In an interview with Radio and Television Serbia broadcast during Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic's visit to Washington, Kirby strongly supported Serbia's European Union accession and announced the possibility of stronger Serbia-US economic cooperation.
Serbia's future is much better in the EU than outside, as it will give young people in Serbia many more possibilities as well as attract foreigners to come to Serbia and look for a job. I am a big sympathiser of the Union, although the US is not a member, Kirby told RTS.
Commenting on the Hague war crimes tribunal's acquittals of Croatian generals Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markac and former Kosovo Liberation Army commander Ramush Haradinaj, Kirby said he was confident it was done well but conceded that he was a little surprised by how nicely those people were welcomed in Zagreb and Pristina.
He said that although the Serbs were disappointed by those welcomes, that did not deny the legitimacy of the UN court's results.
People towards whom many have formed some kind of prejudice are sometimes acquitted, which does not mean that everyone is happy with the outcome of the trials, said Kirby.
He said Serbia represented to the US a key country in the Balkans and that the US was not interested only in Kosovo or Bosnia, adding that his country wanted Bosnia to become a functioning country.
Kirby said he did not believe that much could be done about Kosovo without including Serbia, adding that the aspect of Kosovo was unavoidably linked to Serbia.
Serbian politicians must do what is in Serbia's national interest, even if this means talks with people they don't like, he said, voicing confidence that the Serbian authorities would make the tough and right decision provided that it brought Serbia where it wanted to be.
Kirby recalled that after World War II, the US and Germany sat down for talks although they had been on opposite sides. At some point you have to stop living in the past and move on, he said.
The ambassador said Serbia and the US were moving in the right direction in order to improve economic relations, announcing that Washington planned to make more effort to improve trade and encourage US investment in Serbia, which could happen in January or February.
We have to create a business environment that will bring investors to Serbia, Kirby said.