Kosovo President Accused of Planning Land Swap with Serbia

Kosovo President Hashim Thaci came under fire from his political opponents after he said on Wednesday that the ongoing Belgrade-Pristina dialogue will include talks on "the correction of borders" - a phrase which his critics claimed actually meant the exchange of land and the partition of Kosovo.

Thaci said the talks should also cover the unification with Kosovo of the Presevo Valley, a southern Serbian region with a majority ethnic Albanian population.

"Only unified can we achieve our objectives: mutual recognition between Kosovo and Serbia, a UN seat and membership in all other international organisations," he wrote on Facebook.

"Serbia's claim for Kosovo's partition will always be unacceptable, but during the process of the correction of borders, the just request of the Presevo Valley to unify with Kosovo should be addressed during the dialogue," Thaci added.

Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, which Belgrade has refused to recognise. EU-mediated talks on normalisation of relations were launched in Brussels in 2011. Since June, both sides have stated that the talks are entering the final stage.

As BIRN has previously reported, talk of an exchange of territories - swapping Albanian-majority areas in southern Serbia for Serb-majority ones in northern Kosovo - has again arisen among some Serbian and Kosovo politicians, although it has never been an official topic of duscission during the official Pristina-Belgrade dialogue in Brussels.

Serbian FM Raises Partition Possibility

Serbian officials have been more vocal about the possible partition of Kosovo.

Reuters reported on July 31 that Ivica Dacic, Serbia's foreign minister, said he had talked about partition during his recent visit to...