Petkovic: Gervalla statement shows essence of Kurti's militant policy

BELGRADE - The head of the Serbian government Office for Kosovo-Metohija Petar Petkovic said on Tuesday the most recent statement by the FM of the so-called Kosovo that the Community of Serb Municipalities was dead fully demonstrated the essence of Albin Kurti's "militant policy" towards Serbs.

"How come the Brussels Agreement is dead for Kurti, and the fascist concept of a Greater Albania is not? Such an approach by Pristina is a question exclusively for the EU and the US because it is crystal clear that Kurti is the source of all problems in Kosovo as he is the one saying that dialogue is dead," Petkovic said in a statement released by the Office.

The politicians in Pristina are doggedly refusing to realise that the Community of Serb Municipalities is not a topic for rhetorical exercises or discussions, but a clear and unequivocal commitment undertaken by Pristina in the dialogue with Belgrade, Petkovic added.

Pristina has deliberately created purported obstacles to meeting its own commitments from the Brussels Agreement and therefore must remove them on its own because the process of dialogue and normalisation of relations cannot progress in case the Pristina politicians doggedly continue to refuse to implement what has been signed while even boasting of their own lack of credibility, Petkovic added.

He said Donika Gervalla Schwarz was "trying to explain that the Community of Serb Municipality is some kind of a caprice rather than a substantial need of endangered people, even though the violence Kurti's regime is carrying out on a daily basis is the very proof of the fact that creating an efficient political and institutional protective mechanism is a condition for the survival of Serbs and protection of their collective rights," Petkovic said.

The Community of Serb Municipalities is not a 19-century concept, as suggested by Gervalla-Schwarz, Petkovic said.

"But, on the other hand, Kurti's policy of subjugating the Serbs and imposing an absolute ethnic Albanian domination in Kosovo-Metohija is something that belongs in the darkest historical epochs," Petkovic noted.

The Community of Serb Municipalities, including all powers that belong to it under documents agreed through EU facilitation, must be formed, Petkovic said.

"The sooner the hotheads in Pristina accept that fact, the sooner we will be able to continue productive dialogue - and dialogue and compromise are the only way to solve the decades- and centuries-long problems between Serbs and ethnic Albanians in Kosovo-Metohija," Petkovic concluded.