The Serbian President and leader of the ruling SNS party told a party gathering in Belgrade that he would face a request to recognize a full independence of Kosovo, without divisions and "full and integral territory of an independent Kosovo," Serbian media reported.

He said he would speak with the presidents of China and Russia in Beijing and then head to Berlin for very difficult meetings with the leaders of France and Germany.

President Aleksandar Vucic and Russian Ambassador Alexander Chepurin discussed on Tuesday the organization of Vucic's meeting with President Vladimir Putin.

Vucic and Vladimir Putin are scheduled to meet in Beijing during the Belt and Road forum. Vucic said today that he is honored to be meeting again with Putin.

He said that this would be their 16th meeting, the second this year, and that he will be pleased to talk with the president of Russia about bilateral cooperation in all areas, as well as the situation in the region, the president’s press office has announced.

Mirjana Markovic, the the widow of former Serbian and Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, died on Sunday of pneumonia, Tanjug has been able to confirm. According to unofficial information, she died in a hospital in Moscow.

Dragan Radovic from the Freedom Association told Tanjug that he was in contact with the family and that Markovic died of pneumonia after undergoing two surgeries.

Radovic said that she wanted to be buried in Pozarevac next to her husband, but that the family would have the final say on this.

Russia's next ambassador to Serbia, Aleksandr Botsan-Kharchenko, will arrive to Belgrade in June, when the current ambassador Aleksandr Chepurin leaves his post.

Belgrade based daily Blic writes this, and adds, referring to its diplomatic sources, that Chepurin will continue his career in the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Serbia's new ambassador to Russia will be Miroslav Lazanski, a member of the Serbian National Assembly from the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), and a military commentator.

The proposal to name Lazanski as the head of our embassy in Moscow was adopted at a government session last week, Vecernje Novosti daily reported.

Lazanski will be replacing Slavenko Terzic, who's four-year term as ambassador expired back in 2017.

Sooner or later the EU must accept Serbia and other Western Balkans states as its members, since it is the only way to “preserve” these countries from the influence of other stakeholders, foremost Russia and China, diplomatic sources unofficially told Belgrade-based daily Danas.

They noted “the enlargement is the only tool at the Union’s disposal when it comes to the Balkans,” although it remains completely uncertain if 2025 would be a year of Serbia’s and Montenegro’s accession to the EU.

If there would be a unified stance of the international stakeholders, Pristina would by now revoke 100 percent tariffs it imposed on goods from central Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, Center for Foreign Policy Director, Dragan Djukanovic told RTS.

He also thinks there is a higher probability that due to the Kosovo issue extraordinary parliamentary elections in Serbia would take place in May next year, rather than in June this year.

Serbian media reported on a statement of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs saying that “aggression of NATO member states on Yugoslavia in 1999 represents a black stain that shall always remain on the reputation of North-Atlantic Alliance.”

The statement of the Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry can be seen at: http://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/news/-/asset_publisher/cKNonkJE02Bw/content/id/3583602

The central state ceremony of the 20^th anniversary of the NATO aggression and the Day of Remembrance of the victims was held in Nis, south Serbia, late on Sunday. The day marked 20 years since the western military alliance started its attacks on Serbia, that lasted 78 days.

Addressing the gathering President Aleksandar Vucic said that the death of 2,500 civilians during the NATO aggression, and especially 79 children, will always be a crime for us.

Prime Minister Ana Brnabic said today that Serbia is aware of the
mistakes it has made in the past but added that NATO bombing in 1999 was the
fault of others, not the citizens of Serbia.