Dutch FM cancels visit to Serbia over ICTY

 
Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen has postponed a trip to Serbia scheduled this month. The minister wanted to discuss closer economic cooperation between the two countries with a view to increasing trade and investment flows.
 

Serbia was adamant that the Yugoslavia Tribunal should also be on the agenda. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is a United Nations body set up to prosecute war crimes committed during the war in the 1990s and to try alleged perpetrators. The Dutch foreign minister said there was nothing to discuss on the matter as far as he was concerned.

Ratko Mladic
The Netherlands' standpoint is that if Serbia wants to join the EU, it has to cooperate fully with the tribunal and help capture Ratko Mladic, an ex-military top general wanted by the ICTY in connection with the 1992-1995 Siege of Sarajevo and the massacre of some 7,000 Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica in 1995. In 2004, it was revealed that the Serbian army had been harbouring and protecting Mladic, despite repeated pleas from the ICTY. The tribunal's prosecutor, Serge Brammerts, recently said there is some improvement, but no full cooperation from Serbia.

In May 2006, talks about Serbia's entry into the EU were suspended when the deadline for handing over Mladic to the ICTY was passed.
 
Visa relaxation
The EU's stabilisation and association accord with Serbia's remains frozen, and The Netherlands is refusing to reactivate the accord while Serbian cooperation over the ICTY is considered insufficient. The accord is considered a precursor to full EU membership. Despite the Dutch opposition to reviving the accord, a spokesperson for the Dutch Foreign Ministry told AFP that The Netherlands is willing to support moves to allow easier travel for Serbians into the EU. Brussels is proposing to lift visa restrictions for Serbian citizens from 2010.
 
 
 
Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen, by roel1943 (flickr)