The President of the Republic of Kosovo, Vjosa Osmani, considers that Kosovo can unilaterally implement the Brussels agreement and the Ohrid annex if it receives guarantees from international partners that in return it would benefit from recognition and membership in international organizations. However, she says that so far there has been no concrete answer to such a thing.
Vjosa Osmani for KosovaPress points out that without the approval of a legal act by the Government of Kosovo regarding the draft statute of the Association proposed by the European Union, no one can send it to the Constitutional Court for evaluation.
“It is only my position, not necessarily that of other institutions, I said, it has to do with the way we used them in 2007-2008. When Serbia did not implement it, we had it with our agreement with partners and allies, even though Kosovo had unilaterally implemented the Ahtisaari package, what it had gained was independence, recognition, membership in international organizations. If the international partners are interested in us sitting down with them and the implementation of agreements on the part of Kosovo is connected with international support, security guarantees, recognition and membership in international organizations, this is a new situation. However, until now there has been no concrete response from the international community for such a thing”, she said.
The president of the country, Vjosa Osmani, said that the implementation of the obligations arising from the Brussels agreement and the Ohrid annexation cannot be requested only for Kosovo, while Serbia has formally withdrawn from the said agreement.
“Before sending the draft of the statute to the Constitutional Court, a legal act must be approved by the Government, so without such an act no one can send the draft of the statute to the Constitutional Court, the procedures are clear, the Court has clarified the procedure… The basic agreement which was reached in Brussels and the Ohrid complaint foresee obligations for both parties. It is not possible to request the implementation of obligations only for one party, while the other party, i.e. Serbia, which has formally withdrawn from the agreement, remains without any obligations. The agreement only makes sense if both parties comply. So, in this case, Kosovo has undertaken extremely painful obligations, I would say through certain articles of this agreement, but they only make sense if Serbia also implements the agreement”, emphasized Osmani.
As for the approval of the draft law for Serbian judicial jurisdiction in Kosovo by the Serbian government, the president of the Republic of Kosovo, Vjosa Osmani, has considered such actions as a tactic of Serbia to destabilize Kosovo and the region.
According to her, Serbia has neither judicial nor territorial jurisdiction over Kosovo since 1999.
She even states that the only state that has jurisdiction over the country’s territory is the Republic of Kosovo.
“Obviously, Serbia has no judicial or territorial jurisdiction over Kosovo since 1999. It means that even before Kosovo was declared independent in 2008, resolution 1244 took away any kind of jurisdiction from (former) Yugoslavia at that time and initially established the powers within the framework of the civil and military presence from ’99 to 2008 and from 2008 onwards, the only state that has jurisdiction over this territory is the Republic of Kosovo, which has also been confirmed by the International Court of Justice. Now these are trends, they are tactics to destabilize Kosovo and the region, but at the same time what is best proven through these actions is that Serbia still has the mindset of the 90s, a mindset that aims to destabilize the states neighbor. However, the reality is irreversible and unchangeable and Serbia cannot achieve anything with this”, said President Osmani.
Likewise, Osmani emphasizes that Serbia, through the approval of such draft laws, such as the one on Serbian legal jurisdiction in Kosovo, is a strong indicator that it does not want normalization of relations with Kosovo.
According to her, with such attempts, the Serbian state is trying to expand the list of people from Kosovo that it arrests and blocks at the border.
“Through such laws, there is an attempt to increase even more the number of arrests made by Serbia at the border, therefore once again I call on all our citizens to be careful not to cross through Serbia because through such efforts, through such laws they will only increase the list of people who will be arrested at the border and will create dizzying problems for them.In the law that they have approved, there is a phrase that says anyone who knows that they have contributed to the violation of the rights of minorities, and of course there are no such people in Kosovo, however Serbia’s perceptions and Serbia’s lies are different. And they will try, through such a law, to greatly expand the list of people who block them at the border, who torture them in certain cases and interrogate them and then arrest them.
So, in order to avoid such a scenario, Serbia should be avoided because it is a country that, through propaganda, misinformation and lies, tries to create problems for the citizens of Kosovo”, emphasized Osmani.
At the end of October, the Serbian government approved the draft law on Serbian judicial jurisdiction in Kosovo. This action of the Serbian state has provoked international reactions. The European Union said that Serbia with this law violates the obligations arising from the dialogue. There were also disagreements from the United States of America.
The prime minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, considered Serbia’s action hostile and aggressive towards the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Kosovo.
