Velimir Ilic yesterday warned that the DSS-NS coalition could be forced to start proceedings for President Boris Tadic’s removal from office over the SAA.

On Sunday, Ilic said in Sokobanja that if the president, who is also the leader of the Democrats (DS) insists on signing the Stabilization and Association Agreement with the EU, this coalition will be forced to ask for his recall.

The statement from the New Serbia (NS) leader came after Boris Tadic, the president and leader of the Democratic Party (DS) a couple of days ago said that the SAA would be signed with the EU, because the government had already given the authority for doing so to one of its members. The president Tadic was reportedly prepared to sign the agreement, if it was offered to Serbia at the next meeting of EU foreign ministers, scheduled to be held in Luxembourg on April 28.

The New Serbia (NS) leader said, “We advise President Tadic and his associates not to play games with Serbia, and not to sign anything, because they will have a big problem on their hands. We advise the same to Deputy Prime Minister Bozidar Delic, and we will ask Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica to withdraw any authorization to sign this agreement. If anyone were to sign anything that violates the constitution, they will be held accountable.”

Yesterday, the deputy president of the Democratic Party (DS) Dragan Sutanovac rejected accusations coming from their political rivals, the DSS and New Serbia. According to him, the accusations coming from the DSS-NS “should no longer be answered”, because this coalition is “only there to help the SRS, the biggest enemies of Serbia’s modernization”.

“Little Vojislav wants to help big Vojislav. The one in Belgrade, the one in The Hague,” said Sutanovac in reference to the DSS and the Radicals (SRS) leaders.

Commenting on the recent statement by Velimir Ilic, Sutanovac said, “Velimir Ilic’s honesty is under the most serious question mark, but we will discuss this after the elections and the formation of a DS-led government.”

Earlier, his cabinet colleague and DSS official Zoran Locar said that “if the defense minister agreed with Jaap de Hoop Scheffer to sign the Solana agreement on April 28, this will be a partisan agreement signed by the ?anak-DS-G17 Plus coalition, and nothing more”. “We will not recognize such an agreement,” Loncar said.

“Obviously, NATO wants the signing of the Solana agreement to be interpreted as Serbia’s recognition of Kosovo’s independence,” Loncar said.

Since EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said earlier this week that effort should be made to sign the SAA with Serbia, in a bid to help the pro-European parties in the May 11 ballot, the DSS has referred to the SAA as “Solana’s agreement”.

Lonacar said that if the DS coalition signs the deal, “it will be binding only for those parties, not for Serbia”.

“We hear that the Democratic Party are saying Sutanovac was on a party visit when he met Scheffer, so the only legitimate thing they can sign is a ?anak-DS-G17 Plus party cooperation agreement with NATO,” Loncar said.