Brussels is considering the possibility of holding a meeting between European Parliament members and Russian legislators "on neutral territory."
And this territory may be Serbia, according to a report in Russia's Izvestia newspaper, cited by TASS.
The initiative came from Jiri Mastalka, deputy chairman of the EP Committee on Relations with Russia, the daily said.
Serbia has the clearest stability of all countries in the region and it wants to have a stabilizing effect on other Western Balkan states.
This is what Serbian Prime Minister and President-elect Aleksandar Vucic said after meeting with German Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel on in Belgrade on Wednesday.
With Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic’s decisive victory in the presidential election on April 2, Serbia has edged closer to autocracy. Though the presidency is largely ceremonial, Mr. Vucic can now handpick his successor as prime minister and consolidate his power, since Parliament and the judiciary are all but locked up by Mr. Vucic’s Serbian Progressive Party. Having severely curtailed press freedom and marginalized political opposition, his concentration of power bodes ill for Serbian democracy.
Later this year, Serbia will take part in Collective Security Treaty Organization drills as a full-fledged member for the first time; the other six nations which comprise the regional military alliance are all close Russian allies and former Soviet republics.
US Senator John McCain will arrive in Belgrade for a meeting with Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic.
Vucic announced this during a news conference on Sunday, and said he and McCain will speak "about the position of Serbia and Kosovo."
Vucic said he "assumed" that "relationship toward Serbia, that is, about what is part of Serbia's foreign policy orientation" would also be discussed.
A growing political crisis in Albania, fears over foreigners buying up land in Serbia and problems of youth radicalisation are among the top stories on Balkan Insight this week.
Hotting Up
The political scene in Albania seems to be getting more and more heated by the day. No accident, given that Parliamentary elections are only two months away, prior to which the country’s Parliament will need to elect a new President.
The EU Rapporteur for Serbia and head of the Commission for Foreign Policies at the European Parliament, David McAllister, told German media that Serbia cannot become an EU member without admitting crimes committed in Kosovo and without normalization of the relations with Kosovo.
The President of Kosovo, Hashim Thaci, said that establishment of Kosovo’s army is already a necessity. “I have undertaken the legal initiative for KSF being convinced that all the possibilities to create it through the Constitution were exhausted. This also came as a need being that Kosovo cannot be part of NATO without an army. The common denominator is that Kosovo institutions, parliamentary parties as well as the civil society and the citizens are for the army,” Thaci said at a debate organized by FOL Movement.
During the election campaign Kosovo was not much of a topic for the presidential candidates in Serbia. Some have visited Kosovo but without much fanfare, and the winner although he announced his Leposavić's election rally, dropped out of the visit.
According to the head of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija Marko Đurić, Vučić has won the votes of 80 per cent of voters who on Sunday went to the polls.
After the decision of the Serbian Prime Minister, Aleksandar Vucic, to annul the visit to Kosovo, the Director of the Office for Kosovo at the Serbian government, Marko Djuric will be arriving. Sources of the portal from Mitrovica North, said that the gathering in Leposavic will be held, despite the objections of Albanian citizens, who blocked the roads to object arrival of Serbian politicians in Kosovo.