The European Union has asked Kosovo and Serbia to reach a compromise on the issue of car license plates, with two days left to find a long-term solution to this issue.
The meetings of the delegations of Kosovo and Serbia will take place on Wednesday and Thursday (April 20th and 21st) in Brussels, with the mediation of the EU, in an attempt to find a solution for the license plates of Kosovo and Serbia.
Initially, the working groups of Kosovo and Serbia, which have been established on this issue, will meet. On April 21, the chief negotiators of Kosovo and Serbia, Besnik Bislimi and Petar Petkovic, are also expected to meet with the mediation of the EU envoy for dialogue, Miroslav Lajcak.
EU diplomats said they did not want to see tensions at the border crossings between Kosovo and Serbia, as they had seen in September last year. Therefore, they have called for the use of these recent meetings to reach an agreement.
The Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, stated on April 18 that for Kosovo, the “principle of reciprocity as the essence of any future solution” to the issue of license plates is indisputable and non-negotiable.
Kurti has seen these statements as a threat in Serbia.
Recalling the last meeting of the working groups, which took place on April 7 in Brussels, EU spokesman for foreign affairs and security, Peter Stano, told Radio Free Europe that “new rounds of meetings will take place more “April 20 and 21 in Brussels, just before their mandate expires.”
“The EU has helped both delegations identify solutions, but it is the responsibility of the parties to agree on a solution. “We expect them to make progress by April 21,” Stano said.
He added: “The EU wants to remind the parties once again that it is now urgent to reach a common position. “Every license plate agreement requires political flexibility and compromise on both sides.”
The mandate of the working groups expires on April 21, after on September 30, with the mediation of the EU, the parties reached an interim license plate agreement.
The interim agreement followed the decision of the Government of Kosovo on September 20, which imposed a measure of reciprocity on the issue of Serbian license plates, which meant that upon entering the territory of Kosovo, cars with Serbian license plates had to obtain test license plates. The idea was for these test plates to be valid for 60 days and cost five euros.
Until then, the citizens of Kosovo, who had license plates RKS (Republic of Kosovo), for a decade, when entering the territory of Serbia, paid about five euros for test plates, which were valid for 60 days.
