Vucic: Kurti would not be talking the way he is without "carte blanche" support

BELGRADE - Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Sunday evening a recent statement by Pristina's PM Albin Kurti that Srpska lista representatives in Kosovo-Metohija would "suffer and pay" was terrible but that Kurti would never have been able to say something like that without "carte blanche" support.

"(Kosovo) Albanians are allowed to do anything. However they (their supporters) may pretend to be harsh on them, they are not, and they essentially support them. To me, it is important that we have succeeded in getting several people out of custody and in fighting for those who are still there," Vucic said on a Pink TV talk show.

He said his biggest concern were attempts to "impose guilt on Serbs across the region" just because they wanted "to be Serbs where they belong."

"There is a media lynching and persecution of Serbs in Montenegro if they do not want to renounce Belgrade," Vucic said, adding that he hoped he would be able to tell US special Western Balkans envoy Gabriel Escobar everything he thought "about his tricks, and to his face."

"He can decide who will be in power where, but the Serbs cannot if they disagree with him. But that is not the first time we are facing double standards," Vucic said.

He said the hoped the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina would calm down and added that he did not believe Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik would be arrested.

"There are various ideas, and the idea to arrest him certainly exists somewhere," Vucic said.

He dismissed as untrue claims Aleksandar Vulin would be dismissed from his current post of Security Information Agency (BIA) chief.

"I might have been planning to dismiss him, but they have now extended his term," Vucic said.

He also said a newspaper report that current Serbian Ambassador to the US Marko Djuric would take over at the agency was also untrue.

"Marko Djuric at BIA, I have never even thought about that. I do not read those papers, I cannot even read that nonsense. No one reads that," he said.