Thank you Madam President,
Dinar has not been banned in Kosova. Serbian citizens, and not only them, they can have Dinars. You can own Dinars, but Euro is the only currency as means of payment.
In the previous century, before liberation we had Dinar as means of payment. We were under occupation.
In the 21st century, first, we had Deutsche Mark, German Mark. And then, after Euro. Only Euro is means of payment.
And, we have done so many subsidies, social assistance, given grants for education and Health Care to the Serb majority municipalities and believe me they all take Euros. No problem.
We do not have a single case, where a Serbian citizen of Kosova, said, I don’t want this money because it is in Euro currency.
In our neighboring country, in Montenegro, over a quarter of the population declare themselves Serbs. They have Euro as currency. Ordinary Serbs are not Euro-haters.
Euro is the currency of payment. You can own money in whatever currency you want.
And I will do more communication, more information to Serbs, in the coming days, throughout this month. And I will speak in Serbian, so they understand me better and clearly. Because we who were under the occupation of Serbia, we knew the Serbian language.
But they did not learn our language, because we’re oppressed and dominated. As, you know, throughout the world there are similar cases where the colonizer does not know the language of the colonized, but the colonized knows the language of the colonizer.
And I will speak in Serbian, that I have nothing against Serbs. I have friends who are Serbs. I have a minister who is a Serb, Nenad Rasic. His Deputy, is a Serb: Radoica Radomirovic.
Deputy Ombudsman of Kosova, Srdjan Sentic is a Serb. My party in the Parliament, with secret ballot voted Srdjan Sentic as Deputy Ombudsman of Kosova. I have appointed as one of four members of Board of Trepça, which is the biggest company for mines and minerals, Dragisa Krstovic from Leposaviq. A Serb. A great lawyer.
I do not believe that ethnic differences bring conflict. On the contrary. Diversity, multiplicity, is the state of being. But for political interests, economic interests, ethnic differences can be employed. And we are fighting that.
I’m a social Democrat, who believes in people and who thinks that people are good.
Criminals are individuals. No community is a criminal community. I want to be very clear about this. There are such things as criminal structures. But never a community. A people is never criminal. Never.
And I don’t equalize states with people. We need states, but I believe that people are always even better than states. And I want to communicate and cooperate with Serbs in Kosova. But we also need the Central Bank of Kosova to communicate and cooperate with the National Bank of Serbia. We wrote a letter to them. I hope we’re gonna get an answer.
And believe me Madame President, converting car plates from KM into RKS was much more difficult. Because in RKS car plates of our republic you have “R” for the Republic. The conversion is full. They switched from Serbian car plates into Kosova ones.
In Euro, you don’t have the Republic of Kosova at all. So, if they switched from car plates, it’s way more easier and logical to have faster and smoother conversion from Dinar into Euro as means of payment.
There are four branches of commercial Banks in the northern part of Kosova. We have ten commercial Banks, eight are foreign, two are from Kosova.
Four of these 10 commercial Banks have branches in the north, which can be used for exchange. And there are 15 additional financial non-banking institutions for conversion.
I have been criticized for unilateral action but I am Prime Minister because Kosova is a Republic. If my country wouldn’t have been a Republic, I wouldn’t have become a Prime Minister. So, I defend the interest of a democratic Republic. For bilateral action, in contrast to unilateral, let’s sign the agreement that we have agreed upon as text. Mr. Vucic and myself, we agreed on a text on 27th of February last year in Brussels and Implementation Annex in Ohrid/Ohër in North Macedonia on 18th of March.
So, yes, we are committed to dialogue. But you know what? We already have an agreement. But in order not to violate this agreement, to respect it, and to implement it, I’m saying, let’s do a bilateral action, which would be signing this agreement. So, we adhere with our signing to the spirit and the letter of it.
Here we have heard a critique on opposition to NATO intervention, which saved my people.
25 years ago, 19 countries got together to stop the genocide of Milosevic’s forces in Kosova. 19 countries got together to bomb a European country. It must have been very bad. Otherwise, it doesn’t happen. Sometimes 19 countries cannot agree on a press release. How come that in 1999, 19 countries agreed to bomb Milosevic’s Yugoslavia? It was very bad. And even then, the President of the Russian Federation, Boris Yeltsin, knew how bad the situation was in Kosova. He was talking to former American president, U.S President, Bill Clinton several times per week. Trying to find a peaceful solution. It was very bad in my country, NATO intervention saved us.
Milosevic died in Hague, facing trial, not waiting for the sentence.
So, I understand that some of you oppose NATO intervention, but you have to be in my country in the spring of 1999 and to understand what kind of grave situation we were in. A humanitarian catastrophe.
ICJ, International Court of Justice, gave an advisory opinion on 22nd of July 2010 and said that the declaration of Independence of Kosova did not violate international law. All Security Council resolutions are part of international law.
On our planet, there is no higher court than ICJ. And ICJ said that the declaration of Independence of Kosova did not violate international law. Within the international law is also resolution 1244 from 1999. So, legal debate on the justification of our independence is basically over.
And the last thing I want to mention, is that, in all Serbian tabloids, these days, we see in front pages fantasizing revenge of Kosova on Serbs. We are not going to take revenge. Yes, over 10,000 unarmed civilians have been killed. 20,000 women raped. But we are not going to take revenge. I want justice and justice is justice by not being revenge.
So it is very important to emphasize that in order to have peace between Kosova and Serbia, normal relations, they have to quit fantasizing that we’re going to take revenge. We are not going to take revenge. I’m a Prime Minister who will guarantee that there will be no revenge. Only justice in spite of the background of perpetrators, be they during the war or after it during the peace for political motives or economic ones.
Thank you very much.
Last modified: February 10, 2024