“Serbia failed to meet all conditions”

Serbia has failed to meet all the terms for unblocking the Interim Agreement with the EU, says a senior LDP official. Vesna Pesic told Radio B92 that hopes that the trade agreement would be unblocked had been unrealistic given that Serbia had not extradited all the Hague fugitives. “Serbia failed to meet all conditions” She reiterated that the Serbian parliament had had problems adopting a declaration condemning the crimes in Srebrenica. The senior Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) official never expected the Netherlands to change its position a second time, because it had already done so once when it agreed to allow Serbia to sign the Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA). She said that Brussels’ refusal to unblock the Interim Trade Agreement should not be viewed as an issue of justice or injustice, but rather as meeting the conditions for EU integration, and a chance to create further distance from the policies of the 1990s. "We could have adopted the Declaration; that’s the one thing we could have done—to show that we are aware of what went on during these wars, and to change the policy of war nationalism that still exists. We can still see that group of Radicals that came to parliament in full battle-dress yesterday. We still haven’t dealt with that policy, but recent events indicate that that ideology is starting to crack,” Pesic said. However, according to her, Serbia has changed in the last eight years. Pesic said that it could be best seen in the choice citizens had made between Kosovo and Europe. That’s something that the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) was first to accept, and now the faction led by Tomislav Nikolic. "The Serb Radical Party (SRS) has accepted this because people want to live better. That can be seen by the fact that I, the infamous traitor, have got competition in Tomislav Nikolic now,” she said. Pesic said that it was still hard to believe that the former SRS deputy leader had truly changed, as he was still prone to the rhetoric of Vojislav Seselj and the SRS. Vesna Pesic (FoNet, archive)

“Serbia failed to meet all conditions”

She reiterated that the Serbian parliament had had problems adopting a declaration condemning the crimes in Srebrenica.

The senior Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) official never expected the Netherlands to change its position a second time, because it had already done so once when it agreed to allow Serbia to sign the Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA).

She said that Brussels’ refusal to unblock the Interim Trade Agreement should not be viewed as an issue of justice or injustice, but rather as meeting the conditions for EU integration, and a chance to create further distance from the policies of the 1990s.

"We could have adopted the Declaration; that’s the one thing we could have done—to show that we are aware of what went on during these wars, and to change the policy of war nationalism that still exists. We can still see that group of Radicals that came to parliament in full battle-dress yesterday. We still haven’t dealt with that policy, but recent events indicate that that ideology is starting to crack,” Pešić said.

However, according to her, Serbia has changed in the last eight years.

Pešić said that it could be best seen in the choice citizens had made between Kosovo and Europe. That’s something that the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) was first to accept, and now the faction led by Tomislav Nikolić.

"The Serb Radical Party (SRS) has accepted this because people want to live better. That can be seen by the fact that I, the infamous traitor, have got competition in Tomislav Nikolić now,” she said.

Pešić said that it was still hard to believe that the former SRS deputy leader had truly changed, as he was still prone to the rhetoric of Vojislav Šešelj and the SRS.