welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur and today i'm in pristine, capital of kosovo, which declared itself independent some 15 years ago, but which is still not recognised by and is locked in a potentially dangerous confrontation with neighbouring serbia. now kosovo�*s key allies in washington and brussels are telling my guest today kosovo�*s prime minister albin kurti, will he listen? and if he doesn't, could kosovo see a new round

of balkan bloodshed? prime minister albin kurti, welcome to hardtalk. welcome to pristina. and thank you for having me. well, it's a great pleasure to be in your office, mr prime minister, how close has kosovo come to seeing a renewal of conflict in the last few months? it has been very heavy because the two extremist terrorist organisations which are being financed by serbia and from where they also receive their orders, civil protection and the northern brigade have been very active and first intimidating serbs and serbian candidates who would like to vote and run in elections. and second, in attacking our police.

journalist but first and foremost, nato�*s soldiers on 29th of may. you've chosen in that answer to pile all of the blame on your serbian minority population. that is not the way the international community sees things right now. i never blame serbian minority population. they are 4% of population in kosovo. less than half of them live north of river ibar. but i was blaming two specific organisations and also belgrade, who is controlling them for the violent riots, for the violent unrest that we had in recent months, the eu for the violent unrest that we had in recent months. the eu envoy responsible for trying to normalise the situation here in kosovo, miroslav lapchick, he had a discussion with you just a couple of days ago. he described that discussion as long, frank and open. and he stressed to you, to you, the urgent need for de—escalation.

are you prepared to take actions to de—escalate the tension? of course. and i have offered to have early elections in the four northern municipalities as soon as possible. and to that end, we have to have a rule of law in place. so we have a fair and open campaign prior to free and democratic elections. the united states and your european allies, certainly the united kingdom asked you not to do that. you didn't seek their advice. you just did it. why? on 23rd ofjune, minister of internal affairs djilas together with our director of police government, they've made a press conference where they have exposed all the ammunition and armaments, including rocket launchers that they have confiscated in a car with belgrade car plates belonging to this southern brigade,

a northern brigade, but which actually was also belonging to the serbian railways, a publicly owned enterprise in serbia. and at that press conference, minister of internal affairs announced that he is going to ask from the government to declare these organisations terrorist organisations. if i wouldn't have done so, i would violate my law and i would have to neglect the data from our security sector and intelligence figures. i asked you specifically about your cooperation and coordination with the united states and european allies. the us state department criticised your move to label these groups as terror organisations, it said — the state department said the decision should have been coordinated with the closest international partners of kosovo, including those with prime responsibility to ensure stability in kosovo. we, said the us state department, again call on kosovo to refrain

from unilateral moves. why are you ignoring your friends in the united states? we regularly communicate and co—ordinate with both eu and us, but then i have to respect and to apply constitutionality and legal order and lawfulness of republic of kosovo. i am prime minister of kosovo because kosovo is a republic. five days before making this decision with which we declare these two organisations, terrorist organisations, they were notified about what we're going to do. so we do coordinate. this does not mean that we agree all of the time on all issues. yeah, you see, the serbs say that you're operating paramilitary police forces in those ethnic serb towns, at least four of them in the north of your country. and they say they have clear evidence of and i'm quoting now from the serbian press, beating and torturing of ethnic serbs in their home communities. they name individuals like nenad elovitch,

who has been pictured with his head in a bag, bare chested. he has been beat. these are pictures which the serbs say were circulated within the kosovo police force bragging about the abuse of ethnic serbs. what are you doing about that? out of a dozen of these violent extremists which have been arrested. there has been one case of misconduct of a policeman who has been immediately suspended, but otherwise on all other allegations. my minister ofjustice and minister of internal affairs have sent letters to mr borrell, practically the eu foreign minister. chief, yeah. that whatever we did was fully in compliance with procedures and law of kosova and he has been convinced to this. so you say the situation right now in the north of your country is, to use your word at the beginning

of this interview, very heavy. the serb side, led, of course, by president alexander vucic, say, and i'm quoting him, we are at a crossroads whether we will have peace or not. and there is only one man in the balkans who wants to incite conflict that is albin kurti. well, he attacks me every day, sometimes several times per day. but kosovo is a democratic country, pro—western, oriented, according to transparency international, to freedom house, world justice project, with them, electoral democracy. according to reporters without borders, kosovo is a democratic country, whereas serbia is a hybrid regime or authoritarian one. so we're pro eu, pro nato and pro us. serbia is very much aligned with kremlin. right. but i'm just telling you and i'm told you saying this,

but that's simply false allegations against me. but but my point, i guess, throughout this interview so far has been that the eu, the us and your closest friends are telling you that you need to take actions to de—escalate the situation. and the one thing more than any other that they want you to do is to deliver on the promise that kosovo made in an agreement with serbia brokered by the eu some ten years ago in 2013, a promise to allow the ethnic serb population in your country to create this association of serbian municipalities, which could represent their interests in this country. your country made the promise ten years ago. you refuse to deliver on it. why? belgrade wanted this association out of their policy for a territorial ethno nationalism, which resulted in the republika srpska in bosnia and herzegovina.

it is true that my predecessor ten years ago signed such an agreement. prime minister thatcher made a solemn promise to deliver it. and then this agreement was elaborated further by another prime minister, my predecessor as well, in 2015. but this agreement failed the test of constitutional court. constitutional court decision said that in 23 articles of our constitution basically have been violated by this association of municipalities. they are a tiny minority. why are you so frightened of them? you compare it to the situation in bosnia with republika srpska. but there the serbs represent 30% of the population of bosnia. here they represent four or 5%. so why are you so scared? we're not scared. we're just vigilant because belgrade

is using them to not recognise kosovo and to seek division partition of kosovo. if it wouldn't have been for belgrade, of course, 4% of population would never represent any kind of risk. but again, it is not serbian community which is endangering our republic or these parallel illegal structures which are being getting millions and millions of euros annually from belgrade in order to sabotage our independence. are you right now prepared to talk to president vucic of serbia about all of this or not? of course, i was in brussels on 22nd ofjune, but it was president vucic who didn't want to have a meeting. i think that my constructiveness and my creativity has been shown throughout with different proposals. for example, i proposed the model which is inspired by serbs in croatia. croatian model. serbia and croatia have a normalisation agreement

with a mechanism for protection of minority rights, and serbs are happy with that, i said, let's do it also in kosovo. but they don't want to hear. croatia, the population got out in 2013, signed a document which made an explicit promise which you're not prepared to keep. does it worry you? let's just move the interview on. do you does it worry you that your best friends, your most important friends in the international community, starting with the european union, think you have got this wrong. think you have got this wrong? and indeed they are so sure that you have got it wrong and that you need to change your mind that they've imposed sanctions on kosovo right now. these sanctions have nothing to do with 2013 agreement because that agreement is part of 39 agreements which have been signed by my predecessors and which should be implemented if valid and binding. according to article ten of basic treaty, which i made with president vucic in brussels and then implementation annex in 0hrid.

so what you are referring to an agreement ten years ago that is one out of 39 agreements, which is part of article ten of the newest agreement which i made with president bush. so you cannot put the cart before the horse now by picking and choosing this single agreement. it's part of 39 agreement. prime minister, you say it's not all about the agreement signed in 2013. you tell me then, why are the member states of the eu, your friends? why are they imposing very serious sanctions on you? it has to do with the situation in the north where simply on one hand they don't want to put proper names to specific events and things. for example, three of our policemen have been abducted a month ago in territory of kosova by serbian special military and police units. don't call it the aggression of serbia.

well, the serbs say i want to reach those policemen inside serbian territory. but that's not true. you know, i have offered tonnes of evidence. all my international partners and friends know that it has happened in lip service. in my view, what they are trying to do is by being soft with serbia to try to move it out from the influence of kremlin. and i think this policy... what about russia ? you think this is all about russia? i think it has a lot to do with belgrade pushing in the direction of brussels, in washington, when actually belgrade is so much linked with kremlin historically, culturally, but also in terms of military and energy. so to get this straight, you are accusing the eu of betraying their strong relationship with you because they're trying to persuade president vucic and the serbs to move away from putin and russia. is that it? i have no other explanation why they are tolerating so much

a minister of propaganda from the time of milosevic who doesn't put sanctions to russian federation almost a year and a half since russian invasion ukraine started. i have no other explanation. you know, we as human beings are in search of meaning. i do not know how to explain to myself and to others how soft they are with belgrade, you know, towards... maybe you need to look at the diplomatic big picture. i mean, i've read reports, i'm sure you have, too, that significant amounts of serbian ammunition, for example, manufactured in serbia, are going through third parties into ukraine, being used by ukrainian forces. now, that matters to the united states and to europe, and maybe you have to accept that right now the diplomatic weather is changing and you are going to have to adapt to that, too. well, if an autocrat is friends

with putin for changing that, a democratic country like kosovo should not pay. the autocrat should pay. so let's be very blunt. do you feel you and your interests are being sacrificed because the west is so concerned about the war in ukraine? i think they are so concerned about the possibility of spillover in the balkans, and that is real because of the link of belgrade with moscow. but also they know that serbian ruler in belgrade is not a democrat and he has a lot of power and they never faced the past, the crimes that they committed in the past. they consider their neighbors temporary states. for example, bosnia herzegovina by belgrade. is the eu recognised, but de facto not. there is a lot of influence of belgrade in montenegro, so this kind of regional hegemonic power in direct link with moscow

is causing a lot of fear in the west and for which i believe the republic of kosovo should not pay towards the democrats. just let me please explain this — towards a democrat. i'm a social democrat, towards an autocrat. i must be a sovereign. as to what we're doing in the north is the rule of law as sovereignty and sovereignty as the rule of law. you are paying a price. that's the fact. because eu sanctions imposed in the last few weeks, according to your own alliance of kosovar businesses, are going to cost your country up to 500 euros million by the end of this year. you're losing your access to infrastructure grants to other investments coming from brussels. you can't with your weak economy, you can't afford to lose this financial and economic support. so what are you going to do? we have had 7.35% of gdp as economic growth average in these two years since i'm in power. exports doubled in two years. fdi doubled in two years. tax revenues increased by two thirds.

and it's such a shame now to put these sanctions upon kosovo. your own business community, says albin kurti, must come to his senses when it comes to re—establishing good relations with the eu and the us. i am doing my best, but i cannot surrender a democratic republic to this fascist militia in the north. bill clinton just the other day made a speech in tirana where he said it is time for the albanians and he meant the albanians in kosovo because he was talking about the kosovo crisis, who are now in the majority. they must stop this foolishness, he said. what major political issue can possibly be advanced by arguing how four little towns are run? clinton says, stop the foolishness. are you prepared to? well, i'm not being fooled, but i'm neither being fooled. so i'm prime minister of a democratic republic. rule of law, the most democratic country has

the most professional police. and we're very thankful for the contribution of president clinton, who actually in tirana said that serbs should have not boycotted the elections, they should have voted. and this is the root cause, the lack of participation in democratic process, low turnout, hollow legitimacy. i recognise early elections, this much i can do. and article 72 of local self—government law on local self—government says that with 20% of electoral body in a municipality, they can start a process to trigger early elections. let's do that. i'm going to help. so you cannot from the streets with militia get into mayor's office only through democratic process. but, you know, the serbs aren't going to go back into the municipal offices. they're not going to agree to participate in new elections unless you make a promise to give them this autonomous association of serb communities. if you won't give them that, then even if you have new elections

in those communities, the serbs won't take part. so you're not really achieving anything. do you have a solution which might solve this problem? i have offered again a model which serbia already accepted with croatia. croatia is a success story. with respect to nato membership, the serbs in your country are not interested in what happened in croatia. what they want is the delivery on a promise made to them in 2013. in these 15 years since we declared independence. average annual budget allocated per municipality per capita is 6 to 2% higherfor serb majority municipalities than for the rest. we have been privileging them all of the time. the problem is not to satisfy serbs, the problem is that i cannot satisfy belgrade for the losses caused to serbia as a state by a genocidal regime of milosevic. this is the problem. the problem is in belgrade,

not among the serbian community. people are generally good and peaceful everywhere. i believe in people. but you have autocrats who destroy this goodness, prime minister. it's not just about your foreign partners who are worried and frustrated with you right now. also, many people here in kosovo are worried. one of the leaders of the opposition democratic party, krasniqi, he said, you, mr kurti, you are playing with fire. and many kosovars are very aware of your track record. you're a hot headed politician in different parts of your career. you've spent time in prison for political protests. you released tear gas inside the kosovan parliament back in 2015. you even injured yourself. in 2018 you were found guilty of the illegal use of weapons and obstructing officials doing their duties. you're known as an impulsive, hot—headed, nationalist politician.

you may push this too far. over a glass of wine, the two of us can discuss long about my political activism and my experience in the past as opposition leader and so on and so forth. but this is not about me and i'm not alone. vast majority of people of kosovo think that we should not give up on the rule of law. i am prime minister also of serbs. i have a serbian minister. three municipalities in the north have serbian deputy mayors, dragana, sauvage, katarina advances in north mitrovica and jana popovic in session. i collaborate with serbs, but serbs who vucic is paying to sabotage the state of kosovo are a very peculiar kind. these are the privileged minority within serbian minority. i'm not going to give up to them. the problem is, and i'm looking at that document there, the original

document, the declaration of independence of kosovo in 2008. since then, what really has kosovo achieved? you haven't normalised relations with serbia. you have the recognition of more than 100 countries, but significant countries like russia and china, even five members of the european union still do not recognise kosovo. your economy is in a terrible mess. hundreds of thousands of your own people have left kosovo to go find work in the european union. can you honestly say some, what, 15 years after that document was signed that you are delivering? yes, we're a success story of nato�*s intervention to stop genocide of serbia. and we're a success story of democratic and economic progress working hand in hand. all the seven members of g7 group recognise kosovo. we have 117 recognitions and we're going to continue. kosovo is here to stay and i'm here to serve. i understand politics as public

service to the people, and i'm democratically elected two years ago with a landslide victory, the biggest transformation of government in kosovo since we declared independence. and i'm with full optimism that we're going to succeed. this is making nervous both belgrade and moscow, and that's why they are nervousness is turning into violence in the northern part of my country. but we're going to prevail this time as well. and a final very brief thought. can you guarantee to me that there will not be renewal of conflict of war in the balkans over kosovo? you have my guarantee that government of kosovo by no means will contribute to escalation, will do everything for de—escalation. i offered to sign the basic treaty for normalisation. belgrade refused. so you have my goodwill,

good faith and good intentions. and i am the guarantee that both eu and us as values and strategic interests will be nurtured and prevail in my country. prime minister kurti, it's been a pleasure to talk to you. thank you very much indeed. thank you very much. hello. the weather for the week ahead looks what you'd probably call more typical british summer—like weather. much more changeable. two charts to show you. the first shows how temperatures compare to the norm. the orange/red colours, where temperatures are significantly above normal. central/southern europe seeing the heat, before that recedes towards the mediterranean.

for us, we go to the blues and the whites here — an indication that temperature has become close to, if not below normal. and then there's the rainfall chart, showing how rainfall amounts will tot up through the week. most places, if not all, will see rain at times. driest towards east anglia and the south—east, but even elsewhere, rainfall amounts will vary widely, and that's because we're looking at quite a typically showery week. some of those showers heavy, could merge into some longer spells of rain, and also windy at times. driving things is a broad area of low pressure which is not going to just shift its way northwards and eastwards. monday, it's centred towards the south—west. it's going to start to throw a weather front our way. so after a sunny start, outbreaks of rain will set in across south—west england and wales through the morning and lunchtime. through the afternoon, through the north and west midlands and into northern england. north of that, scotland and northern ireland, some heavy and thundery showers, a bit of sunshine in—between. greatest chance of thunder in the north—east of scotland. east anglia and the south—east, largely staying dry here. only a few showers expected, and still quite warm — 23, 2a degrees. now, that first band of rain

fragments into showers through monday night. but monday night into tuesday, a band of persistent rain through wales, south—west england pushes through the midlands towards east anglia and the south—east, drawing in probably the warmest air by night this week — 16, 17 degrees here. temperatures elsewhere up a little bit on monday morning's values, at around 12 to 15. but here's the chart for tuesday. low pressure is centred now to the northeast of us, bringing in winds more from a general westerly direction than a southerly one. still got it to begin with in east anglia and the south—east. cloud, outbreaks of rain here. could be a while to shift, depending on if we see any wobbles on that weather front develop. most other parts — so some sunshine, plenty of cloud at times and frequent showers. some of those, heavy and thundery, especially further north and west. and most places seeing temperatures drop relative to monday. tuesday into wednesday, that low pressure starts to push closer towards western norway, allowing the winds to go more west to northwesterly, so temperatures drop a bit further. a dry and bright start to many southern and eastern areas. showers will develop heaviest to the northern half of the uk, with the risk of thunder, as we're close to that area of low pressure.

further away from the low pressure, lighter, fewer showers across southern counties. temperatures for all, though, at, if not a little bit below average for the time of year by this stage. and it will turn colder still into thursday for the northern half of the country, with a northerly wind developing. not much of a breeze on thursday. so some slow—moving showers where they do pop up. but actually, fewer showers compared with the rest of the week, especially across england and wales, although there is the chance of some high cloud drifting in towards the south—west later on. just 13 or 1a in the north of scotland, 20 to 22 to the south—east. as we go through thursday night and into friday, though, the next area of low pressure is developing out towards the west, pushing its way in. that is going to draw southerly winds once again. so a lift in the temperatures across northern scotland, but looking likely we'll see areas of heavy, thundery rain and strengthening winds to the west of the uk. at this stage, certainly, eastern areas could have a fine day on friday, although cloud amounts will generally increase. temperatures just start to lift a little bit. but as we go into next weekend and beyond, we do it all again.

not what you want to see in the middle ofjuly. an area of low pressure spinning across the country towards the north—east. further rain at times, and probably windier next weekend and into next week too. take care.

�*welcome to newsday, reporting �*welcome to newsday, reporting live from singapore, live from singapore, the headlines. an unnamed bbc presenter has been suspended, following allegations over

payments to a 17 year old, for explicit pictures.