Today, the Speaker of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, Ana Brnabic, said that during the Fourth Parliamentary Summit of the International Crimea Platform in Stockholm, she had very good, open and honest meetings on the rule of law and the European integration of Serbia with the President of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly Pere Joan Pons Sampietro, representatives of the Baltic countries, Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, as well as with the President of the German Bundestag Julia Klockner.
In a statement to the media, the National Assembly Speaker said that she and Sampietro discussed reforms in the field of the rule of law and of continued cooperation, stressing that Serbia and the OSCE are extremely keen on reforms concerning the rule of law. She also expressed her hope that the President of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly will visit Serbia in the future.
Speaking about the meetings with the representatives of the Baltic countries, Brnabic stressed that these are the countries that are more sceptical in terms of supporting Serbia’s European integration, and she assessed that these were good meetings where they discussed why European integration is important and why and how important it is that Serbia receives a positive signal from the European Union after four years.
"Many open questions, mainly due to the fact that until now we traditionally have not only insufficient but almost no communication with the Baltics, and this will change with the opening of our embassy in Riga, Latvia. I hope that this will happen, as well as these first steps by the end of this year", said Brnabic.
As she pointed out, this is a good thing because this embassy will cover all the Baltic countries and added that it is always good to talk. "It is even more important to talk to those who may have some understanding of the direction of your land", added Brnabic.
In the meeting with Julia Klockner, Brnabic indicated that it was a very good conversation about Serbia's European integration, reforms and European path. "Gratefulness that we are here together. All in all, quite a few good meetings and I hope a good job has been done for Serbia," said Brnabic. When asked by a journalist to comment on the fact that at the Summit of the Crimea Platform one could hear a lot of mention of respecting international law and the UN Charter, which is what Serbia calls for, Brnabic said that the most interesting thing was that some things were said at the Summit that we would have signed at any moment and that everything she heard reminded her even more of the injustice done to Serbia in connection with the Autonomous Province of Kosovo-Metohija.
She pointed out that it is almost unbelievable that in every speech they heard that the inviolability of territorial integrity and internationally recognised borders is sacred and that there is no reason, no circumstance in which anyone would be allowed to threaten the territorial integrity of internationally recognised countries, UN member states, in any way, by force or by some invented law. "That the most important thing in the world is for the world to live in peace and for us to have stability, the UN Charter and the international legal order, and that if we do not all respect all of this, then the world will return to the age of wars, in the context of which we will have wars of conquest where countries will steal each other's territories", stated the Parliament Speaker.
As she said, when you listen to all this, you wonder where the respect for Serbia's territorial integrity is in all of this.
"How can this apply to us and why is it not applied to us, and how is it that in our case, the UN Charter and international law are not the most important thing, so that, after this, I have even stronger thoughts and greater emotion about the injustice done to our land and our nation, above all, in Kosovo- Metohija. But it is good to hear all this sometimes and then remind some of our interlocutors today and in the future that these principles did not apply in the case of the Republic of Serbia", pointed out Brnabic.
She added that she had previously participated in Crimea Platform summits via video messages, but now, for the first time, she is participating in person.
Source: TANJUG
