• Kurti: On March 18, we discuss implementation plan (RTK)
• Lajcak to arrive in Kosovo today (media)
• U.S. concerned with opposition’s objection to European plan (Koha)
• Konjufca: Association should not be formed before agreement (Zeri)
• EU Council is expected to adopt visa liberalization for Kosovo today (media)
• Abdixhiku: Agreement with Serbia must have recognition at center (media)
• Krasniqi: We expressed our reservations regarding agreement (Reporteri)
• Southeast Europe Marches for Women’s Rights (BIRN)
• Kosovo Serb Policeman Arrested on War Crimes Charges (BIRN)
• Right-Wing Serbian Students Protest Against EU Kosovo Deal (BIRN)

Kurti: On March 18, we discuss implementation plan (RTK)

Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti spoke on Wednesday about the March 18 meeting in Ohrid, during a visit to a local business in Pristina. “Our expectations are that preparations for the March 18 meeting which will be held in North Macedonia, in Ohrid, will continue, and let us see how we can attach to the agreed European proposal a real implementation plan that should be characterized by inclusiveness and efficiency,” he said.

Kurti reiterated that he was ready to sign the European proposal. “I was ready to sign when we were in Brussels, so you understand that an agreement requires parties and not just one,” he said. According to Kurti, it is a shame that the agreed text with five sentences, a preamble and 10 Articles has not already been signed on February 27. “Why there are no signatures, I believe that the answer should be sought from others,” he added.

Lajcak to arrive in Kosovo today (media)

EU Special Representative for the dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia, Miroslav Lajcak, will stay in Pristina today and tomorrow. After his visit to Kosovo, Lajcak is scheduled to travel to Belgrade where he will meet Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic.

Klan Kosova quotes a statement from Brussels as saying that Lajcak’s visit to Pristina is a follow-up of the high-level meeting held in Brussels on 27 February and preparations for the 18 March meeting in Ohrid, North Macedonia. Discussions with the parties will focus on the annex of the implementation plan of the European proposal.

U.S. concerned with opposition’s objection to European plan (Koha)

The United States has expressed concern over the objections of opposition parties to the European proposal for the normalisation of relations between Kosovo and Serbia. A spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy in Pristina told Koha on Wednesday: “We fully support the EU's proposal for the path towards the normalization of relations between Kosovo and Serbia. Our joint efforts to move this proposal forward have included consultations with the opposition parties of Kosovo … President Biden and State Secretary Blinken, on their recent communications on the Independence Day of Kosovo, highlighted that the proposal has our strong support, and it would lead Kosovo towards greater regional stability, economic prosperity as well as European and Euro-Atlantic integration. We are concerned about the statements made by the leaders and officials of the opposition parties who have expressed opposition to the EU proposal. These views are not consistent with US support for the proposal.”

Konjufca: Association should not be formed before agreement (Zeri)

Kosovo Assembly President Glauk Konjufca said in an interview with ATV on Wednesday that the Association of Serb majority municipalities should not be formed before an agreement is reached with Serbia, “otherwise that would be a serious mistake”.

“We should go to Ohrid with our position that the agreement is constructed like this: De facto recognition happens and then Kosovo finds the modus for the Association. If we go the other way around, Kosovo would be damaged and it is wrong to take such a position,” Konjufca was quoted as saying.

EU Council is expected to adopt visa liberalization for Kosovo today (media)

The Council for Justice and Internal Affairs of the Council of the EU,) is expected to approve today its position in the first reading on the liberalization of visas with Kosovo.

This is stated in the agenda of the Council.

According to the announcement, as Klan Kosova reports, the EU Council's statement of reasons for the issue of visas with Kosovo will also be approved at this meeting, these reasons approved by "Coreper" (Committee of Permanent Representatives in the European Union).

Regulation on the liberalization of visas for Kosovo. Adoption of the Council's position at first reading and of the statement of reasons of the Council approved by Coreper, part 2, on 1.3.2023", the agenda notes.

Abdixhiku: Agreement with Serbia must have recognition at center (media)

Leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), Lumir Abdixhiku, was received at the Elysee Palace by the adviser of President Emmanuel Macron, Isabelle Dumont; in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs by the deputy director for Continental Europe, Sylvain Guiaugue; while in the senate by Senator Sénatrice Laure Darcos, chairperson of the France-Kosovo Friendship Group.

In these meetings he expressed his appreciation for the support of the French state in all the state-building periods of Kosovo, LDK announces.

Abdixhiku reiterated the position of the LDK on the dialogue process, as a process which Kosovo should treat with priority as a means towards reaching a final and legally binding agreement, with recognition at its center. "The implementation of preliminary agreements, in accordance with the constitutional order of the Republic of Kosovo, have no alternative", he said.

Abdixhiku also highlighted the necessity to open a new path towards Euro-Atlantic integration with special emphasis on the fastest possible membership of Kosovo in NATO and the support that France can provide in this direction.

Krasniqi: We expressed our reservations regarding agreement (Reporteri)

Leader of the Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) Memli Krasniqi met the French ambassador to Kosovo, Olivier Guerot. He announced on Facebook that he and Guerot discussed the current political situation and developments in the dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia.

“To Ambassador Guerot, I expressed the positions of the Democratic Party of Kosovo regarding this process and the reservations that we have shown publicly regarding the current agreement presented, focusing especially on the lack of mutual recognition as the final result of the dialogue process between Kosovo and Serbia.

PDK remains committed to continuous cooperation and constructive coordination with our international allies, always in order to achieve our national goals,” Krasniqi wrote on Facebook.

Southeast Europe Marches for Women’s Rights (BIRN)

Women’s rights organizations in countries all over Southeast Europe staged Women’s Day marches and rallies, demanding equal rights and better protection against domestic violence.

Domestic violence survivor Elvedina Hajdari on Wednesday joined the Women’s Day march in Kosovo organized by civil society and women’s rights NGOs in the capital, Pristina, sharing her own experience of judicial institutions’ neglect.

“I came here to demand justice for women near the justice institutions that often become accomplices to the violence committed against us,” Hajdari said at the Palace of Justice in Pristina, where different justice institutions are located.

Hajdari reported domestic violence committed against her in 2021 and explained that despite her former husband being charged with a criminal violation, he was released in regular procedure and continued to bother her.

This year, Kosovo women’s rights activists and citizens are marching under the slogan “We march, we don’t celebrate, for a life without violence for women and girls”.

In 2022 in Kosovo, 2,289 women were victims of domestic violence. In January and February alone, 320 women reported domestic violence. Civil society has often condemned the lenient sentences courts issue in gender-based violence cases.

In October 2022, the Kosovo government backed legal changes to impose stricter sentences for rape, sexual assault and domestic violence, as well as enabling the publication of convicted sexual abusers’ identities.

Kosovo was not the only country in the region marching on Women’s Day, demanding respect for women’s rights.

Read more at: https://bit.ly/3Yxw7si

Kosovo Serb Policeman Arrested on War Crimes Charges (BIRN)

Kosovo’s Special Prosecution announced on Tuesday that a Kosovo Serb policeman had been arrested on war crimes charges for allegedly beating and torturing a person at the police station in Kamenice/Kamenica in 1999, while on official duty.

“It is suspected that the defendant Z.A., during the Kosovo war, specifically in March 1999, at the police station in Kamenica, in the capacity of an official and in collaboration other members of the Serbian police, in uniform and armed, first beat the victim with the initials B.M. with rubber rods and kicks, inhumanely torturing (him), mistreating him and causing heavy injuries,” the announcement read, adding the victim risked losing their life.

While the Prosecution presented the suspect only with initials, Serbia’s Office for Kosovo confirmed his identity as Zlatko Arsic, a Kosovo Police member from the eastern municipality of Kamenicë/Kamenica.

The Kosovo prosecution said also that in February-March 1999, Z.A. is suspected, in co-perpetration with other members of the Serbian police and paramilitary groups, of participating in “the forced expulsion and displacement of the citizens of Kamenica and the surrounding area, and then looting houses, and then with the aim of damaging the property of Albanians, setting fire to them and taking part in the mistreatment of civilians Albanians”.

Read more at: https://bit.ly/3l0ueq4

Right-Wing Serbian Students Protest Against EU Kosovo Deal (BIRN)

Several hundred people gathered at a protest called “Students for Kosmet” organized by students of the University of Belgrade, denouncing the EU plan for the normalisation of relations between Kosovo and Serbia.

The protesters also criticized the idea of forming an Association of Serb-Majority Municipalities in Kosovo, a planned body to represent the Kosovo Serb community that was agreed in a previous deal signed in Brussels in 2013 but not yet been implemented.

“We have only one single demand, it is clear and we will not give up on it, that is the immediate termination of all negotiations and discussions within the framework of the French-German plan,” one of the speakers said.

“That plan leads the Serbian people to ruin, and the government that signs it leads to treason,” it was said.

The protest was held at the Faculty of Philosophy after which the protesters walked to the building of Radio Television of Serbia, RTS, demanding that the public service provide an opportunity for people to hear another opinion on the matter.

Read more at: https://bit.ly/3Zy8j8W