Former Serbian Assembly President says Kosovo is lost to Serbia

Excerpt from interview with Civic Alliance of Serbia (GSS) chairwoman Natasa Micic by Dragan Banjac: "Kostunica's government is an interest group", published by Serbian newspaper Glas javnosti on 9 January

[Micic] [Passage omitted] Kosovo is effectively independent of Serbia. The sooner that reality is accepted the better it will be for Serbia. The problem of its status is a problem of the rights of its Serbian citizens, not who controls that territory, because Serbia does not have that control, and it will not have it. The independence of Kosmet [Kosovo-Metohija] should be linked to achieving European standards which will best be measured through the rights of minority citizens. The slogan "We will not give up Kosovo" is only a way to manipulate the Kosovo Serbs for the purposes of Belgrade's political power struggle. That is a continuation of Milosevic's policy that resulted in losing Kosmet. So I do not think it is possible for [Democratic Party of Kosovo leader Hashim] Thaci and [Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush] Haradinaj to sit in the Serbian Assembly and decide about whether Serbia's prime minister will be [Vojislav] Kostunica, [Boris] Tadic or [Tomislav] Nikolic, depending on who offers them a better coalition deal. That would mean that Kosovo was a part of Serbia, but the moment for that was lost forever 15 years ago.