During his first visit to Serbia in 2009, Biden was on the same red carpet with then Serbian President Boris Tadic, who at the time discreetly signaled with his hand to the USA official to stop next to him, so they could honor the Serbian flag together.
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After visiting Belgrade, Biden flew to Pristina, capital of the Kosovo and Metohija province, where he will on Wednesday meet leaders of the region.
Hundreds of Serbian ultra-nationalists protest against Vice President Biden’s visit to Belgrade by chanting, “Vote for Trump!”
Associated Press said Biden’s visit exemplified Washington’s bid to counteract Moscow’s historial sway on Serbia and maintain United States influence.
Beau Biden, former Delaware Attorney General, served in 2001 in Kosovo as an interim legal adviser.
Naming streets after US officials is becoming something of a tradition in Kosovo, whose population is mainly ethnic Albanian and which considers the United States its savior since 1999 North Atlantic Treaty Organisation airstrikes halted killings by Serbian troops. Serbia does not recognize Kosovo sovereignty.
Biden may also raise the unresolved murder of three USA citizens in the aftermath of the 1999 war in Kosovo, and the 2008 torching of the U.S. embassy.
Serbia has not officially recognized Kosovo as an independent state.
He also criticized Trump for encouraging the Russians to hack Clinton’s email: “Even if he is joking – which he’s not – even if he’s joking, what an outrageous thing to say”.
Biden, who will meet Serbian Premier Aleksandar Vucic and President Tomislav Nikolic, will also discuss upholding stability in southeastern Europe, a region that witnessed the continent’s worst violence since World War II with the bloody disintegration of the former Yugoslavia.
“I would like to add my condolences to the families of those whose lives were lost during the wars in the 1990s, including those whose lives were lost as the result of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation campaign”, he said. Ethnic tensions remain high in the Balkans, with neighbors bickering over who was the most responsible for the bloodshed.
The U.S. has “recognized and encouraged a constructive role of our country” in “maintaining the regional stability of the Western Balkans”, Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic said after meeting Charles Kupchan, Senior Director for European Affairs at the U.S. White House National Security Council Monday. Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008.
Biden, a Democrat, said on Monday that Trump’s remark that President Barack Obama had founded Islamic State had increased threats to the physical safety of USA troops in Iraq. The trip also highlights Washington’s worry about the slow pace of regional reconciliation 17 years after the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation air war and 21 years after a Bosnia peace deal was signed. “We are where we are now thanks to the help of our friends and we need their help to go further”, said 37-year-old government worker Bejt Bejta.
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However, it has signed a series of EU-brokered deals to regulate relations between the two.
