Eurasia

The Belgian embassy in Belgrade has told politicians from South Serbia that it will deny all requests for asylum which have been submitted by Serbian nationals this year. According to Beta news agency, Riza Halimi, the only ethnic Albanian MP in Serbia’s parliament, said that he was informed on Tuesday …

European and Moldovan officials will negotiate visa regime liberalization beginning in June. The decision was taken by 5 European Commission observers after their official mission in Moldova. They met Moldova Prime Minister Vlad Filat and set the start of negotiations regarding visa regime liberalization for Moldovans in June 2010.

Romanian PM Emil Boc deputed the foreign affairs minister to issue a new application blank for small border traffic permits. Boc is willing to take further steps to facilitate obtaining traffic permits. Yesterday, Emil Boc had a phone discussion with his Moldovan opposite number Vlad Filat. They spoke about the …

The arrest of a former Bosnian wartime politician in London is convenient for Balkan nationalist rhetoric: It lends Serbia a boost of power in the eyes of the public and throws Bosnia’s ethno-nationalists another bone of contention to use ahead of elections, Anes Alic comments for ISN Security Watch. The …

The Ukraine parliament has ousted Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko with a vote of no confidence. Viktor Yanukovych, the country’s recently elected president, now needs to form a working coalition to run the country.

British Ambassador in Belgrade Stephen Wordsworth said that Serbia could join the EU in seven or eight years. This would come “if it focuses all of its efforts on European integration and removes all the obstacles in its path,” he said.

Serbian FM Vuk Jeremić said during his visit to Budapest today that to tie Serbia’s EU perspective to the problem of Kosovo would be “a tragic mistake”. “Anyone who thinks that Serbia, in case it had to choose between the European Union and Kosovo

Bulgaria will join the Schengen Area in the next year and the Eurozone – within 3 years, European Parliament President Jerzy Buzek has predicted. Buzek was on his first official visit to Bulgaria for the country’s national holiday – March 3, Liberation Day.

Bosnian Ambassador Borisa Arnaut submitted his credentials to the Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs in Belgrade on Wednesday. Addressing reporters for the first time upon his arrival in Serbia, Borisa said that his priorities will be developing good-neighbourly relations, eliminating differences and finding common interests between Serbia and Bosnia.

Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic says the mass killings of non-Serbs in Sarajevo and Srebrenica during the 1992-1995 Bosnian conflict are a “myth”, and denies any responsibility for them. During day two of his opening statement at the UN war crimes