Belgrade---Aleksandar Vucic will this week become the first Serbian premier to make an official visit to Albania, aiming to improve fragile relations between the two Balkan countries, an official said Monday.
His visit comes six months after that of Albania's Prime Minster Edi Rama to Belgrade -- the first visit to Serbia by a Tirana government head for 68 years.
In Tirana, Vucic will have talks with his counterpart on Wednesday and will be speaking Thursday at an economic forum in which regional country leaders are participating.
Relations between Serbians and Albanians are strained over the question of Kosovo, a territory with an ethnic Albanian majority that declared independence from Serbia in 2008, with the support of the United States, but remains unrecognised by Belgrade and its ally Russia, as well as others.
"We want to deepen collaboration with Serbia and advance together on the path of peace, cooperation and integration in the EU," Rama told AFP ahead of the visit.
In November last year, Rama's visit to Belgrade was marked by a verbal clash with Vucic over Kosovo.
The visit was however supposed to ease strains on bilateral relations, which have also been fuelled by claims of the ethnic Albanian minority in Serbia for more autonomy or even a unification with Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority.
Despite this friction, the two men agreed to continue with their contact and carry on working towards an improvement in relations between the two countries.
In Macedonia earlier this month, police clashed with an ethnic Albanian armed group, whose members were mostly from Kosovo. Eighteen people were killed, including eight police officers.
AFP
