WASHINGTON (AFP)–The U.S. will offer economic and other aid to Serbia during the “extraordinarily difficult period” it will face with Kosovo’s independence, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday.
“We want a Serbia that is looking to its future and that future is in Europe,” Rice told senators, adding she intervened so that Serbia could be offered NATO’s Partnership for Peace, a first step toward joining the alliance.
“I do know this is going to be an extraordinarily difficult period of time for the Serbian people,” Rice said during a hearing at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
“And what the U.S. is going to do is offer a hand of friendship, saying that the status of Kosovo and its resolution will allow Serbia to look forward, and to move on then with what it needs to do,” Rice said.
“We hope to be good partners in exchanges, in economic assistance, in all the ways that could reach out to Serbia,” Rice said.
“But it is a great culture and they are great people. I hope they will look to that future, not to the past,” she added.
Leaders of Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian majority are expected to proclaim independence from Serbia Sunday or Monday, the day of a crucial European Union foreign ministers meeting that will discuss the issue.
The U.S. and numerous E.U. member countries - including the U.K., France, Germany and Italy - have already expressed their intention to quickly recognize Kosovo’s independence.
Kosovo has been run by the U.N. since mid-1999, after a NATO air assault drove out Serbian forces waging a brutal crackdown on separatist ethnic Albanian guerillas and their civilian supporters.
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