Any border changes or exchanges of territory in the Balkans would lead to new tragedies, Kosovo Prime Minister, Ramush Haradinaj, said in Dubrovnik on Saturday, in a comment on current discussions on a possible exchange of territory between Serbia and Kosovo.

The Kosovo PM gave the statement on the sidelines of an international conference in Dubrovnik, and his Croatian host, PM Andrej Plenkovic, too, called for respect for the existing borders.

“Any border change or territory exchange would trigger new tragedies in the Balkans, cause instability and undermine long-term political and security investments in peace in Kosovo and the rest of the region,” said Haradinaj.

His statement was supported by Croatian PM Plenkovic too.

“Today we have sent messages that borders need to be respected and that changes that could destabilise our neighbourhood are not good. We have to be aware that there are some basic principles that we, as a state, and the international community should support,” he said.

Belgrade and Pristina have been conducting an EU-mediated dialogue on the normalisation of relations and as of recently a possible exchange of the majority-Serb and majority-Albanian communities between Serbia and Kosovo is being mentioned.

The ministers are attending the Dubrovnik Forum 2018, which focuses on challenges caused by migrations, terrorism, climate change and various asymmetric threats facing Europe and the wider Mediterranean area on the political, security, economic, social and cultural fronts.