PRISTINA: Kosovo’s new Prime Minister Albin Kurti bowed to Western pressure by promising late on Thursday to partially lift import tariffs on Serbian goods, but while the European Union welcomed the move, Washington immediately said it was not enough.
“On March 15 the government will decide to abolish tariffs on the import of raw materials... as a sign of goodwill to resolve the economic dispute with Serbia,” Kurti told a news conference.
The move could become one of the steps leading to the restart of EU-brokered normalisation talks with Serbia, which have stalled since November 2018 when Kurti’s predecessor, Ramush Haradinaj, imposed the taxes.
“We welcome this announcement as a first step and are looking forward to seeing more details,” a spokesman for the EU foreign policy chief Josep Borell said on Friday.
“This step could... offer an opening for the resumption of the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina facilitated by the European Union,” he said, warning that “too much time was lost’’. — dpa
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