European Union ministers who met in Brussels on February 23 2009 reached no decision on a Serbian invitation to send a delegation to the country to assess its co-operation with The Hague tribunal.

Debate on the proposal will resume at an EU summit in March, media reports said.

Satisfying the EU that it is co-operating properly with the tribunal is a key condition for Serbia to progress in its aspirations to join the EU.

Serbian news agencies quoted foreign minister Vuk Jeremic as saying that the invitation still stands.

However, Karel Schwarzenberg, the foreign minister of the Czech Republic - the country currently holding the rotating presidency of the EU - expressed misgivings that the proposal for a fact-finding mission would be the "best solution".

"Perhaps the mission's members would get a very good impression of Serbia, but we have to keep in mind that the final decision about full co-operation between Serbia and The Hague court will be made by (Chief Prosecutor Serge) Brammertz. I would say that sending the mission could even have the opposite effect, and therefore we must consider it in great depth," Schwarzenberg was quoted as saying by Serbian news site B92.
 
Serbia's Beta news agency quoted Italian foreign minister Franco Frattini and EU High Representative Javier Solana as having said in Brussels that relations between Serbia and the EU were "developing very well".

Bulgarian news agency Focus, quoting Beta, reported that Frattini and Solana said on February 23 2009 that there was no longer any ambiguity regarding co-operation and contact between Jeremic with Solana's representative in Belgrade, Peter Sorensen.

Solana made the statement to Beta, adding that "everything is OK" with regards to general co-operation between Serbia and the EU, both over the EU's rule of law mission EULEX and Kosovo.

Frattini said that it was "unjust" for the opinion of one EU member to "block" ratification of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) with Serbia, and only focus on the "misunderstanding" between Jeremic and Sorensen, as was suggested by official EU sources.
Officials in the EU Council of Ministers told Beta that that misunderstanding had been "completely clarified and ironed out," though they said some ministers at the session had criticised the absence of reaction by official Belgrade representatives to the political gathering of Kosovo Serbs on February 17 in Zvecan, where the presence of EULEX in Kosovo was questioned.