Hammond on Britain’s stand on Kosovo’s UNESCO membership

Philip Hammond confirmed on Thursday that the London government has a positive stand concerning Kosovo’s UNESCO membership.
Source: Tanjug Thursday, October 8, 2015 | 17:53

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Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs of Great Britain Philip Hammond confirmed on Thursday that the London government has a positive stand concerning Kosovo’s UNESCO membership.
Replying to reporters’ questions as to whether he thinks ethnic Albanians in Kosovo would be able to provide better protection for Serbian cultural heritage, Hammond replied that the United Kingdom believes UNESCO membership will impose additional, more rigorous obligations for Kosovo in terms of protecting Serbian cultural heritage.

In this manner, we will reinforce protection of Serbian cultural heritage instead of bringing it into question, Hammond told a joint press conference following the meeting with Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic, and noted that people should focus on the future.

Serbia is fiercely opposing Kosovo-Metohija’s UNESCO membership and Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic stated on Saturday that the proposition concerning Kosovo’s UNESCO membership is equally absurd as would be a suggestion for the Islamic State to be admitted into UNESCO.

He specified that since the arrival of KFOR in the southern Serbian province in 1999, the ethnic Albanians in KiM destroyed by dynamite or set fire to more than 200 Serb churches, monasteries and sites of religious and cultural significance and demolished 8,000 tombstones.