21.03.2023.
Minister Vučević meets with European Enlargement Commissioner Varhelyi
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defence Miloš Vučević met with the EU Commissioner for Enlargement and Neighbourhood Policy, Oliver Varhely, in Brussels today.
Following the meeting, the minister of defence pointed out that the meeting with Commissioner Varhelyi was the crown of all the meetings he had on that day in Brussels, and he stressed that the “Schuman Forum” had been an opportunity to hear different thoughts on security challenges and risks that Europe and the world were facing, and that the participants had touched upon the war in Ukraine.- The forum was an excellent opportunity to meet people, to understand the messages, and it was a chance for us as the state of Serbia to understand what will take place in the future, and what the position of Europe is. It is better to be present than absent because you can say something that is important for us and promote Serbian position and Serbian views - Minister Vučević.
According to him, the key role of our country is “to survive it all”, since, as he stressed “in a war between the great ones, the small ones are the most often the ones who get hurt, and we have experienced that several times throughout our history”. - The situation is slightly more complicated for us. When I say “slightly” I am using diplomatic terminology, having in mind the issue of Kosovo and Metohija. We are a candidate country, strategically oriented towards becoming a member of the European Union, however, from the viewpoint of military alliances we are a militarily neutral state with an open issue, or problem, the challenges regarding Kosovo and Metohija where standards are not applied equally, like in case of the narrative regarding Ukraine where they insist on the inviolability of borders, the sovereignty of one internationally recognised state. Serbia has no problem with that whatsoever, quite the contrary. On the other hand, in our case such position is not accepted or recognised - stated Minister Vučević.
He added that there were some positive effects after the talks in Ohrid, and that the position of Serbia was somewhat better.- The impression of the people with whom I talked here is that Serbia has been more than a constructive partner in the talks in Ohrid which were by no means easy. Nothing is finished, and in the end of the day, nothing has been signed yet, but there is a wish to pursue the all-encompassing normalisation of Serbian-Albanian relations - said the minister of defence and expressed his satisfaction to have had the opportunity on that day to meet the colleagues from Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro, and high officials from the European Union.
