Serbia leader in protection of minority rights

Minister for Human and Minority Rights and Social Dialogue Tomislav Žigmanov talked today with Vice-President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Kyriakos Hadjiyianni about the state of human and minority rights in Serbia.

When it comes to the protection of human rights of members of non-Albanian communities in the southern Serbian province, Žigmanov said that the situation is very difficult and that the Government uses every opportunity to emphasise to the representatives of the international community that it is extremely important that they pay attention and constantly keep in focus the situation with drastic violation of human rights of members of non-Albanian communities in Kosovo and Metohija and to make additional efforts to stop it.

The Vice-President of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly pointed out that Serbia is a leader in the protection of minority rights not only in this part of Europe, and underlined that the quality of protection is also reflected in the inclusion and integration of minorities into a system in which everyone has equal freedoms and rights according to the standards of the Council of Europe.

Hadjiyianni also underlined that the issue of people's rights in Kosovo and Metohija is of great importance to him, adding that the OSCE sees what the tendencies are there.

In this context, Žigmanov pointed to the exclusion of Serbs from the process of making political decisions and the violent abolition of the institutions of the Republic of Serbia in Kosovo and Metohija, which we are witnessing these days.

In this way, as he said, the availability of services is getting complicated, from social and health care to education. Also, the number of ethnically motivated crimes is increasing, which further complicates the overall security situation in society.

The Minister underlined that the government consistently insists on dialogue and that the insistence of the international community on this matter should be permanent, because we are witnessing that the unilateral actions of the Albanian side have consequences on the position of the Serb community and on the dialogue.