Turkey and Serbia decided to boost their economic links during a visit to Belgrade by Turkish Foreign Minister Ismail Cem, Tanjug news agency reported.
Cem and Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic agreed to reactivate the two countries' joint economic commission with the goal of promoting economic relations, Djindjic's office announced after they met on Friday, March 2.
The two also proposed setting up a business council for private enterprises, a communiqué said. Trade between Belgrade and Ankara has dropped considerably over the past 10 years, Djindjic's office said.
Cem was the first Turkish minister to visit Belgrade since the formation in 1992 of the new Yugoslavia, made up of Serbia and Montenegro. He met Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica, who ousted Slobodan Milosevic in October.
Kostunica and Cem discussed the problem of southern Serbia, where ethnic Albanian rebels are waging a guerrilla war against Serbian forces, and the Turkish minority in Kosovo, the presidency said in a communiqué quoted by Tanjug.
The province of Kosovo has been administered since the 1998/99 Serbian-Albanian conflict by the United Nations and NATO. Some 1,000 Turkish soldiers are currently serving in the NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping force in Kosovo.
Earlier Friday, Cem met Yugoslav Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic and signed a series of cooperation agreements. Relations between the two countries were strained under Milosevic, notably over Turkey's participation as a NATO member in the alliance's air campaign against Yugoslavia in 1999. Turkey has close historic bonds and interests in the Balkans where the Ottoman Empire ruled for five centuries. — (AFP, Belgrade)
© Agence France Presse 2001
© 2001 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
