Buckle Up: Serbia-Kosovo Flight Deal a Wake-up Call for All

The new route would considerably cut travel time between Belgrade and Pristina, with the bus between the two cities currently taking around six hours.

The announcement also triggered speculation that Serbia might lift its airspace blockade for flights to and from Kosovo. Currently, flights operate via an air corridor with North Macedonia, extending flight times by 15-20 minutes and incurring extra costs for airlines.

However, questions have already been raised about which Kosovo documents will be accepted by authorities at Belgrade's Nikola Tesla Airport - an ID or a passport? - as well as what the approach will be toward travellers holding other passports: Will they be able to enter Serbia at the Belgrade airport if they first entered Kosovo via a border not recognised by Belgrade? In other words, will the flight be classified in Serbia as a domestic or an international service?

But whatever the technicalities related to freedom of movement, reaching this agreement reflects a major power shift on the side of the 'facilitators.' It also shows that while the 100 per cent tariff imposed by the Kosovo government in November 2018 on Serbian goods may have shut down the EU-facilitated dialogue in Brussels, it did not cut off all communication between the two states.

EU left looking weaker

US Ambassador to Germany Richard Allen Grenell. Photo: EPA-EFE/HAYOUNG JEON

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic has persistently repeated that the dialogue will not restart until Pristina scraps the 100 per cent tariff, while the head of Serbia's so-called Office for Kosovo and Metohija, Marko Djuric, said on Monday that flights between Belgrade and Pristina would not restart until the tariff is removed and the Brussels dialogue...

Continue reading on: