European Union governments on Tuesday (December 14) reiterated their commitment to allow six Balkan countries to join the European Union one day after fierce differences emerged during the negotiations.
A year ago, the governments of the European Union Unable to An agreement was reached on a statement aimed at advancing the European Union’s strategy to attract six prospective members of the membership.
The Western Balkan countries include Serbia, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania and North Macedonia.
As EU countries worry that Romania and Bulgaria have rushed to join the EU in 2007 and the mismanagement of Eastern European workers to the UK has caused many British people to oppose the EU, this year’s negotiations on the EU’s common position are also full of pressure.
An EU diplomat told EURACTIV, “These countries seem to have forgotten the geopolitical urgency that they claim to be crucial to joining the EU”.
The new Bulgarian government was approved on Monday and has not yet lifted its predecessor’s veto power over North Macedonia’s initiation of EU membership negotiations and resolution of historical and language disputes, although this process will take time. The progress of Albania is formally linked to North Macedonia by the European Union.
The Bulgarian delegation managed to block the language that started the process this year.
The words “As soon as this year” appeared in the earlier version of the document that EURACTIV saw were changed to: “The Council looks forward to the convening of the first intergovernmental meeting… the framework for the Council to be held as soon as possible after the negotiations are approved.”
The Croats have the upper hand
At the same time, EURACTIV learned that another part of the conclusion was shelved by Zagreb, who supported the demands of the Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The loose central institutions of Bosnia and Herzegovina formed an unstable national alliance with the Bosnian Croat Federation, and controlled the Serb-dominant Serb Republic in it.
Croatia’s largest political party HDZ BiH and its leader Dragan Čović-despite claiming to be supported by the majority of Croats, he is not a current member of the country’s tripartite presidium representing Bosnia (Bosnian Muslims), Croats and Serbs- -Call for the reform of election rules.
HDZ refused to recognize the current Croatian representative Željko Komšić, saying that he was elected by Bosnian votes.
Čović and HDZ have been demanding a thorough reform of the electoral law in order to strengthen the position of Croats in federal elections, where Bosniacs hold a considerable majority.
The question of whether to admit HDZ’s claims is Divided into European Union countries and political groups.
The preliminary draft conclusion emphasizes the importance of implementing the Sejdić-Finci ruling of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).
The 2009 judgment-not yet implemented-has ordered Bosnia to remove the race prefix from the election of presidential members.
So far, only the so-called constituent countries-Serbs, Croats, and Bosnians-can run for the three-person, inter-ethnic presidency of Bosnia.
If the ruling is implemented, any citizen of Bosnia and Herzegovina, regardless of race, can be elected to the presidential seat.
An early draft of the EU text passed on Tuesday was circulated among the group delegation, focusing on the implementation of the ruling, followed by calls for “limited constitutional reforms.”
Although the wording on reforms was retained in the adopted text, the citation was moved to the end of the paragraph and instead emphasized that “no legislative or political steps should be taken”, which will make the enforcement of judgments more difficult.
In addition, in response to Zagreb’s request, a new sentence appeared: “The Council emphasized that some [BiH] The ruling of the Constitutional Court has not yet been fully implemented”.
This sentence probably refers to The 2016 “Liubic” ruling, It was discovered that certain provisions of the federal entity’s legislation that the Croats claimed were unfavorable to the ethnic group.
EURACTIV understands that Germany and the Netherlands, which opposed the Croatian amendment, finally agreed to these changes in exchange for Bulgaria’s blessings for the North Macedonian language.
“They just succumbed,” said an EU source.
