that “Ivanovic was murdered by the same criminal group [led by Milan Radojicic]” as her son.

In court on Tuesday, however, the witness refused to repeat the allegation.

“I am not sure, I do not deny my testimony but that was only my opinion,” she said when she was asked about her previous statement, claiming that what she said was based on rumours and not on what she knew for certain.

Powerful Kosovo Serb businessman Milan Radojicic is vice-president of the main Belgrade-backed Kosovo Serb party, Srpska Lista. The indictment in the Ivanovic case accused him of being the leader of the criminal organised group that organised the murder in January 2018, together with Kosovo Serb businessman Zvonko Veselinovic. They have both denied any involvement and neither man is on trial.

All the witnesses so far in the trial have been reluctant to confirm previous testimonies about the alleged organised criminal group led by Radojicic.

Four of the defendants in the trial – Marko Rosic, Silvana Arsovic, Rade Basara and Nedeljko Spasojevic – are accused of being members of the joint criminal enterprise that murdered Ivanovic.

Two police officers, Dragisa Markovic and Zarko Jovanovic, are also on trial, accused of evidence-tampering in the case. All the defendants have pleaded not guilty.

Witness Rajic also told the court on Tuesday that “I do not know any of the policemen here”, referring to the accused.

However, during her testimony she revealed she had tried to initiate criminal charges against several policemen who she believed had neglected their duties when it came to solving her own son’s murder case. The policemen included one of the accused in the Ivanovic trial, Rade Basara.

The second witness on Tuesday, Dragan Jablanovic, was the mayor of the Serb-majority municipality of Leposavic until December 2017, a month before Ivanovic’s murder.

Jablanovic was also reluctant to repeat the testimony he gave to prosecutors when he was first questioned in 2019.

He had mentioned one occasion when he was prevented from entering his office by at least five unidentified people, who told him that “Milan Radojicic paid us 1,000 euros each to not let you enter your office”.

On Tuesday, however, Jablanovic declined to mention Radojicic, saying that “I was not told who paid them but only that they were paid 1,000 euros each to prevent me from entering the office”.

Jablanovic, from the Kosovo Serbs Party (Partija Kosovskih Srba), also told the court about political intimidation in northern Kosovo in the period before Ivanovic’s killing.

He said that, like Ivanovic, whose car was set on fire, he received threats from representatives of the Belgrade-backed Sprska Lista during the 2017 municipal election campaign.

He said that an explosive device was thrown at his house and that activists from his political party were followed and beaten up by those from Srpska Lista.

“None of us in Leposavic was feeling safe [after Ivanovic’s car was torched],” he said.

Ivanovic was once seen as a hardline nationalist, but before his death had evolved into a political moderate who advocated coexistence between Kosovo’s Serb minority and Albanian majority. He had also become increasingly vocal in his criticism of the Belgrade government.

At the time of his death, he was being retried for ordering the murder of Kosovo Albanians during the war in Kosovo in 1999. He pleaded not guilty.

COVID-19: 158 new cases, one death (media)

158 new cases with COVID-19 and one death from the virus were recorded in the last 24 hours in Kosovo, the Ministry of Health said in a statement. 644 persons recovered from the virus during this time.

There are 3,396 active cases with COVID-19 in Kosovo.