Belgrade and Pristina’s technical teams have reached an agreement in Brussels on integrated crossings. However, the agreement is not spared from various controversies. For one negotiating side nothing significant will change at crossings, for the other side those crossings will resemble, more than they used to, on border crossings.
According to Serbia’s Liaison Officer in Pristina Dejan Pavićević, crossings will remain in the so far fashion, without ramps, flags, state insignia or shifts in the regime of crossings. On the other side, head of Pristina’s team Edita Tahiri stated that makeshift premises will be replaced with proper premises build from the solid material and added that three crossings will be on the Kosovo’s side and three on Serbia’s side.
Most North Mitrovica inhabitatns are disappointed and think that crossings Jarinje and Brnjak in the north will resemble on customs check-points.
The Democratic Party of Serbia’s (DSS) official from northern Kosovo Marko Jakšić argues that this is another agreement in a row of agreements to the detriment of Serbia and voiced expectation that Constitutional Court of Serbia will declare the Brussels Agreement null and void.
“Belgrade claims that it is about status neutral agreement, I personally think that it is not the case. With such agreement another Albanian state has been set in Balkans. I think that the best opinion over the Brussels Agreements will be given by the Constitutional Court of Serbia,” concluded Jakšić.
Contradicting statements of both delegations were given and with regard to donors and managers of the project. Tahiri said that construction of the buildings will be funded by the European Union from the pre-accession funds, whereas Pavićević said that the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) will be in charge.
RTK2 tried to obtain comments from Serb political representatives from northern Kosovo but was told that they can’t comments the agreements since they were not direct participants in negotiations.
