On the occasion of a joint publication between ELIAMEP’s South-East Europe Programme and the Kosovo Foundation for Open Society Dr.Ioannis Armakolas, Stavros Costopoulos Research Fellow and Head of the Programme, together with a number of Greek opinion leaders visited Kosovo between 8 and 11 December 2014. During the visit the Greek opinion leaders had the opportunity to meet important members of the Kosovar political elite and other stakeholders from the international community and Kosovar civil society, academic and business community and to have discussions and interviews for the research purposes.
On Tuesday 9 December, the group of Greek opinion leaders was received by the President of Kosovo Atifete Jahjaga. During the brief discussion the group was informed about the policy challenges that Kosovo is facing as well as about the details of the formation of the new Kosovar government and the declared priorities of its future policy making. On Wednesday 10 December in the Serb-majority municipality of Gracanica, the group met the newly appointed Deputy Prime Minister Branimir Stojanovic, a politician with the party ‘Serbian List’, and other members of the Serbian community of Kosovo. The group was informed about the problems of the Serbian community in Kosovo as well as about the efforts to address those through the participation in the Kosovar government and the EU-mediated intensive dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina. Additionally, the group of Greek opinion leaders met the Head of the Liaison Office of the Hellenic Republic in Kosovo Ambassador Konstantina Athanassiadou and were informed about relations between Greece and Kosovo and the policy challenges in the context of Kosovo’s EU perspective, which is in line with the wider enlargement agenda of Greek government. Moreover, the group met the former Head of the Liaison Office Ambassador Emeritus Dimitris Moschopoulos who is now an Advisor to the Kosovo institutions on Religious and Cultural Heritage through the United Nations Development Programme. Finally, during its stay the group met also a number of other prominent politicians, members of the international community, representatives of civil society organisations and think tanks, journalists and opinion leaders, and business people from Greek companies active in Kosovo.
On Wednesday 10 December the new report entitled “Being Greek, Being Kosovar…. A report on mutual perceptions” and recently published in English, Albanian and Serbian by the Kosovo Foundation for Open Society and ELIAMEP’s South-East Europe Programme was launched in Pristina. The study is the first ever conducted in both Greece and Kosovo and involving the investigation of mutual perceptions and stereotypes though opinion polls in both societies. Dr. Ioannis Armakolas and Shkelzen Maliqi, co-authors of the study together with Dr Iannis Konstantinidis and Agon Maliqi, presented the rationale and the main findings of the study. Ambassador Konstantina Athanassiadou, Ambassador Emeritus Dimitris Moschopoulos, a representative of the Kosovar Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the co-authors participated in a round table discussing the findings of the study. The report will soon be made available through ELIAMEP’s website and it will be published in Greek and presented in Athens at the beginning of next year.