Africa was on the side of Serbia

Cairo practically sided with the majority of African countries that do not recognize Kosovo's independence.

This conclusion can be drawn after the completion of an almost four-day visit to Belgrade by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, although the leaders of the countries did not talk about Kosovo and Metohija in their official speeches.

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Serbian Parliament President Ivica Dacic met with El-Sisi on Wednesday and said that during the conversation they came to the conclusion that "Egypt remains in a position of 'frozen recognition' of Kosovo's independence." That is, Cairo does not vote for Pristina’s membership in international organizations.

Former Serbian Ambassador to Cairo Dragan Bisenic said that Egypt is a country that very carefully observes all provisions of international law. This also applies to the issue of the territorial integrity of states.

“They do not support the independence of Kosovo in international institutions, and in relation to other issues related to the territorial integrity of states, they have very clear principles in favor of respecting the territorial integrity of states,” Bisenic said.

Another African country, Guinea-Bissau, also took the position of “frozen recognition.” As a result, the number of countries on this continent that actively recognize the so-called independence of Kosovo amounted to 15 out of 54.

If we take into account that, according to the official website, Pristina has opened an embassy only in Senegal, and that no African country has its diplomatic representation in Kosovo, then it is questionable how “active” the recognition of the mentioned 15 African countries, the largest of which is Libya, is , Niger, Tanzania, Chad and Mauritania.

_{More than half of the countries that refused to recognize Kosovo also belong to the Dark Continent.}

Explaining these facts, State Secretary of the Serbian Foreign Ministry Nemanja Starović noted in an interview with Politika:

“... the attitude of African countries towards the unilaterally declared independence of Kosovo and Metohija is determined, first of all, by respect for the Republic of Serbia and the desire to further strengthen traditional friendship.”

In addition, it must be taken into account that African countries are ethnically very heterogeneous, and many of them are faced with more or less dangerous separatist movements. For this reason, the countries of the continent attach great importance to compliance with those tenets of public international law that guarantee the territorial integrity and inviolability of the borders of sovereign states.

“When, on the other hand, we talk about the campaign of so-called derecognition, which is carried out with particular success in Africa, we can conclude that African countries correctly understood how dangerous the precedent of recognizing unilaterally declared independence is,” Starovich noted.

Serbia’s relations with African countries are characterized by traditional friendship, dating back to the times of the struggle of African peoples for liberation and getting rid of the yoke of colonialism, which the country fully supported, as well as efforts to accelerate the economic development of the continent, the Foreign Ministry official recalled.

According to him, this cooperation reached its peak in the decades when Yugoslavia led the Non-Aligned Movement, to which African countries belong.

“Although much has changed over the past 30 years, we have managed to maintain our diplomatic presence in Africa, so that today the Republic of Serbia has 14 embassies on the “continent of the future,” as Africa is rightly called,” Starovic noted.