Serbia Starts Mustering EU Accession Talks Team

Jadranka Joksimovic, Serbia's Minister for European Integration, said the government had started interviewing potential members of the Serbian negotiating team with the EU.

"We have a lot of names. Soon we will have suggestions for members," Joksimovic told the daily newspaper Danas on May 21.

The government will make a final decision on the team once its Office for European Integration has submitted its proposal for the members.

According to earlier announcements, the negotiation team with the EU will be presented to the public by the end of May.

Although EU members states are yet to agree on a date for opening accession talks with Serbia, Belgrade hopes that the talks will be launched this year.

"We have done a lot and we will do more to achieve more results," Alexander Vucic, the Serbian Prime Minister, said on Monday in Brussels at a conference entitled Friends of Serbia.

On Tuesday, in an interview, Vucic referred to the problem of exhaustion over enlargement in the EU, noting that in the states awaiting entry there is an equivalent exhaustion of patience.

"We have invested not only a lot of our time, our full energy, our political strength in today's processes, we have also started the toughest and harshest possible economic reforms in Serbia," he said.

"We have achieved a lot in the dialogue with Kosovo Albanians, but then you see that you are not respected enough," Vucic for EuroNews.

Earlier this month, Johannes Hahn, the EU Enlargement Commissioner, said further progress in the normalisation of relations with Kosovo was essential before accession talks with Serbia could start.

"It is of absolute importance that the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina is continued and has concrete...