Chairman of the Serbian parliament’s Committee for Kosovo-Metohija (KiM) Milovan Drecun said Sunday that it was necessary for the executive government in Pristina to be set up as soon as possible as it was vital for the creation of the community of Serb municipalities (ZSO) and continuation of the Brussels process.

"For us it is most important that the executive power is formed as soon as possible, so that we can finalize the creation of the community of Serb municipalities, as the ZSO is the condition of all conditions for a promising future of the Serb people in Kosovo-Metohija and long-term sustainability of a policy pursued by Serbia in our southern province,” Drecun said for Novi Sad-based daily Dnevnik.

Drecun said that every delay in the setting up of the government in Pristina was putting the realization of that objective, the central element of the Brussels agreement, fundamentally out of reach.

Expressing his confidence that the ethnic Albanians would soon reach an agreement between them on the government creation following the June 8 Kosovo election, Drecun stressed that the KiM Serbs would “definitely be part of the executive power in Pristina, not just because it is guaranteed by the constitution there or because the EU will insist on that, but also because of the fact that it is important for their voice to be clearly heard there.”

Drecun pointed out that the creation of the executive power in Pristina was a necessary condition for a discussion about “the format of the continuation of the Brussels process,” adding that “as long as the government is not formed there, the normalization of relations cannot be taken forward and no new topics can be opened.”

Speaking about a possible change of the model of dialogue, Drecun stressed that Serbia’s key requirement remained that the dialogue had to be status-neutral.