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A NEW FRAMEWORK FOR A NEW STAGE OF DIALOGUE

The Council for Inclusive Governance (CIG) organized on November 26, 2022 in Belgrade, Serbia, a workshop for a group of experts from Serbia and Kosovo to discuss the potential for a new stage of the dialogue. The latest events signaled that the decade-long status quo has likely been broken down. Now there are two options: a new status quo or a breakthrough. The international community has offered the parties several principles and a framework for negotiations, known as the French-German/EU proposal (later referred in the text as proposal). So far, Pristina’s and Belgrade’s signals to the proposal are ambiguous.

 

How to help this new process succeed was the main question posed to the group. The participants debated several topics including sustainability of the current status quo, preventing a new status quo from setting in, possibilities for an agreement on the new negotiating framework (i.e., if the Proposal represents a credible offer), the role of the powerbrokers, and willingness of the parties to engage. Held under the Chatham House Rule, the meeting is part of a larger project on the normalization of relations supported by and implemented in cooperation with the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA). Please see the report below for the brief outline of the discussion.