Balkans

The EU still does not have an ambassador to Macedonia. The procedure for the election of the new diplomat has been launched and some 17 candidates gave applied so far. The new EU ambassador is expected to be appointed by mid-September.

The Montenegrin parliament postponed until Wednesday the debate on electoral law, which was scheduled for Tuesday. The decision was announced following a meeting between Prime Minister Igor Lukšić and opposition leaders.

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has sentenced Momcilo Perisic, formerly a general with the Yugoslav Army, VJ, to 27 years in prison for crimes committed in Sarajevo, Srebrenica and Zagreb.

An assembly of Albanians from Presevo, Bujanovac and Medvedja has adopted a declaration calling for dialogue with Serbia and Brussels, and pledging to boycott the forthcoming census. The assembly of ethnic Albanian leaders from the ethnically mixed border region sent their request for talks to Belgrade and the European Union, …

A fresh round of talks to decide on the formation of a new government in Bosnia and Herzegovina has failed to achieve consensus, eleven months after the country’s population voted. Leaders from Bosnia’s six largest political parties gathered in the city of Mostar yesterday to try to find a compromise …

PM Mirko Cvetković today in Belgrade held a meeting with foreign ministers of the Non-Aligned Movement, gathered in the capital for the organization’s summit. Cvetković stated on the occasion that Serbia saw as its most important goal to preserve the country’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, while its foreign policy priority …

Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremić and his Egyptian counterpart Mohamed Kamel Amr planted a tree at the Park of Friendship in Belgrade on Monday. It came 50 years since the planting of the first tree in the park, and is meant to symbolize friendship between peoples.

Serbian Minister for Kosovo Goran Bogdanovic said that the agreement reaches in Brussels about the customs stamps is an opportunity for lifting the embargo on Serbian goods set by Kosovo’s authorities. According to the minister, Belgrade will not accept Kosovo’s customs officers and neither would it accept for the revenues …

Montenegrin PM Igor Lukšić and opposition parties will hold today a new round of talks on the language taught in schools and the name of that subject. PZP will table the proposition that the school subject be called native language and literature.

Germany’s federal Ministry of Interior has no intention whatsoever to reverse its negative opinion on the readiness of Bulgaria and Romania to enter the Schengen free movement area. “At present, Sofia and Bucharest are still not ready to join the Schengen Agreement,” stated