Belgrade-Pristina Dialogue at Standstill Due to Different Visions, Lack of Ideas, Trust

NKEU

The Belgrade-Pristina dialogue is at a standstill due to the different visions that Pristina, Belgrade and the international community have of it, but also due to the lack of trust between the two sides and a lack of ides on the part of the European Union, said participants in a Sept. 23 conference titled How to Re-Start the Brussels Dialogue - Possibilities and Obstacles, organized by the Working Group for Chapter 35 of the National Convention on the European Union and the Aktiv non-governmental organization.

Dragisa Mijacic, coordinator of the National Convention's Working Group for Chapter 35, said that there had been a turning point in the dialogue last year when an agreement was reached on the path to normalization and that this was expected to produce stabilization until the region joined the EU.

"The idea was to resolve the basic issues, to have a breakthrough in the disagreements between Belgrade and Pristina... Unfortunately, that did not happen for various reasons, most of all the different visions and different strategic positioning," Mijacic told the conference, adding that the dialogue had come to a lack of meetings even between the main negotiators.

Ilir Deda of the Institute of Human Sciences, Vienna, said that, more than 20 years since the dialogue started, the situation was "worse than it ever was" and had a very negative effect on people's lives.

Deda said there was no trust between Belgrade and Pristina, but that the EU did not trust the two sides either, and they did not trust the EU. According to him, EU special representative to the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue Miroslav Lajcak has contributed to the lack of trust by giving different statements and sending different messages in meetings in Pristina and in Belgrade.