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Brussels Puts Paid to Balkan Hopes – and Europe's Fears - of Speedy Accession

06 11 2006  Slow pace of reforms means European Commission doesn’t expect new members anytime soon for enlargement-weary EU.

By Gjeraqina Tuhina in Brussels (Balkan Insight, 6 Nov 06)

An enlargement strategy paper, due to be published on November 8 by the European Commission, is to advise Western Balkan countries against making any new moves towards joining the European Union.

The document, seen by Balkan Insight, has been primarily influenced by the limited advances of the hopeful states in meeting political and economic conditions on the EU’s promise to allow them to one day join. However, so-called ‘enlargement fatigue’ in the EU itself has played a large part in setting the EC’s cautious agenda.

Also seen by Balkan Insight, individual progress reports for each country in the Western Balkans are to be published the same day as the EC’s strategy, tackling the critical issues they face in the process of EU integration.

Croatia was the first country of the region to gain candidate status and start accession talks. But in spite of its ambitions to join the Union in 2009, its progress report finds that, since talks started last year, short-term priorities set have been only partially addressed. Judicial and administrative reforms are singled out as particularly problematic, along with widespread corruption.

Macedonia became a candidate for EU membership last December and hopes to open accession talks in 2007. But the EC does not believe it is ready, concluding in its report that the “pace of reforms has slowed down in 2006, and the country needs to step up its efforts”.

Serbia’s report applauds its achievement of macroeconomic stability via privatisation and foreign direct investment, but finds organised crime remains a serious problem. The EC will warn Serbia once more that failure to fully cooperate with the Hague tribunal remains a key condition for resuming talks on a Stabilisation and Association Agreement, SAA, the first step towards EU integration.

Albania needs to focus on implementation of its SAA, which will enter into force next month. Its EC report makes plain that a good track record in implementing the agreement signed last June will be essential, “before considering any future step towards EU integration”. Albania’s priorities will remain political, judicial and economic reforms, as well as the fight against corruption and organised crime.

Montenegro, in its first progress report since gaining independence earlier this year, is found to have made some advances in tackling corruption. But the EC wants to see this widespread problem dealt with at the overall legal and institutional level, which still “presents loopholes which allow for corruption and limit the capacity of the state to effectively prevent and prosecute corruption”.

The Commission’s findings in Bosnia and Herzegovina are disappointing. It reports that progress in the troubled state towards meeting political criteria has continued at a slower pace and that key political priorities set out in its European Partnership have been “only partially addressed”.

Kosovo’s territorial limbo presents a particular challenge to the EC, which is set to report that a future status settlement needs to be clear politically, as well as legally. “The Kosovo status question is sui generis and hence sets no precedent”, reads the draft progress report, which otherwise finds very serious problems in the United Nations-administered province in terms of organised crime and its influence on various socio-economic sectors and politics.

While this year’s progress reports present a sobering picture of the Balkan transition, the EC admits that its overall enlargement strategy, saying ‘stop for now’ to potential members, is also a response to the negative feeling of EU citizens towards further expansion of the soon 27-nation bloc.

The Commission believes the success of enlargement hinges on public endorsement, and will therefore recommend that existing member states improve the way they present enlargement to their electorates. The paper, thus, sends a clear message that, besides the readiness of applicant countries and EU institutions for accession, EU citizens also need to be factored in.

Public opinion is one of the reasons why the EC is now to re-affirm its individual approach to Western Balkan countries. The enlargement strategy paper emphasises that there will no more group accessions, as happened in 2004 when 10 new countries became full EU members, because “the candidates and potential candidates vary considerably in terms of political and economic development and administrative capacity”. This lays waste to fears of more advanced candidates that they might have to wait for the region’s laggards to catch up, but also shows recognition of the fact that the large-scale enlargement has been unpopular among citizens of the ‘old EU’.

While the message to the region may be less enthusiastic than some might have hoped, the EC’s strategy nevertheless reassures it that it will keep its word on membership prospects for countries already in the enlargement process.

For hopefuls elsewhere in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus, the picture is less optimistic, with only vague references to future possibilities.

“The European Union is defined by its values rather then fixed geographical limits”, says the European Commission, arguing that “[T]he shared experience of ideas, values and historical interaction cannot be condensed into a simple timeless formula and is subject of review by each succeeding generation”.

Gjeraqina Tuhina is Radio Television Kosovo’s Brussels correspondent. Balkan Insight is BIRN’s online publication.