Nikolic: Serbia cannot choose between EU, Kosovo

The second is that Serbia will not allow for any armed force to appear in the territory of the Serb community for a long time, the president said for Belgrade-based TV. "The next is that the Serb community should have the competencies to which local self-governments are legally entitled, so that the administration in Pristina cannot obstruct the exercising of these powers," Nikolic said, adding that this is the plan made by the Serbian parliament. "We have not relented in anything, but apparently someone figured that we had our back against the wall. Serbia has no right - especially the person going to negotiate cannot violate the Resolution of the National Assembly on Kosovo," Nikolic said, adding that if one goes below what the Resolution contains, this must go before parliament. The president also said that some solutions for Kosovo can seriously jeopardize continued EU integration, but that Serbia should strive to achieve both objectives. It is not possible to choose between Europe and Kosovo, he added. If we were to accept to abandon the EU nobody would guarantee that we would not negotiate with the Albanians and that Kosovo would remain part of Serbia, but the two issues are linked, Nikolic stated. He stated that concrete plans concerning powers to be enjoyed by a community of Serb municipalities will have been made by Thursday, when government officials will be responding to questions by MPs in the Serbian parliament. "We will be ready to concretize each question for each area that we want to be managed by the Serb community and to define them in such a way that the citizens, rather than only the Albanian side and EU High Representative Catherine Ashton, can know exactly what Serbia is asking for," Nikolic said. Nikolic stressed that senior government officials are exposed to great pressures, but added that they are all together supporting the cause. All key officials in Serbia, particularly Prime Minister Ivica Dacic and First Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic, are exposed to pressures by the ones who want the agreements on Kosovo to be signed as soon as possible, adding that these are mentors of Kosovo-Metohija's independence. The president also underlined that if no agreement is reached in the dialogue with Pristina until April 2, the new time frame will be one year. It is not the end of the world if no agreement was reached, but it would be a great challenge for the government, Nikolic said. It is impossible for Kosovo to get a chair in the UN, Nikolic said, adding that in the talks in Brussels not a single moment is spent on this topic. I do not believe that there will ever be a Serbian president who will recognize the independence of Kosovo, Nikolic underlined.