The new government of Serbia seems to be prepared to make "compromises" with Kosovo, Prime Minister Milos Vucevic said in an interview.
Ahead of a high-profile meeting between Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti in Brussels on Wednesday, Vučević assured Belgrade that it was ready to negotiate despite a recent flare-up of tensions between the neighbours.
"We are ready to make deals and compromises, compromises that mean neither side is an absolute winner or an absolute loser," said Vucevic, who took office in May after a dominant election victory late last year. from the ruling Serbian Progressive Party.
Vučević is officially the head of government in Serbia, but is largely considered a subordinate of Vučić, who has ruled the country for more than a decade.
The talks in Brussels come as tensions flared between Serbia and Kosovo for months after Pristina's government made the euro the sole legal currency and outlawed the Serbian dinar on its territory.
The move followed the collapse of EU- and US-backed negotiations between the two sides and renewed unrest in Serb-majority areas across northern Kosovo.
Hostilities between Kosovo and Serbia have flared since the war between Serbian forces and ethnic Albanian insurgents in the late 1990s, which prompted a NATO intervention against Belgrade, which views Kosovo as a breakaway region.
Prishtina declared independence in 2008, a move Serbia has refused to recognize.