TIRANA – The Council of the European Union announced on Friday that it has appointed Slovak diplomat Miroslav Lajcak as EU Special Representative for the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue and other Western Balkan regional issues something which was received with skepticism in Kosovo.
The tasks of the new EU special representative will be to achieve comprehensive normalization of the relations between Serbia and Kosovo, improve good neighborly relations and reconciliation between partners in the Western Balkans, and contribute to the consistency and effectiveness of EU action in the Western Balkans, according to a statement released by the Council on Friday. Lajcak will take up his duties immediately, with an initial mandate of 12 months.
Lajcak, who was the president of the UN General Assembly from 2017-18, previously held the position of EU Special Representative to Bosnia and Herzegovina between 2007 and 2009. He was also appointed as the personal envoy of the EU High Representative to Montenegro in 2006 to “negotiate, organise and supervise” the country’s independence referendum.
The EU-mediated dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia has been suspended since November 2018, after the previous Kosovo Government imposed a 100 per cent tariff on Serbian imports. Head of the EU Office in Kosovo, Nataliya Apostalova, welcomed the appointment. “A highly experienced diplomat, he will be assisting a challenging Dialogue process between Pristina and Belgrade. Best of luck Mr Lajcak!” Apostalova wrote on Twitter.
However, Kosovo political officials were less enthusiastic about the appointment.
Perparim Kryeziu, a spokesperson for the acting Kosovo Government, told Prishtina Insight on Friday that there were reservations about the two EU Officials responsible for the dialogue, Borrell and Lajcak, both being from two countries – Spain and Slovakia which have not recognized Kosovo along with three other EU members, that is Cyprus, Greece and Romania.
Former Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj was also skeptical about the appointment, criticizing the EU for “stalling the process” of the dialogue during the “stages of the grand finale and a leading US role.”
Haradinaj’s comment on Twitter was as following: “The @EUCouncil just announced the appointment of #Lajčák as EU Special Representative for the #Kosovo – #Serbia dialogue. In the stages of the grand finale and a leading #US role, the #EU is stalling the process.
Rumours of Lajcak’s potential appointment that surfaced at the beginning of March were also met with criticism from Thaci, who claimed that as a politician from one of the five EU countries that do not recognize Kosovo’s statehood, his role in the dialogue would not be neutral. Thaci labeled his selection as “the wrong choice.”
Lajcak has previously spoken against the possibility of a land swap between Kosovo and Serbia, mooted by Presidents Thaci and Vucic in 2018 as a potential tool in the settlement between the two countries. Lajcak described the notion as being against “the spirit of democracy and the very foundations of the EU” to BIRN in November 2018./argumentum.al
