<p>PRISTINA, Kosovo — Antony Blinken, the U.S. Secretary of State, has told Kosovo that the normalization of talks with Serbia is essential in its path toward the European Union.</p>
<p>Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti on Thursday made public a letter of congratulations he had received from Blinken a day earlier. Blinken urged Kosovo “to engage productively and without delay in the U.S.-supported EU-facilitated dialogue with Serbia.”</p>
<p>“Securing a comprehensive normalization agreement with Serbia centered on mutual recognition is essential to Kosovo’s ability to reach its full potential and move forward on its EU accession path,” wrote Blinken.</p>
<p>Brussels also has stressed that Kosovo-Serbia normalization talks are fundamental in their goal of becoming bloc members one day.</p>
<p>Kurti, who took the post on March 22 after his left-wing Self-Determination Movement, or Vetevendosje!, won the most votes in Kosovo’s Feb. 14 parliamentary election, has said that talks with Serbia are not high among its immediate goals.</p>
<p>Negotiations to normalize ties between Kosovo and neighboring Serbia, which started a decade ago, stalled last year.</p>
<p>Kurti and new President Vjosa Osmani have mentioned the issue of the some 1,640 people missing in the 1998-1999 war as a priority in those talks.</p>
<p>Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, a decade after a brutal 1998-1999 war between separatist ethnic Albanian rebels and Serb forces, which ended after a 78-day NATO air campaign that drove Serb troops out and a peacekeeping force moved in. </p>
<p>Most Western nations have recognized Kosovo’s sovereignty, but Serbia and its allies Russia and China don’t. Tensions over Kosovo remain a source of volatility in the Balkans.</p>
