We are very happy that UNESCO Executive Council has decided to place Kosovo on the agenda. That is small procedural victory because Serbia tried very hard to remove this topic from the agenda, said Kosovo Deputy Foreign Minister Petrit Selimi to Danas.

When asked whether normalization of relations is possible because many Serbs claim that is it not possible because Kosovo is trying to take over Serbian Christian monuments, Selimi said that this is ridiculous since Serbian Orthodox monuments are property of the Serbian Orthodox Church, and added that Kosovo Albanian leaders have pledged publicly that monuments will remain Serbian, whereas status of the church won’t be jeopardized ever. “The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon wrote in three reports that he congratulates Kosovo for our inter-religious dialogue. We are active members of the global coalition against the violent extremism. Thus, Orthodox Church (SPC) is safe in Kosovo, and will be safer when Kosovo becomes member of the UNESCO,” said Selimi.

Selimi also said that the issue of the Serbian Orthodox Church heritage won’t be open in the course of the Brussels dialogue because no topic could be on the agenda in Brussels without the explicit consent of both sides, and added that Brussels dialogue has nothing to do with the UN organizations.