The day we met Prime Minister Albin Kurti

By Maxime Köse

Wednesday the 16^th of June was the longest, yet certainly most exciting day of our virtual trip to Kosovo. On our schedule were not two but three meetings. We met with Jovana Radosavljevic and Milos Milovanovic from the New Social initiative in the morning, with Milos Antic from UNDP Mitrovica in the afternoon and with no one less than Prime Minister Kurti himself in the evening. 

 

Our day started off with an inspiring conversation with Jovana and Milos, two young professionals with master’s degrees and impressive international resumes. They are, respectively, the executive director and program director at the New Social Initiative, located in the north of Mitrovica. During the meeting they gave us a glimpse of their vision and the activities of their organization, which are centered around four core objectives namely, the normalization of relations and dialogue between Kosovo Albanians and Kosovo Serbs; dealing with the past; citizen participation; and capacity building. Stressing the importance of understanding the perspective of “the other,” Milos told us about one of the most recent projects of the New Social Initiative, namely a collaboration with social media “influencers” in order to highlight positive stories about interaction between Kosovo Albanians and Kosovo Serbs. Their message was clear: The New Social Initiative looks forward and works towards a future where young people in Kosovo think, act, and interact beyond their ethnic and historic differences, regardless of what happens on the political level. 

 

I think I can speak on behalf of my fellow "peacelabsters" when I say we were impressed and inspired by how intelligent, articulate, and compassionate Jovana and Milos were. They seemed so well aware of the problems in Kosovo while, at the same time, also knowledgeable of the steps needed to be taken in order to overcome these problems. Furthermore, I should emphasize the courage and perseverance of Jovana and Milos, who also admitted to regularly facing severe backlash because of their work.

 

After our meeting with the New Social Initiative, we met with Milos Antic who is a local Kosovar working for the UNPD located in Mitrovica, an organization that works towards realizing the sustainable development goals in Kosovo based on the UNPD’s "Strategic Plan." Milos clearly is a knowledgeable professional with a lot of experience in the field and who knows what is going on "on the ground." One of the most remarkable moments of our meeting was when Milos explained that he has experienced a change in the way in which people judge themselves and others. Whereas twenty years ago people would base their judgments on one’s ethnic background, Milos explained that, right now, people are judged for what they do. 

 

Moving on to another highlight of our day: our meeting with Albin Kurti, the prime minister of Kosovo. Prior to the meeting we were instructed to address him as Prime Minister Kurti. This confirmed to me that our meeting was quite a "big deal"! After Prime Minister Kurti joined our zoom meeting, he apologized for being a little late and explained that he had just returned from Brussels where he had had a meeting with President Vučić of Serbia. This was a meeting we had already been reading about and we had learned that it was generally considered to be not a very fruitful meeting. 

 

With carefully chosen words Prime Minister Kurti gave our group an update about the issues he is working on, now that he is back in office (he had to step down as prime minister last year, but was re-elected in March 2021). This included his focus on justice and jobs, as well as on missing people and a peace declaration with Serbia. It was interesting to listen to what the prime minister was saying, but at the same time, it was also interesting to observe how he was saying it, which words he was using and what he was not saying. 

 

While doing my very best to not stumble over my words in front of the prime minister of Kosovo, I asked him whether he had ever imagined himself becoming a prime minister at the time he was still and student and political activist. He admitted that it had always been the cause that led him to where he is now, but also that he could only have come so far because he has never been alone. He said he has been lifted up because of collaborative thinking with others (except for the time he spent alone in jail, he added almost jokingly). Along with this answer came a piece of life advice namely, to “make mistakes, learn from them, never make them again and move on, in other words, don't be afraid of failing, but fail well." 

 

In response to a question about the dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade, Prime Minister Kurti emphasized that, to him, talks with Serbian officials are not about the status of Kosovo (or Kosova in Albanian), but about the relationship between Kosovo and Serbia. According to him, Kosovo and Serbia find themselves in a situation of “mutual non-recognition.” He added that he would not recognize Serbia as a country as long as Kosovo was not recognized by Serbia. Unfortunately, we did not get the opportunity to ask him to elaborate on this statement. 

 

Although I am sure there were many other things we wanted to ask Prime Minister Kurti, it was a very interesting experience to meet him, and we were grateful he had taken some time out of his busy schedule for our Peace Lab class. At the end of the meeting he also admitted he enjoys meeting AUC students because it makes him “nostalgic” about his own student time. One hour after the meeting we even got ourselves a feature on the official Prime Minister Instagram page. I am sure this meeting made this a day we won’t forget soon!