The European Union announced today that the lawsuit against the member of the Serbian List in the Kosovo Parliament, Ivan Todosijevic, is contrary to the Brussels Agreement-
In a statement submitted to Beta, European Commission spokesman Peter Stano said that the EU was aware of the decision of the Kosovo Court of Appeals in the trial against Todosijevic and reminded that the Brussels agreement from 2013, reached in the dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia, is still in force-
“This agreement, among other things, stipulates that ‘the Court of Appeals in Pristina will form a panel in which the majority of judges will be Kosovo Serbs, with jurisdiction over all Kosovo municipalities with a majority Serb population’- In this particular case, this has not been respected,” Stano-
He added that the Brussels agreement is a cornerstone in the normalization of relations between Kosovo and Serbia and that “it must not be undermined-”
“The EU expects the two sides to respect and fully implement all agreements reached in the Brussels dialogue- We also expect both sides to constructively contribute to reaching a comprehensive, legally binding agreement on mutual normalization of relations,” Stano said-
He also stated that the EU “strongly emphasizes that any denial or revisionism regarding the events from the time of the conflict in the Western Balkans in the 1990s is contrary to the values of the European Union and the project of integration of the Western Balkans into the EU-”
“We call on everyone to show restraint out of respect for the victims and to work on an honest and credible assessment of the past- The region needs reconciliation, stability and normalization of relations,” Stano wrote-
Today, the Court of Appeals of Kosovo rejected as unfounded the appeal against the verdict of the Basic Court in Pristina from December 5, 2019, which sentenced Todosijevic to two years in prison for denying that a massacre of Albanian civilians was committed in Racak-
In March 2019, at the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the beginning of the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, Todosijevic said in Zvecan that “the reason for the aggression was the so-called humanitarian catastrophe in Kosovo and Metohija, the fictional Racak-”
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, who also called the first-instance verdict against Todosijevic frightening, saying that he also claims for Racak that it was a “fabricated crime”, also said today that the Serbian List MP was convicted “only because he told the truth about Racak, the truth about everything that happened to the Serbian people- ”
Today, Vučić called on the EU to “tell the Albanians in Priština that they must abide by what they signed and accepted”, stating that the final verdict against Todosijević “brutally and grossly” violated the law and the Brussels Agreement.