#DiplomaticCentennial Ambassador Brankovic: Excellent level of Romanian-Serbian political relations very hard to achieve at economic level

A previous version of this interview, published April 2, contained several substantial phrasing errors, now corrected.

Romania and Serbia strive to get, in terms of economic relations, at the same "excellent level" of the political relations, but this target is "very hard to achieve," Ambassador of Serbia to Romania and the Republic of Moldova Branko Brankovic said in an interview to AGERPRES.

"Economic relations are good, but always could be better, (...). And we always want and strive to come up with the economic relations to the same level of the political relations (...)It's a very hard task, not that we don't want to, but the political level is so high that the economic... I don't know what we have to do, both countries, in order to bring up to the same level the economic relation.," the diplomat stated.

In the interview, the official talks about the prospect of Serbia's accession to the European Union, the recent tensions in Kosovo and his country's relationship with the North Atlantic Alliance.

"We have a very comfortable majority in the country to become members of the European Union, but, at the same time, we have an even more comfortable majority not to enter NATO. The wounds are still very warm," the diplomat pointed out.

Branko Brankovic brought to mind, in this context, the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, stating that he is grateful to Romania for not participating in.

Moreover, the Ambassador briefly talks about the Sebastian Ghita case.

"The relations between the two countries are on a very high level, and whatever might appear as "a problem", has to be solved bilaterally, friendly. So I have no doubt that your minister and my minister are in accordance that something should be done as far as this is concerned for the benefit of both countries and to keep up the level, which is very high, of the political relations. I have no doubt that we will find the solution about what is what and who is who and who and what did something. Most probably your people know that in detail, but we don't know that.," he explained.

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AGERPRES: Your Excellency, when talking about the relationships between Serbia and Romania, there is also always the question of the Romanians in the Timoc region. Can you tell me what is the status of the discussions regarding this specific problem now, between Serbia and Romania?

Branko Brankovic: You may recall that President Vucic was recently on a visit [here]. He had very substantive talks with Mr. Iohannis, the Prime Minister and the leaders of the two Houses of Parliament. The subject of minorities as a whole was on the agenda. There is no doubt that all of them discussed that very thoroughly.

Mr. Vucic said that since we have a mixed commission, Serbia and Romania for the minorities, we have to give them the possibility, as soon as possible to start putting all of that on paper and to present to both Governments what might be the further steps concerning all that.

Mr. Vucic said and our policy is that we do our best to do whatever is necessary in accordance with the Convention of the Council of Europe about minorities. So, whether it concerns Romanians in Voivodina or in the Timoc Valley, of course they have to have equal treatment, in accordance with the Convention. The mixed commission, since 2011 - that was the last meeting in Belgrade - has not met for a number of reasons, partly that for a long time your side didn't have the co-chairman, and then after that our side... So, now we have two co-chairmen and on the initiative of Mr. Vucic and Mr. Iohannis we expect that the mixed commission will meet here in Bucharest pretty soon, and there is no doubt that since they had very good cooperation before, as well as substantive proposals on a number of things, we have no doubt that we are going to have, as a result of this meeting, quite something which is going to be definitely on the level of the Convention of the Council of Europe and on the very high level of the relations between Serbia and Romania. So, I would be patient to see them, because they are obliged by our governments to do and to offer to our governments something that might be on the level of the relations that are very good, very high level.

AGERPRES: This leads me to Kosovo, because the discussion on the Romanians in the Timoc Valley is also a part of Serbia's history with the minority rights and a very complicated way in which these matters are approached. And this leads me to Kosovo, how does the Kosovo issue affect Serbia's path to accede to the European Union?

Branko Brankovic: Oh, this is quite a long story. We have never got any official demand from any European officials that we have first to recognize the independence of Kosovo as a kind of prerequisite to become a member. But, you know, the point is that the events on Monday [e.n. - March 26] show the opposite. Why? The events - you are informed, you saw what happened on Monday and my President said very openly - were not just the invention of the Albanians because we know that Albanians do nothing, as we say: they don't even go to the toilet without asking permission from the United States and some European countries.

The whole thing on Monday was thoroughly prepared - why? To provoke the Serbians in northern Kosovo that they react, as a platform for more severe reaction for the occupation of the north of Kosovo. Because for Kosovo and those co-sponsors of the independence of Kosovo, north Kosovo is a kind of pin in the eye. But Serbs reacted in a very sophisticated way.

The Police - so-called police - because those are terrorists from the UCK [e.n. - Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosoves in Albanian, Kosovo Liberation Army in English] in changed uniforms - have tried to provoke as much as possible. When they saw that it doesn't go as the plans they had, so that they could use even guns, arms, etc, they started to beat people up and that's how 32 persons ended up in the hospital. But the Serbs were smart and they knew it was a kind of provocation.

You have to know that all around north Kosovo, a lot of Albanian forces have been deployed in order to wait for the signal that something in north Mitrovica would start what the French people would call "la bagarre" [e.n. - fight, scandal] so that they could intervene. That was organized and orchestrated with the permission and not only that, but the plans from some Western countries. You will have the proof of that.

How come? KFOR and EULEX are primarily responsible for peace and security in Kosovo. How come that more than one hundred armed police appeared and there was not a single representative of KFOR and EULEX? People say that there were some of them taking photos, that was all. How come? So that has definitely been orchestrated.

To get back to what you said, since they know that Serbia will never ever recognize the unilateral proclamation of independence of Kosovo, they wanted to do that by force. To become somebody in the north so that they could say 'this is a state, we have the right' and then the Western countries would start opening the procedure of getting Kosovo in the UN, in UNESCO, etc.. Another proof - just recently in the UN in New York, the representative of the European Union called at a lunch all members, I mean ambassadors, of the European Union... a so-called working luncheon with - for the first time - the so-called consul of Kosovo. We vehemently reject any manner of this approach. This, we find, is Kosovo coming through a small door to certain international organizations and we are intervening in the whole world for that to not happen. At the same time, all five countries [in the EU], including Romania, who didn't recognize Kosovo, they didn't participate, they rejected to participate in that luncheon.

And by the way, half of the other ambassadors didn't come. So that was another proof that there is an orchestration on how to go over the majority of the countries that didn't recognize Kosovo and to get them to join as a member of any organization. Why? They have done what they did with bombing [e.n. - NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999], that was a war crime, and they would never say we made a mistake or apologize. No, they have to do everything in order to "prove" that they were right when they did what they did. They need approval for bombing of Yugoslavia without approval from the Security Council, which was an example "par excellence" of a war crime. I won't go on with their use of cluster bombs and bombs with depleted uranium, etc., etc., another crime against humanity.

AGERPRES: You're talking about war crimes but when it comes to the question of ex-Yugoslavia, one country's war criminal is another country's war hero...

Branko Brankovic: Excuse me interrupting you, but we shouldn't talk about the countries, we have to talk about individuals, and obviously in 1991, 1992, until 1995, a lot of criminal actions and war crimes have been committed on all sides and everybody has to pay for the crimes he or she did. That goes without saying. And we very well support something like that. So, countries haven't done anything... you know, you can't say that a country has committed something like that. But the bombing of Yugoslavia was a decision of countries and members of NATO and we are very grateful to Romania, being members of NATO, not participating in bombing. Romania didn't participate in the bombing of Yugoslavia.

AGERPRES: But as far as I remember, they opened up the airspace for...

Branko Brankovic: Do you expect that Romanian authorities could do anything, as members of NATO, if they could say "no, we will close the airspace"? It was a clear-cut forcing of the basic principles of the charter and of international law. So, it wasn't opened, they crossed without permission, that I am sure of. Crossed without permission and we thank once more Romania, this being another proof of the relations we have between Romania and Serbia. And you shouldn't forget that we have this year 139 years since we established diplomatic relations. So that's another proof.

AGERPRES: You were talking about the situation in the region, between the countries of the former Yugoslavia, but how do you see, in the light of the accession of the European Union - in the near future, I guess, all the countries will be a part of the European Union, but they have a very complicated history together - I'm talking about the war in the former Yugoslavia less than 20 years ago - how do you see the relationships between these countries. I mean Serbia will have to deal with Albania, which is involved in the Kosovo region, you say...

Branko Brankovic: Since you mentioned Albania... We have good relations with Albania, that has nothing to do with Kosovo. They support Kosovo, but the United States also support Kosovo and we also have good relations with the United States. So the region... Albania is part of the region but I am talking about the former Yugoslavia. You know that we have some problems with Croatia and they have already been let in [the EU]. They say no country will join the European Union without sorting the bilateral problems. How come that Slovenia and Croatia joined when they have bilateral problems and very serious ones? We have less of a problem than Croatia, because we have been witnessing the revitalization of certain very bad remnants from the Second World War. They are going around raising monuments to war criminals.

AGERPRES: But you said it's a problem of people, not of countries...

Branko Brankovic: No, no, but we are talking now about the decisions of the government of Croatia. All Croats are not what the Ustase [e.n. fascist party central to the one-party state system of Croatia during the Second World War] was. I have very many friends from Croatia and they are not Ustases, but they have certain remnants and they are making some problems and the present government in Croatia and the leading party are leaning on some remnants, because the first President of independent Croatia, Mr. Tudjman was having certain ideas about this, but that's a long story.

But let's go back... You know that quite recently our President was in Croatia, so we want dialogue, we want to solve the problems, but you may recall that in 1995, there was this "Storm" military action [e.n. Operation Storm] by the Croats, they call it "Storm", when more than 200,000 Serbs were expelled from Croatia. That is the first case in the history of countries where a country expels its own citizens, because those Serbs used to be citizens of Croatia for more than 200-300 years. Never ever has it happened for a country to expel its own citizens.

You should probably know that during this Independent Croatian State in the Second World War [e.n. - 1941-1945] there was a rule that they proclaimed: one third of Serbs need to be killed, one third to be converted to Catholicism, and one third to be expelled. Now with 1995 they have somehow succeeded with that.

So we want to say that the good relations with Croatia that we want have to be based on what they have accepted when they were admitted to the European Union. And the European Union said that you have to do your best that all Serbs, your citizens, that were expelled, get back, they get back their apartments, etc., and nothing was done for 20 years. Few thousands have gone back. And then they made some lists, some clandestine lists, saying 'this gentleman is on the list of war crimes' and they are arresting them. And people are afraid of going back, because they don't know the list, because the list is an arbitrary list for certain political reasons. But again we are ready to open up all the avenues for discussion with Croats to have excellent relations with them.

AGERPRES: But, talking about that, will there be trust between the countries of ex-Yugoslavia within the European Union? I'm talking about Serbia with Croatia, with Albania, with...

Branko Brankovic: You know what? You don't have a big trust between Croatia and Slovenia and they are in the European Union, so I do not expect a bigger distrust if all of us enter the European Union. We in Serbia act in accordance with few credos. No. 1 - Serbia will never compromise its national and state interest, that's why we are not imposing sanctions on Russia. No. 2 - We do not accept ultimatums. We rejected the ultimatum in 1914 from General Potiorek, we rejected in 1941 Hitler's ultimatum, we rejected Stalin's ultimatum in 1948 and we rejected NATO's ultimatum from 1999 - that was an ultimatum - I was a member of Serbian and Yugoslav delegation in Rambouillet, I know what happened, 70 days and 70 nights I was there. So that was nothing but an ultimatum. We reject ultimatums.

Another credo, which is a very good saying in English, is "He who dares, wins". And probably another one: the loser is the one who gives up. We, in Serbia, never give up. Those are somehow basic rules for how we act, that doesn't mean we want to impose on anybody those rules, but we act in accordance with those rules, and we want, as I said, excellent relations with all countries.

We are getting back to having them, as it used to be when Yugoslavia was a non-aligned country... we want to have good relations with all the countries, and that is why we have with Russia, China, with all the Asian countries, with the Maghreb countries. And you shouldn't forget that more than one hundred countries didn't recognize Kosovo, and you know that we have withdrawals from that: Suriname, Guinea-Bissau. They withdrew their recognition of Kosovo. I don't know, but you should probably know that there was recently a moment in the Czech Republic. The former minister for foreign affairs led a group of people who visited Serbia and they opened up the discussion to withdraw the recognition, on the basis of "how can we Czechs recognize Kosovo but not recognize Crimea?"

AGERPRES: When President Vucic came to Romania and had talks with President Iohannis, in the common declaration, they said they are looking for a compromise regarding Kosovo. What does a compromise mean in this situation?

Branko Brankovic: You know the meaning of the word compromise: You accept that, I accept that, you agree that I would accept that, and I agree that you will accept that. The meaning of the word "compromise" is very well known. We have, on the basis of the initiative of President Vucic in Serbia, a very large discussion with a number of known people from the Academy of Science, with lawyers, with universities, a discussion what might be the compromise we can offer. And he said that probably at the end of April, the beginning of May, we may have some ideas about that compromise. We are now in the discussion amongst ourselves. And that's to get back to Monday, because why did the Serbs in Kosovo meet on Monday? To discuss the possible compromise which they think might be acceptable for them and what people understand. So, it's too early to say what that might be, but we are very thoroughly working on that, to find the compromise that the Albanians... the Albanian and Serbian population and other non-Albanians can live over there in peace and security and to be free people. But it's too early to say what might be the compromise.

AGERPRES: In an earlier interview you talked about the relationships between Serbia and Russia, and in an earlier interview a few years ago you said that the sanctions imposed on Russia are ridiculous, because the US is there and Russia is here. What do you think about the expelling of the diplomats that was not imposed, but suggested...

Branko Brankovic: Well, this is now a hysteria in the Western world organized by the Americans against Russia. The European countries, unfortunately, very much trusted and supported, for years, certain policies proposed by the United States. Willingly or not, the Americans and the recent actions by Mr Trump on North Korea was a very good example. Since at the beginning he said 'We are going to attack him, and they are not going to do that', and slowly but surely he came to the proposal that he might accept contact with the leader of North Korea. And then, all of a sudden, as a result of all of that, North Koreans and South Koreans put the set together and participated in the Winter Olympics. And now, we have the leader of North Korea a few days ago in China. So the Americans have lost in their policy a lot of credibility, as far as Korea is concerned, this Asian part. But what is going on in the Middle East? The invasion of Iraq a long time ago by the Americans and British has started to create the trouble which exists now in Syria, Iraq and all the other countries, all around.

And the influence of the United States, you understand is a big power - economic, military. Nobody is challenging that. But the influence is slowly but surely going down. You should never forget that for the first time after '45 the Russians are militarily present in the Middle East, which has never happened before. So what's that supposed to mean? That's supposed to mean that the policy of the United States, slowly but surely, is not having that kind of an influence and from time to time they lose temper. Do things that this is accidental? That Trump for such a short period of time, he's changing almost every week some people from his Cabinet. That means that all of them in the administration are trying to find the best possible way to keep the United States on the level they deserve, they are a big power, economic and you know... And we have good relations with the United States. We want good relations, it goes without saying. But, whether they want to accept it or not China and Russia are now very high on the level of not only big powers but with influence in Europe and around the world.

You may recall that a long time ago Charles de Gaulle and [Konrad] Adenauer said, and Charles de Gaulle in particular, Europe is from the Atlantic to the Urals. That means Russia is a European country. So the sanctions against Russia... they were broken immediately the next day. As I said, we are not going to compromise. Our state and national interests are not to impose sanctions on Russia, since we suffered almost ten years from the sanctions of the Security Council - we know that the sanctions never solved any problem.

There were and there are sanctions against North Korea. And what? Nothing happened. The German and some other European enterprises are on a daily basis acting like no sanctions are imposed on Russia. And so that's I would say superfluous and could call them even ridiculous, when you impose sanctions and immediately you break them.

AGERPRES: Russia has a lot of investments in the energy department in Serbia. Will this aspect be a leverage or a breaking point when it comes to Serbia's negotiations to the accession to the European Union? I am talking about this in the light of the tensions between...

Branko Brankovic: As I said, we are not going to compromise our relations with anybody, including Russia. There is no need that we, upon entering the European Union, have to break relations with somebody else, economic, political, etc. Frankly speaking, just take a look on Germany or France. They have relations with all of the world, including North Korea, through other channels, you know. So for this or that, none of the countries members of the European Union are breaking relations for God knows what kind of reasons. They themselves want to have good relations. Expelling those diplomats is the regular thing, it has ups and downs, and they simply change these intelligence people. But the United States didn't break the relations with Russia or with China. So why should we, let's say, stop or neglect our relations in any field, be it economic, political or something else with Russia, when all those who are advocating that and asking us to do that do not do that?

AGERPRES: When it comes to China, China invests a lot in the Serbian infrastructure. But then come the European standards. I mean China cannot invest in EU countries because there are the European standards. How will Serbia approach this? How will Serbia approach the relation with the Chinese investors in infrastructure once it becomes a part of the European Union?

Branko Brankovic: First of all, it's too early to discuss now about that. You know that Chinese standards about a number of things are very high. So '16+1', you know what it means? This is the group of 16 countries including a number of European countries and China. China is offering about ten billion dollars for economic operations. And all those 16 countries including Serbia cooperate in a number of things. We have together with Hungary this modernization of a railroad between Belgrade-Budapest with Chinese money. I mean credit, etc. Nobody contests that. So why should all of a sudden... something is going to be within or in accordance with the practices or standards and something is not? So, as I said, 16 countries accept that and the European Union has accepted that, because Hungary and all the others are saying yes. So I don't see why Serbia shouldn't accept that as well.

AGERPRES: Coming back to Romanian issues. There is... The problem between Romania and Serbia when it comes to the case of Sebastian Ghita, who is now in Serbia, and the Romanian Government...

Branko Brankovic: First and foremost, this is not a problem. I don't see it as a problem. Your minister was just a few days ago in Belgrade. As far as I understand, this morning at 9'oclock I read that he said the whole thing is a judicial one. So I don't see the problem about that. What was the result of the talks between my minister and the Romanian minister we still don't know.

AGERPRES: There are reports regarding the investments, actually the contracts that an IT firm founded by Sebastian Ghita had contracts with the public, even Serbian ministries. Do you know anything about it?

Branko Brankovic: Frankly speaking, I personally know nothing about that. Nothing has been announced or we haven't got any information from our ministry about that. So the details about Ghita's work we don't know, but there is no doubt that your minister might know that and they exchanged some [information]. But you know what, the relations between the two countries are on a very high level, and whatever might appear as "a problem", has to be solved bilaterally, friendly. So I have no doubt that your minister and my minister are in accordance that something should be done as far as this is concerned for the benefit of both countries and to keep up the level, which is very high, of the political relations. I have no doubt that we will find the solution about what is what and who is who and who and what did something. Most probably your people know that in detail, but we don't know that.

AGERPRES: You were talking about the economic relations between Romania and Serbia. The Serbian Ministry of Energy said that there is a possibility of having a transport of gas between the two countries. Do you think this is possible? What are the steps to do that?

Branko Brankovic: Everything is possible, if we have good relations as we have, and of course, we manage to find money. So we want to have all kind of these ways, up, south, north, whatever, we are ready to participate in all of that. And we want to because you are, if I may say, lucky that you are if not self-sufficient, but almost close to that, with oil and gas. This is not the case with us. So we would like really to have with Romania and with other countries which have at their disposal this kind of resources to have a... just to open up connections and to be, in a way, in business, if I may say so, which could be for the benefit for both countries. So, energetically, I see that we are in a very good cooperation because we have Djerdap [the Iron Gates Hydroelectric Plant], which works perfectly all right.

As far as gas and oil are concerned we are working on that and I see quite a perspective. And you may recall that President Vucic and President Iohannis, and Vucic together with Madam Prime Minister and the two leaders of the two Houses, there was almost, if I may say, an agreement that we speed up the beginning of the work on the highway between Belgrade - Timisoara. And President Vucic promised in the talks we are going to do our best to save, I mean to find, money for our part. And there was a very clear cut promise by Mr Iohannis and all the others to find money for this part, from Timisoara. So that's quite an investment. This is quite a good cooperation in those terms. As far as the economic relations are concerned, you know that the trade is going very nicely.

We have almost every year one billion and three hundred millions, you know, half and half import and export, euros, of course, and that goes very well. Then we are very happy that we have around 25 percent increase of Romanian tourists in Serbia. So we have more than one hundred thousand people over there. We have a lot of interesting things in tourism to offer, winter tourism, summer tourism, SPAs. A number of Western European countries have recognized that they are coming, particularly the Nordic countries and the others where they have 10 months winter, they are very happy to come to our SPAs where they can treat themselves, etc, etc. So this is another very good point. So when you put everything together, economic relations are good, but always could be better, not only between two countries, but generally speaking. And we always want and strive to come up with the economic relations to the same level of the political relations. As far as Serbia and Romania is concerned, it's a very hard task, not that we don't want to, but the political level is so high that the economic... I don't know what we have to do, both countries, in order to bring up to the same level the economic relation.

AGERPRES: Could Serbia be an example for Romania in terms of economy? I am talking now about the case of AirSerbia - the company could be an example for TAROM, as the latter is almost bankrupt...

Branko Brankovic: I had the pleasure to cut the ribbon when AirSerbia came to Bucharest. We find that investment in AirSerbia from certain Arab countries is very good. We have renewed our fleet and we have now millions of passengers already going through AirSerbia. We, as you know, opened a direct flight Belgrade - New York. We used to have New York, we used to have to Chicago and we used to have to Toronto, as well. We are now working on all of that besides New York. We want to open up that and we want AirSerbia to fly to the Middle East. We want now to reopen to Australia, another connection that used to be. And the whole of Europe is covered. We have now direct flight Belgrade -Beijing that was just recently opened. We are very happy that we have daily flights Belgrade - Bucharest together, they are in pool - TAROM and AirSerbia - which is quite a good sign of excellent cooperation in that field. I am not an expert in aviation, but I think the prospects are very good for this cooperation. What TAROM might do I don't know - with all due respect to all the people in TAROM and Romanians here, I don't know. But I know that AirSerbia is in good cooperation with TAROM, which we want to continue, and that as far as AirSerbia is concerned, we are really very happily expanding.

AGERPRES: Romania is celebrating 100 years since the reunification this year. How do you see Romania now and how do you see the question of European unity at this point in time?

Branko Brankovic: What happened, happened, that's history. It's upon Romanians, Moldovans and the other two to act in accordance to their interest, so... We have good relations with Romania and Moldova - I am ambassador in Moldova, as well. So as far as this part is concerned, let's call it a bilateral thing between two countries - members of the UN - Moldova and Romania. Then the European Union unity - unity as a whole - the rules which exist within the European Union are very clear. So if you want to be a member you have to obey those rules.

As far as I see it, besides the fact that we are very, very happy that five countries in the European Union did not recognize Kosovo, all the other levels of this unity, I would say, work very well. Now and then you have now a problem with Poland, then you know that Hungary was trying to have some rules about God knows what. I am not going to get into details, they know that very well. And they want to impose article seven on Poland and, you know, just..., etc., etc.

The point is the European Union, as an organization, has to respect the sovereignty and independence of every single country, member of the European Union. To impose anything which is to the detriment of any country is not good. I sincerely hope that all the rules which exist are more or less okay, because otherwise, the countries who joined the European Union, they wouldn't accept this, but the big countries in the European Union, like Germany, France - the United Kingdom is not anymore - they from time to time in the history of the European Union, they have tried, being big countries economically, to press on the other countries on matters such as sanctions against Russia.

That was the invention of - you see now with this - the United Kingdom, France and Germany to a certain extent - on the basis of the cooperation with the United States - they are doing that because of this hysteria about this. And okay, you are going to expel one diplomat from Romania, and the Americans, British and the others are leaders in all of that but then we'll get them back pretty soon. There are ups and downs. And to get back to what I said at the very beginning, I think that the United States is - with this policy, which I explained - is losing certain kind of an influence. But it's wrongly to think that that's because Russia is doing something. No. We shouldn't try, any country, to find excuses for certain things in other countries. You have to find whatever it is within yourself.

AGERPRES: Do you think that once becoming a EU member, Serbia will bring a kind of the expertise regarding the way of dealing with turmoils and also the history of no compromise? I mean Serbia has a certain way of approaching a problem, once being part of the European Union will Serbia be a voice for no compromise?

Branko Brankovic: Once we get into European Union, this is a kind of compromise since we accept the rules of the European Union. But, as I said, we want to be respected as a sovereign, independent country, and that's because we will respect every single European country the same way. But I told you, those three, four credos, we will always follow that. We have to follow that. That is why we survived a lot of troubles, First, Second World War or Stalin, etc.

AGERPRES: Can you describe in one word Serbia's relationship to NATO at this point?

Branko Brankovic: I have two. No membership in it. We have a very comfortable majority in the country to become members of the European Union, but, at the same time, we have an even more comfortable majority not to enter NATO. The wounds are still very warm. We have more than 3,000 people killed, civilians, we have more than around 12,000 wounded, and a number of them crippled, and more than 100 billion euros of material damage. Wherever you go around Belgrade or Serbia you see the remnants of that bombing. You can't, unless you want to commit suicide, put on the agenda within the Serbian population - let's go to NATO. No chance. And just two days ago, when all those events in Kosovo [took place], Vucic again said no, we don't want to go into NATO, that's it.

AGERPRES: So the two words would be "no chance"?

Branko Brankovic: I've been too long in politics, international politics - what is today "no", tomorrow may be "yes." But, as far as NATO is concerned, we have in our Constitution that we are keeping our neutrality and we have to obey that. Maybe some time later [it will happen], I doubt that I will live that long to see Serbia in NATO, but I intend to live very long. As I said, what happened, what they did to us, that's very fresh, even in the young children, and those in middle-age and older do not forget. So it will take decades until somebody might say let's see what happens. Probably God knows whether it is going to happen in the distant future. Who knows!? AGERPRES. (RO - author: Oana Ghita, editor: Catalin Alexandru)