First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Ivica Dacic met today with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Gambia Ousainou Darboe, who is on a visit to Serbia.

Minister Dacic emphasized that Minister Darboe was the first Gambian official to visit our country after many years and said that Serbia was highly interested in restoring the relations with those countries with which it had good cooperation during Tito's Yugoslavia.

"Our relations today are not as good and developed as they used to be and it is in our strategic interest to restore them.

We stand ready to promote cooperation in all segments. We would like President of the Gambia to visit our country, and of course, we wish the people of the Gambia as fast development as possible".

He announced the signing of the Protocol on cooperation between the two ministries, covering cooperation in various fields as well as mutual support at the international level. The Minister also indicated interest to have a cooperation agreement signed in areas of mutual interest.

"Economic cooperation is modest, but there is a lot of room to increase commodity trade and promote cooperation in the fields of agriculture, construction, military industry and we are ready to help in training and education by granting scholarships to the Gambian students.

We are also ready to help establish cooperation in the fields of military-education, medicine, culture, sports, fight against organized crime, terrorism..." the Minister said.

Minister Dacic conveyed to his Gambian colleague a request that the Gambian Government once again review its decision on recognition of a unilaterally declared independence of Kosovo.

"I ask and propose to our Gambian friends to once again re-examine their decision made in 2009 by the previous Government and former President to recognize unilaterally declared independence of Kosovo since an increasing number of countries are also reconsidering their decisions. I expressed a hope and our wish that the Gambia does the same", Minister Dacic said.

He emphasized that he informed Minister Darboe about the developments of past years and decades and that this was a unilateral act which continued to generate various positions and disputes and that even though some countries recognized unilateral declaration of independence of Kosovo, a number of countries in the UN Security Council like Russia and China, including some big Muslim countries, did not.