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44 I Southeast Europe bne October 2020
national security advisor Robert O'Brien and the US president's envoy for the Serbia/Kosovo dialogue, Richard Grenell.
Originally, Vucic and Kosovo’s President Hashim Thaci were scheduled to
meet on June 27 in Washington,
but the meeting was canceled after
the announcement that Thaci had
been indicted by The Hague-based Specialist Prosecutor’s Office for war crimes committed during Kosovo’s independence war with Serbia. Then the
meeting was scheduled for September 2 but was postponed by two days due to “scheduling reasons”.
Kosovo unilaterally declared indepen- dence from Serbia in 2008, but it is still not recognised by Belgrade as a separate country. The proclamation of indepen- dence came one decade after the Kosovo war in 1998-1999 which ended with Nato attacks in Serbia. The independence war claimed more than 10,000 victims, mak- ing the two sides fervent enemies.
Serbia and Kosovo will continue high level meetings with the mediation of the EU on September 7 when Vucic and Hoti are scheduled to meet again in Brussels. EU officials expect the final deal between the two sides to be reached within months.
Kosovo wants the final agreement to include the recognition of Kosovo by Belgrade, but Serbian officials say that recognition is not an option.
Croatian officials slam MEP’s watermelon protest as “security threat”
bne IntelliNews
Croatian MEP Ivan Vilibor Sincic dumped dozens of watermelons outside Government House
in Zagreb as part of a protest to raise awareness about the situation of
local farmers.
Farmers in Croatia complain that since the country joined the European Union local food producers have been undermined by cheap imported food.
Sincic and other protesters outside the government building on September 10 said the watermelons they threw down were meant to symbolise the watermelons and other fruit and vegetables farmers would have to plough under or destroy because they were unable to sell them.
Sincic delivered an address to the small crowd through a loudhailer from on top of the van, and fellow demonstrators accosted members of the government as they entered the building.
“Every year, thousands of tonnes of domestic products fail in Croatian fields. Our struggle must be for our country, for our children, for our people,” Sincic wrote on his Facebook page.
“We import food, we import over 90% of salt [though we are] near the Adriatic
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Sea. They [politicians] do not hear the voice of farmers, they do not hear the voice of craftsmen. They only hear when they are shouted at.”
Croatian government officials were quick to criticise Sincic. Agriculture Minister Marija Vuckovic dismissed the protest as “theatre”. Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior Davor Bozinovic said that “no one expected that something resembling a security threat would come from
a politician”.
"Certainly this is not a good picture, especially for those who are politicians and MPs and who express their political position in this way. We are
a democratic state, but in a democracy there must be rules," Bozinovic added.
Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic has already said that a security plan will be drawn up for the area outside the government building.
Sincic, who is just 30 years old, was one of the founders of the Zivi Did (Human Shield) anti-eviction movement, whose members occupied properties to prevent foreclosures. A party of the same name was founded in 2011, and Sincic is its chairman. He ran in the 2014 presidential election, coming third after the candidates for the two main parties, and went on
to successfully run first for the Croatian parliament and later to become an MEP.
MEP Ivan Vilibor Sincic (right) and a fellow protester empty a van of watermelons outside the Croatian government building.