KOPAONIK - The Serbian Association of Car Insurers could not sign a vehicle insurance agreement with Kosovo's authorities even after three years of negotiations, although it has offered a considerable price cut, the association's secretary general Vladan Manic has said.

Besides the significant price reduction for insurance services, the association offered a wide range of tariffs that would enable freedom of movement of people, goods and services across the administrative line between central Serbia and Kosovo-Metohija, Manic said at the Kopaonik Business Forum on Tuesday evening.

However, the association refused to sign any contract that would stipulate the payment of vehicle insurance at the administrative line, Manic said at a panel discussion titled “Key Issues in Insurance Industry in Recovery Period”.

Manic said that the association could not accept to sign this agreement with Kosovo's bodies, as that would indirectly mean the recognition of Kosovo's statehood.

Kosovo has been placed under the UN interim administration (UNMIK) after international forces entered the southern Serbian province, after the signing of the Kumanovo Agreement, which brought the NATO aggression and bombing of Serbia to an end, in June 1999.

However, with the support of the United States and Western Europe's leading powers, ethnic Albanians in KiM unilaterally proclaimed independence on February 17, 2008. Serbia does not recognize it.

Negotiations on the normalization of relations between Belgrade and Pristina have been taking place under the auspices of the EU in Brussels since 2013.