One of the veteran ethnic Albanian leaders from Presevo Valley said on Monday that an idea of the region joining Kosovo "was not precise, not concrete and was blurred," and warned about its effect on Serb entity in Bosnia, the Beta news agency reported.

Riza Halimi told the Pristina Koha Ditore daily that the suggestion made by Kosovo’s President Hashim Thaci of an eventual annexation of Serbia’s southern region mostly populated by ethnic Albanians was their old ambition, but said he was sceptical because of the timing.

If that were achieved, he said, it would be a precedent which Republika Srpska (RS), the Serb-dominated entity in Bosnia, would use to secede from the country and join Serbia.

According to him, Kosovo’s Parliament “which possess the highest legislative authority and democratic legitimacy” should have come out with the idea, not Thaci.

Halimi insisted that Thaci’s suggestion should be made explicit and that during the dialogue and in its results the territorial integrity of the Presevo Valley should be preserved.

Halimi said he would insist that if the Presevo Valley was on the agenda of the Brussels-facilitated Belgrade – Pristina dialogue, an ethnic Albanian representative should be present in the talks.

However, he added, having in mind the principles of the Contact Group (for the Balkans, consisting of the US, UK, France Germany, Italy and Russia) against the borders’ changes, the current suggestion on Presevo Valley’s annexation seemed paradoxical.