The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Diaspora of Kosovo has confirmed for Radio Free Europe that the head of the office for Kosovo in the Serbian Government, Petar Petković, has been refused a visit to Kosovo.

From this, the ministry did not show the reasons for rejecting the request for a visit.

Earlier on May 3, the Office for Kosovo in the Serbian Government said that Petković had asked to visit Kosovo for Orthodox Easter over the weekend.

According to an announcement from this office, during this visit, Petković was expected to participate in the midnight liturgy for Easter in the Deçani Monastery, then in the service in the Graçanica Monastery on Easter morning and in a meeting with the young people in the Draganac Monastery.

“Although the visit was exclusively of a religious nature and included exclusively visits to monasteries and holy places of the Serbian Orthodox Church, in the spirit of the biggest holiday for Serbs, without political goals, the authorities in Pristina stopped his visit without any explanation”, said the Office for Kosovo in the Serbian Government.

This office said that for more than a year, the Government of the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, is preventing Petković from visiting the Serbs in Kosovo.

“These prohibitions [of visits] are not groundless, but also represent a direct violation of the Agreement on free movement and official visits, especially when it comes to the chief negotiator in the dialogue from the Serbian side.”