Pristina denies entry to Kosovo-Metohija to official of Serbian gov't office

BELGRADE - The Serbian government Office for Kosovo-Metohija said on Thursday Pristina had denied entry to the province to its Deputy Director Svetlana Miladinov, who was to visit the Orthodox Serb population on St Nicholas Day (December 19).

In a statement, the Office said Belgrade's liaison officer in Pristina Dejan Pavicevic had also not been allowed to make a holiday visit to Serbs incarcerated by the Pristina authorities to see the conditions they were kept in and their respective health condition in the wake of numerous complaints of inhumane treatment and violations of fundamental human rights.

Just two days after the most recent round of the Brussels dialogue, Pristina is directly violating the agreement on freedom of movement and official visits, which shows that Pristina's PM Albin Kurti and its chief negotiator Besnik Bislimi do not care either about the EU or the process of the EU-facilitated dialogue itself, the Office said.

Full respect of the agreement on official visits was once again agreed in Brussels two days ago, but Pristina has trampled everything again, it said.

"In fact, these bans, too, demonstrate all the weakness of the Kurti regime and confirm that Kurti's approval rating has been seriously shaken ahead of the upcoming February 9 elections, and he is trying to restore it by banning Serbian officials from visiting Kosovo-Metohija. We, as well as the international community, have long known that it is much more important to Kurti to attempt to flex his muscles against the Serbs and Belgrade than to respect the dialogue and reached agreements and, for that reason, there is nothing left for Belgrade to do after Pristina's latest moves than to act accordingly," the Office said.