Balkans

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen is set to begin a two-day visit to Bulgaria on Thursday. This will be Rasmussen’s first visit to Bulgaria since he was appointed to the top post in April 2009. The Secretary General is expected to meet with Bulgaria’s PM Boyko Borisov, President Georgi …

General Ratko Mladic’s war diaries, which the ICTY Prosecution announced today it had received from Belgrade, are considered to be key pieces of evidence in some of the ongoing trials at the UN war crimes tribunal. The Prosecution at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, made public …

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, today delivered the final verdict in the case of former Macedonian Interior Minister Ljube Boskoski and police officer Johan Tarculovski. Boskoski’s acquittal was affirmed, while Tarculovski’s conviction and 12 year prison sentence were upheld.

United Kingdom Foreign Secretary William Hague says the new British government firmly supports the EU integration prospects of Turkey and the Western Balkans, the Spanish daily El Pais reported on Tuesday (May 18th). Hague, who was in Spain to attend the

The European Commission (EC) has asked Tirana to answer 170 additional questions, to supplement the questionnaire submitted last month when Albania applied for candidate country status. Integrations Minister Majlinda Bregu said on Tuesday (May 18th) that Albania will send “clarifications” regarding issues raised by the Commission. According to media reports, …

The government has received an official invitation to attend the EU-Western Balkans conference in Sarajevo next month, Deputy Prime Minister Hajredin Kuci said on Tuesday (May 18th). Kosovo will be on equal footing with other participating countries, with an equal right to express its opinion on regional developments and European

The parliamentary committee on the constitution has agreed on almost all proposed amendments, the sole exception being the controversial issue of the expatriate vote, committee chairman Vladimir Seks said on Tuesday (May 18th). That one amendment has been the subject of lengthy negotiations between the ruling Croatian Democratic Union and …

At the initiative of the MEP from the Group of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament, Evgeni Kirilov, Bulgarian MEPs (representatives of all political parties – Bulgarian Socialist Party, Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria, Blue Coalition, National Movement for Stability and Progress, Movement for Rights

The Serbian War Crimes Prosecutor’s Office has called for an investigation to begin at a mass grave site in the southwestern Serbian town of Raska. Ten days ago Serbia announced that with the help of the EU rule of law mission in Kosovo, EULEX, it had uncovered a mass grave …

Prosecutors at the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal say Serbia has sent the court a bundle of diaries written by Bosnian Serb wartime military commander General Ratko Mladic. They have filed a motion seeking to have the notebooks included as evidence in the case against Radovan Karadzic, the Bosnian Serb wartime …