"New declaration on Kosovo unnecessary"

Source: Tanjug

BELGRADE -- Parliament Speaker Slavica Đukić-Dejanović says it will be clear this week whether the government will send a document on Kosovo and Metohija to parliament.

Speaking on Sunday, she added that "a new declaration on Kosovo is not necessary".

“We should know the government's official stand on the issue, but it is true that if we do not alter our policy on Kosovo-Metohija and there are no concrete reasons for taking new stances, a new declaration is not needed,” Đukić-Dejanović told Tanjug.

She thus echoed a statement made earlier the same day by Serbian President Boris Tadić, who said a new parliamentary declaration on Kosovo was not necessary because a framework for the government policy on Kosovo is provided by previous declarations.

"If there is no declaration, it is not the end of the world - it would be good if it passed, but it is not necessary," Tadić said in an interview for the Belgrade-based Prva TV.

The parliament speaker emphasized that there were "several possibilities", including for parliament to receive a document from the Serbian government at the request of the Committee on Kosovo-Metohija.

"If that would not be the case, the Committee could propose that the report, which has already been delivered to the parliament, be debated at a plenary session," she was quoted as saying.

In that case, the session would be convened, Đukić-Dejanović stressed.