Speaker: Government Lacks Opposition’s Support Regarding Kosovo

Vladimir Orlic (Foto: Beta / Nenad Petrovic)

Serbia’s parliament speaker and ruling Progressive party official Vladimir Orlic said on Jan. 23 that resolving the issue of Kosovo and Metohija requires a unified approach but that the authorities do not have such support from the political opposition.

Speaking for Pink TV, Orlic claimed that the opposition “reacted thoroughly the same” regarding President Aleksandar Vucic’s announcement that the country will soon be faced with difficult decisions, adding that “both the left and the right” have demonstrated equal destructiveness by labeling Vucic a traitor.

Orlic stated that, in the past, his party had supported parliamentary decisions regarding Kosovo and Metohija which were made when the current opposition had been in power. The Progressives’ reasoning, Orlic said, had been to demonstrate Serbia’s unity. Yet, according to him, the current opposition is simply “shameless,” prepared “to hope even for their country’s ruin if that will bring them [political] gain.” 

The parliament speaker added that the authorities, led by the Progressive Party of Serbia, have thus far been working on defending their position by strengthening the state, all so that Kosovo and Metohija could be protected. In Orlic’s opinion, the opposition’s attacks on Vucic are attempts at winning cheap political points, fueled by “a pathological hatred and their inability to defeat Aleksandar Vucic,” which, in turn, is “completely futile and destructive.”