The Mayor of the Presevo Valley Bujanovac town told N1 that a longtime lack of willingness to include the ethnic Albanians into the state structures and in the society as a whole left an impression that Serbia didn’t want them.
Saip Kamberi said that the Assembly of the Albanians from Bujanovac, Presevo and Medvedja, the three municipalities in the Valley, adopted a declaration demanding that participants in the Belgrade – Pristina dialogue include their problems in the talks.
“We doubt that any agreement between Kosovo and Serbia would bring stability unless our problems that have not been solved with Belgarde for 17 years are not settled or if they are pushed under the carpet,” Kamberi, of the Party for Democratic Action, (PPD) said.
He added they told Kosovo’s President Hashi Thaci about the issues and asked him to insist that Presevo Valley Albanian rights become a part of the European Union-facilitated dialogue.
“The idea of border correction as a possible solution came up later,” Kamberi said.
Pristina leaders advocate that Presevo Valley should join Kosovo as a part of border correction between Serbia and Kosovo. Belgrade has not publicly commented on the issue yet.
He described some of the problems as an almost absolute absence of ethnic Albanians in the local institutions, issues in the educations, non-recognition of diplomas and lack of textbooks.
Kamberi said that his party had been trying to cooperate with state institutions, their only MP voted for the last two governments, they had talks with both President Aleksandar Vucic and Prime Minister Ana Brnabic last June, but apart from promises, their problems were not solved.
He warned that unless the issue of ethnic Albanians in the Presevo Valley were dealt with within the framework of the Brussels dialogue, “any particular solution would lead to humanitarian catastrophe because people will leave.”
