State Department: Kosovo's New Government to Give Priority to Dialogue with Serbia

State Department (Flickr.com/ Photo by: U.S. Department of State (IIP Bureau)

The United States will encourage Kosovo's new government to give priority to talks with Serbia, a spokesman for the U.S. State Department, Ned Price, said during a Feb. 17 news briefing in Washington, after the Voice of America's Albanian service had asked him to comment on recent elections in Kosovo.

Albin Kurti, the leader of Self-Determination, the party that won a landslide victory in Kosovo's elections on Feb. 14, the most convincing one since the territory declared independence in 2008, had made it very clear earlier that the normalization dialogue with Serbia was not his priority.

"When it comes to the dialogue with Serbia, the United States strongly supports the EU-mediated talks between Kosovo and Serbia with a view to reaching a comprehensive normalization agreement, focused on mutual recognition," Price underlined.