Vucic: Serbia's EU path, situation in Kosovo-Metohija discussed with Scholz

HAMBURG - Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Monday he had had a cordial meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Hamburg and that they had discussed numerous topics, including Serbia's EU path and the situation in the Autonomous Province of Kosovo-Metohija.

"We discussed certain issues related to Kosovo-Metohija and we presented differing positions, but agreed to a great extent on numerous global topics. At the same time, the importance of our cooperation was highlighted, as was the gratitude to our partners for the enormous number of factories and investors from Germany that are employing our people and contributing to its development," Vucic said.

"If it were not for German companies, we would have hardly reached the investment-grade (credit) rating, on which our German hosts and Chancellor Scholz congratulated us," he said.

Vucic said Serbia's joining of a global initiative for batteries had also been discussed at the meeting.

He also said he expected to visit Germany's lithium mines with Scholz soon and added that he was confident reporters would be invited as well.

"He (Scholz) informed me Czech PM Petr Fiala had just told him Czechia was starting to build a lithium mine. They, too, will open talks about whether to make it one large mine - the largest in Europe - or two that would be among Europe's three largest mines," Vucic said.