Brnabic: Good meetings in Brussels, fight for Serbian interests continues

BRUSSELS - Serbian PM Ana Brnabic said on Wednesday in Brussels she had had good meetings with EU Enlargement Commissioner Oliver Varhelyi and Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson and noted that a fight for Serbia and its interests continued in the wake of a UN Security Council session.

"I hope we will soon have the opportunity to sign an agreement with the European Commission on deployment of Frontex also at our border with Northern Macedonia to strengthen it further and reduce the flow of both legal and illegal migration through the Republic of Serbia, which is extremely important for our people. That is the format President Aleksandar Vucic has also launched as a trilateral format with Hungary and Austria to protect this part of Europe, as well as our people, from migration through Serbia," Brnabic told reporters in Brussels.

She said Johansson had commended Serbia for all it had done about the visa policy and had understanding for Serbia's policy on visa alignment.

"We will be trying to defend our visa policy until we become an EU member. We have the right to grant visa-free regimes to certain countries but, on the other hand, as a responsible partner of the EU, we must ensure those people do not use our visa-free regime to proceed to the EU. That is not happening. A 7 pct decline in the number of entries to the EU from Serbia has been registered since last year. We have the situation fully under control," Brnabic said.

She said the meeting with Varhelyi had addressed all current topics - Kosovo-Metohija, media laws, rule of law and an upcoming European Commission report on Serbia's progress.

Brnabic said she expected to see positive headway in the report as much had been done, especially when it comes to rule of law.