Dacic responds to Pristina: Blinken, too, visited Central Asia last month

BELGRADE - Serbian FM Ivica Dacic said on Monday Pristina had a problem with his recent visit to Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan even though it did not have a problem with the fact US State Secretary Antony Blinken had travelled there last month.

The three Central Asian nations do not recognise the so-called Kosovo.

Speaking to Prva TV, Dacic said they were friendly countries to Serbia and that he had become the first FM of Serbia to visit them.

"President Vucic believes we need to embark on cooperation with those large countries. I think there is great potential for cooperation," Dacic said.

Does Pristina expect Serbian representatives to be lobbying for recognitions of the so-called Kosovo, he asked.

Speaking about his discussions during the visit to Central Asia, Dacic said:

"We did not even talk about Kosovo-Metohija so much."

He added that Serbia had "ridiculously small" volumes of trade with the three countries.

He said that, during the visit to Uzbekistan, he had addressed cooperation aimed at solving Serbia's problem of workforce shortage as Uzbekistan had a regulated system and a state agency in charge of employment abroad.

He said 600-700 Uzbeks were working in Serbia right now.

"Those countries have a traditionally good attitude towards us and there should be visits and development of cooperation," Dacic said.

He also noted that there were ten countries in the Pacific region that Serbian officials had never visited.