Pantic Pilja: We removed Pristina’s request for special guest status in the CoE from the agenda

Kosovo submitted a request to gain special guest status in the Council of Europe, but Belgrade successfully ensured that their request was not included on the agenda of today's Political Committee meeting. Spain and Hungary supported Serbia in this effort, confirmed Biljana Pantic Pilja, head of the Serbian delegation to the Council of Europe.

As Pantic Pilja stated to Kurir, after Kosovo submitted this request, Belgrade undertook diplomatic measures to ensure that Pristina's request was not on the agenda of the Political Committee session in Paris.

"The so-called Kosovo submitted a request to transition from the status of 'other delegation,' which does not exist in the Rules of Procedure of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, to the status of 'special guest,' which is a recognized procedural category. The procedure is such that their request was read in the Bureau in Luxembourg and forwarded to us in the Political Committee, which was supposed to give its opinion today and send it back to the Bureau. If adopted, they would not have received additional rights, but this would have been used in Kurti's election campaign. We believe this would have been a form of reward for them, despite them not fulfilling anything from Dora Bakoyannis' report, especially the section concerning the Community of Serb Municipalities, an obligation from the Brussels Agreement. Furthermore, there is ongoing terror against the Serbian population in Kosovo and Metohija under Kurti’s regime. These were some of our arguments, and thanks to our diplomatic efforts, with full support from President Aleksandar Vucic, this time we succeeded, and the request was not included on today's meeting agenda, postponing it to the January session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe," Pantic Pilja explained.

As she emphasized, this was yet another provocation by Pristina aimed at bolstering its election campaign.

"It is clear that they are not giving up on their intention to become a full member of the Council of Europe, and they are trying to improve their status step by step. However, it is also evident that they are gradually losing the support of their former sponsors. It seems the international community is losing patience with Kurti and his unilateral actions," Pantic Pilja concluded.