Serbian Prime Minister Ivica Dacic on Tuesday ruled out holding a referendum on a historic agreement toward improving relations with Kosovo. In an interview with Kyodo News, Dacic, speaking through an interpreter, said, "There is not going to be a referendum," stating the Serbian government's position on the issue for the first time after it struck the deal with Kosovo on April 19.

An EU-led court in Kosovo sentenced on Monday five people to up to eight years in prison for illegal organ harvesting and transplants at a Pristina clinic in 2008. The five defendants, among them prominent Pristina urologist Lutfi Dervishi, were sentenced to between one to eight years each, said presiding judge Arkadiusz Sedek from Poland. Two defendants in the trial that has opened in 2011 were acquitted. ih-an/txw

Serbia's parliament on Friday gave its green light to an EU-brokered deal aimed at normalising ties with former foe Kosovo, a landmark accord already approved by the government. The deal, which has come under fire from ultra-nationalists and Kosovo Serbs, won vast backing in the 250-seat parliament, as MPs from the ruling nationalists' coalition and from the centre-left opposition had already indicated they would vote in favour of it. Out of 203 deputies present, 173 voted to approve the deal, while 24 were against it. The remaining six abstained from voting.

BELGRADE (Reuters) - The European Union cautioned Serbia on Friday not to delay implementing a landmark accord on Kosovo after Belgrade said it might hold a referendum on the deal, which is crucial to its hopes of starting EU membership talks. The EU-brokered agreement between Serbia and its majority-Albanian former province won Belgrade a preliminary green light for accession talks this year, but the bloc wants progress on the ground before taking a final decision in late June.