Skopje, 15 December 2021 (MIA) – I think that if all six countries in the region take part in ‘Open Balkan’, the initiative will serve as one of the instruments for improving regional economic and trade cooperation, but not political cooperation, President Stevo Pendarovski said at a press conference in Pristina. According to him, ‘Open Balkan’ is just one aspect of the Berlin Process, an initiative with institutions and resources, something which the former currently lacks. The Berlin Process is a kind of umbrella initiative that can include others. “Other initiative can be a part of the Berlin Process, but not a substitution for it. The Berlin Process has produced excellent results in the past 7-8 years and has a tendency to expand,” Pendarovski said. He reiterated that he had previously expressed reservation over ‘Open Balkan’, noting that if the initiative was an attempt to restore Yugoslavia or an alternative to EU membership, he would have opposed it. However, PMs of participating countries assured him that that was not the case, so he expressed his support. “That was before the initiative launched. Now, I’ll reiterate what I’ve been saying for the past two years – the initiative was faulty from the very beginning because it doesn’t include all six Western Balkan countries, but only half of them and it won’t be successful until the rest joint it,” Pendarovski told a joint press conference with Kosovo counterpart Vjosa Osmani. Osmani underlined that Kosovo doesn’t support the initiative because it isn’t based on principles of good-neighborly cooperation and equality, seeing as Serbia still doesn’t recognize Kosovo. “Kosovo has reservations regarding the political goals of this initiative, particularly Serbia’s. It also has reservations in regard to its economic and security aspects and efforts to use the process to stall EU integration, instead of speeding it up, which is our aim. The Berlin Process is our only goal and we see no reason to take part in other initiatives,” the President noted.