Kosovo and Serbia should find a way to normalize relations and Croatia will support them in that, Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said in Pristina on Monday.

“Croatia’s stand is that we support stability, that we are for de-escalating all the tensions we have seen in recent weeks, that it’s first of all up to Serbia and Kosovo to find the optimal way to resume dialogue and respect either the existing agreements or reach new agreements which will make the relations better,” Plenkovic said in a joint press conference with Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti.

Croatia is interested in developing relations with Kosovo and normalising the relations with Serbia as much as possible , Plenkovic said. “We will do our best to support normalisation between Kosovo and Serbia.” Kurti invited Serbia to a mutual recognition of the two countries, saying that they should talk about the disappeared.

“We want to join NATO and the EU. It’s necessary to make progress in the Euro-Atlantic integration process,” he added.

Plenkovic said Croatia supported EU enlargement and that the road to membership represented “a clear anchor and course of political, social, economic and sectoral development.”

“Serbia’s European perspective is equal to that of all Southeast European countries, he added.

Serbia is conducting EU accession negotiations, while Kosovo has not been recognised by five EU member states – Cyprus, Greece, Romania, Slovakia and Spain – so Serbia, Plenkovic said, “is several steps ahead of Kosovo.”

He is confident the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue with the EU’s mediation will bring them closer to membership and “eventually, I don’t know when, bring to mutual recognition. But it’s up to the states to agree on that.”

A meeting was held between Plenkovic, Kurti, their delegations and the two countries’ business people, including representatives of the Croatian Chamber of Commerce, Ericsson Nikola Tesla and KONCAR – Electrical Industry.

Before the pandemic, Croatia-Kosovo trade was €100 million annually. Croatia is Kosovo’s seventh biggest foreign trade partner. Plenkovic said the relations between the two countries were “friendly, full of understanding and the wish to intensify them.” He also met with Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani, who presented him with the Saint Theresa presidential medal.

The medal was also given to Josip Samardzic, director of the general hospital in Slavonski Brod which treated the passengers from a Kosovo bus which crashed near the Croatian city in July. Ten people were killed in the accident.

Plenkovic was also received by Kosovo Parliament Speaker Glauk Konjufca.

Later today he will visit the Croat community in Janjevo and the Croatian contingent within the NATO-led peacekeeping Kosovo Force.

This is the first official visit by a Croatian prime minister to Kosovo in ten years.