German chancellor Angela Merkel said that while Berlin and Belgrade had differences on Kosovo and related issues, Germany would support going ahead with the European Union’s Stabilisation and Association Agreement with Serbia and the country’s candidacy for EU membership.

Merkel made the remarks on October 1 2008 after a meeting in Berlin with Serbian president Boris Tadic.

According to a report by Serbia’s Beta news agency, Merkel said that Germany was fully convinced that the new Serbian government was doing everything it could to successfully continue and finalise co-operation with the Hague tribunal, and emphasised that Berlin would continue to advocate this stand in future talks within the EU.

Our impressions about Serbia are very good and we want Serbia to join the European Union, Serbian news agency Tanjug reported Merkel as saying.

Merkel said that Germany and other EU countries were “just now working” on determining a stand on Serbia's initiative to seek from the International Court of Justice an opinion on the legality of Kosovo's independence, on which the UNGeneral Assembly is to vote on on October 8.

Tadic told reporters that he had briefed Merkel about Serbia's initiative in the UN and emphasised that "Belgrade's intention is to take the issue from the political into the legal sphere, which should ensure political stability."

Deutsche Welle reported Tadic as saying that his remarks at a September 30 news conference about a possible partition of Kosovo had been misinterpreted.

He told the September 30 news conference: “Partition is being discussed in Serbia and the international community and it has been one of the options during all these years…That option I can consider only when all other options are spent.”

On October 1, he said that the way his remarks had been interpreted, that he was considering partition of Kosovo, was “politically wrong”.

He said that Belgrade would never consider Kosovo as independent, but was making an effort to shift the Kosovo issue “from a political corner to the legal corner” by seeking a ruling from the ICJ.

“I will reiterate the position and policy of Serbia regarding Kosovo,” Tadic said. “Serbia does not and will never recognise Kosovo's independence.”

Tadic said that the EULEX mission could come to Kosovo after meeting three conditions -- that the UN Security Council adopt a relevant decision, that the Ahtisaari plan not be applied and that the EU mission be neutral in its status.

Merkel said that it was important for the EULEX mission to work throughout Kosovo and that this had been one of the topics of her talks with Tadic.

She praised the new Serbian government for the arrest of ICTY fugitive Radovan Karadzic, describing this as an important signal, but recalled that Ratko Mladic and Goran Hadzic remained on the run.

German news agency DPA reported from Pristina that the Kosovo government said that Serbia’s attempt in the ICJ was futile.

“Our message to all those who profess partitioning Kosovo is that they've lost Kosovo forever,” Kosovo parliament Speaker Jakup Krasniqi told DPA.

“Kosovo now has internationally recognized, defined borders and any attempt to change them would open new problems in the Balkans,” he said. “We don't believe that the Balkans and Europe are interested in creating the problem of redrawing regional borders.”