Burkhalter to visit Serbia on Thursday

BELGRADE - President of Swiss Confederation and Minister of Foreign Affairs Didier Burkhalter will pay an official visit to Serbia on Thursday when he will meet with Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic and other top officials.

During his stay in Serbia, Burkhalter, who also holds office as the OSCE chair, will meet with outgoing Serbian deputy prime minister Aleksandar Vucic and after the meeting, the two of them should attend the opening of the Swiss-Serbian chamber of commerce which will be organised in the Serbian Chamber of Commerce.

The president of the Swiss Confederation and Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ivan Mrkic will sign an agreement between the Serbian government and the Swiss Federal Council on paid jobs for families of the members of the diplomatic missions, consular offices and permanent missions in international organisations, the Serbian Ministry of Foreign Affairs released.

According to the release of the Swiss Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Burkhalter will visit Serbia, Albania and Kosovo on Thursday and Friday and meet with the leaders of the countries over the engagement of Switzerland during its presidency over OSCE.

Burkhalter's visit to the Western Balkans aims to facilitate three ongoing processes which are key for the stability in the region, including normalisation of the Belgrade-Pristina relations in keeping with the provisions of the agreement reached between Belgrade and Pristina one year ago, reinforcement of regional cooperation and encouragement of regional reconciliation, and especially the search for a solution to the missing persons issue, states the release.

Serbia, which is supposed to take over the OSCE chair in 2015, is Burkhalter's first stop on his tour and the...