The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Federica Mogherini, acknowledged on Monday 10 December that there are currently "quite major difficulties" in the dialogue between Serbia and Kosovo.
Meeting with the press, she mentioned in particular the imposition of a 100% tax on Serbian and Bosnian products by Kosovo.
However, Ms Mogherini believed that an agreement between Belgrade and Pristina could still be reached. She once more reiterated that such an agreement, while involving territorial adjustments, should not lead to "ethnically pure countries". "What is relevant for the EU is that the agreement comprehensively takes into account all issues related to standardisation, [whether it is] legally binding, and that it respects the principles of international and EU law (...) which means, no ethnic divisions within countries", she explained.
Progress for Serbia and Montenegro
Furthermore, Serbia and Montenegro have made progress in their accession processes by opening two and one negotiating chapters respectively.
Belgrade has thus opened chapters 17 on economic and monetary policy and 18 on statistics, which is something that does not fully satisfy the Serbian Minister for European Integration, Jadranka Joksimović, who would have liked more chapters to have been opened. In total, this decision means that 16 chapters out of 35 were opened, two of which were provisionally closed.
Montenegro itself has opened Chapter 27 on the environment, bringing the number of chapters opened to 32 out of 35, of which 3 are provisionally closed. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)