WASHINGTON (AFP) – The U.S. chief international development officer has stepped up as U.S. and European leaders work to strengthen ties between two former warring enemies to stabilize rising tensions. Samantha Power will travel to Serbia and Kosovo this week to meet with leaders there.
Mr. Power was the first U.S. Agency for International Development Director to visit Serbia, which has close historical and cultural ties to Russia.
Relations between Serbia and Kosovo have often been hostile since Kosovo’s separation from Serbia in her 1990s at the end of the Cold War. Since Russia invaded Ukraine last year, tensions between Serbia and Kosovo, with Albanians in the majority and Serbs in the minority, have recovered in general.
Its power lies in meeting with the prime ministers and presidents of both countries and encouraging them to continue on the path of normalizing relations between the two countries and to make further progress towards joining the European Union. “USAID underscores its support for Serbia’s path to EU membership through partnerships to promote economic growth and democratic development,” USAID said in a statement.
Power will be the first senior US official to visit the region since the European Union brokered a meeting between the two leaders in Brussels last week, urging them to resume peaceful dialogue.
The EU has spent 12 years, he said, facilitating negotiations between Serbia and Kosovo. Kosovo declared her independence in 2008, but Serbia does not recognize it as a nation.
Brussels and the US have intervened frequently to ease tensions between the two capitals, especially since Russia attacked Ukraine. The war in Kosovo erupted when separatist Albanians rebelled against Serbian rule, and Serbia responded with a brutal crackdown that killed about 13,000 people, mostly Albanians. NATO military intervention eventually forced Serbia to withdraw from the territory.
Mr. Power will also meet with Serbian and Kosovar civil society members, business leaders, journalists and others. Among them are Serbian former NBA player Vladhe Divac and athletes with disabilities.
