May 28 (SeeNews) - Serbia plans to hold a referendum on a legally-binding agreement for normalisation of the country's relations with Kosovo if Belgrade and Pristina reach a compromise, Serbian president Aleksandar Vucic said.
"If they scrap the taxes, we will go to talks to find a compromise solution. If this accidentally does happen, and I am skeptical it will, we will come to Parliament and ask the people and citizens of Serbia to take a decision," Vucic told parliament in a speech on Monday.
Kosovo, considered to be a potential candidate for EU membership by the European Commission, unilaterally declared independence from Serbia in 2008 and has so far has been recognised by more than half of the 193 UN member states.
On November 21, Kosovo's government decided to increase the import tax on all goods produced in Serbia and Bosnia to 100% from 10% set earlier that month in order to protect Kosovo’s sovereignty and interests. The scope of the tax was expanded on December 29 to include products manufactured under international brands in the two neighbouring countries.
"It is important that we all here finally admit what happened to us and draw conclusions. We suffered a national defeat in each of the meanings of this word. We lost part of the territories we controlled, a huge number of people, and the economic losses cannot be even calculated," Vucic also said.
Serbia now has two options -- to normalise relations by reaching an agreement or to maintain a frozen conflict, Vucic said. Тhere is no visible Serbian authority in Kosovo, except for hospitals and schools, he added.
Serbia and Kosovo launched a series of EU-facilitated talks in March 2011 to resolve all outstanding issues between them. The negotiations are a key aspect in the EU integration process of Belgrade and Pristina, but a little progress has been achieved so far.
"Normalisation can be reached only in two cases. One is the way the world, the international community and Albanians are imagining it. Achieving an agreement in which Kosovo is a comprehensive territory, an independent state, would give Serbs some rights. [...] And the other option that was dropped was the one I spoke so much about and for which I was attacked so much," Vucic said.
In September, Vucic and Kosovo president Hashim Thaci were expected to discuss for the first time the possibility for a land swap deal under which Serbia would exchange part of its territory populated with ethnic Albanians for Serb-populated areas of northern Kosovo. However, the meeting was called off.
Most opposition parties boycotted Vucic's speech in parliament.
A total of 165 out of 250 members of Serbia's parliament support the SNS-led coalition government of prime minister Ana Brnabic. Three opposition parties in parliament are members of the opposition Alliance for Serbia - the centre-left Democratic Party, Dveri, and the People's Party, holding a total of 24 seats.