The candidacy of Serbia for membership in the EU will be the topic of a political dialog on January 26 in Brussels, Spanish Ambassador Inigo de Palacio Espana has announced in Belgrade. The meeting will be attended by the heads of diplomacy from Serbia and Spain, i.e. Vuk Jeremic and Miguel Angel Moratinos respectively. The Spanish presidency of the EU will present information on the hitherto steps and inclusion of the candidature on the agenda of the ministerial session. Dusica Maticki has more about what this meeting could yield.
“I believe Serbia will get a clear insight into where do we stand and what are its next moves relating to the candidacy”, said Ambassador De Palacio Espana, while stressing that his country is strongly in support of Serbia. He added, however, that the ministerial session on January 26, in line with its format is not the place where a formal decision on the sending of Serbia’s request to the European Commission could be made. That decision is made by the Council of General Affairs, so it is hard to predict when it will be on the agenda. The Spanish Ambassador has explained that the procedure is additionally burdened by the distribution of competencies within EU institutions. The transition period that has been started on December 1 last year, with the Lisbon Treaty coming into power, should end soon. It is still uncertain which of the roles will stay with the six-month presidency over the EU ,and which will belong to the permanent Chairman Herman von Rompouy, i.e. to Catherine Ashton and Stefan Fiele, as commissioners for foreign affairs and association.
While presenting the program of future work in the European Parliament, the nominated commissioner for enlargement and neighborhood policy, Czech diplomat Stefan Fiele has underlined that the enlargement is in the interest of the Union, because it is a factor of stability. EU Commissioner for Common Foreign and Security Policy Catherine Ashton has also said that the future of the West Balkans will be one of the priorities of its work, adding that she wishes the entire region to make progress towards the Union.
Another important step in the process of Serbia’s integration is the unfreezing of the Stabilization and Association Agreement. The decision on this issue needs to be made by all member-states, but Spain believes it could happen in June, when the discussion on this subject is planned. “In our opinion, Serbia has been fully cooperating with the Hague Tribunal lately, which is confirmed by the report of Chief Prosecutor Serge Brammertz. If it continues, I do not see how could we make any other conclusion instead of unfreezing the Stabilization and Association Agreement”, emphasized Inigo de Palacio Espana. In view of the same topic, Director of the Serbian Government Office of European Integration Milica Delevic has stated that the EU should have a perception of Serbia doing everything to fulfill its Hague obligations. According to her, it is better to focus on extraditing the remaining fugitives to The Hague than what are the next phases in the European integrations to be reached.
The EU is paying special attention to the improvement of regional cooperation, and Serbia has demonstrated in the past period that it is exerting effort in that direction, assessed the Spanish Ambassador. In comment to the mutual lawsuits of Croatia and Serbia before the International Court of Justice, he said that it would be better to look for the solution through a friendly dialog. Head of the EU Delegation in Serbia Vincent Degert agrees with the stance that dialog is the best way to overcome the bilateral and regional problems.
At the end of last year, 68% of the respondents in a survey in Serbia were in support of Serbia’s membership in the EU. Such a result was contributed to by the visa liberalization and implementation of the Interim Trade Agreement. It can be expected that the potential positive signal from Brussels would lead to even greater support among the Serbian citizens.
Source:glassrbije.org/
