Slovenia takes over 6-month EU presidency

LJUBLJANA, Slovenia, Jan. 1 (UPI) -- Slovenia has taken over a six-month European Union presidency that will see the issue of Serbia's breakaway Kosovo province as a major challenge.

Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel said Slovenia expects the future status of the independence-seeking, mainly ethnic-Albanian Kosovo province should be resolved by the end of June, Serbia's Belgrade B92 radio reported Tuesday.

Underlining Slovenia's wish to help Serbia in its bid join the EU, Rupel reiterated the EU stand the Belgrade government should first arrest and transfer war crime suspects to the U.N. tribunal in the Netherlands.

During its EU presidency, Slovenia is to deal with monitoring the ratification process by EU member countries of the Lisbon reform treaty, world climate change protocols and efforts by Balkan nations to join the EU.

Slovenia, with a population of 2 million, joined NATO and the EU in 2004 and is the only country to do so of the newly independent states of the former Yugoslav federation that disintegrated in ethnic wars from 1991-95.

The rotating EU presidency offers Slovenia an opportunity to help in running the 27-nation alliance of nearly half a billion people.