Toespraak Eurocommissaris Olli Rehn van uitbreiding over de mogelijkheden tot vooruitgang in de Westelijke Balkanlanden (en)

SPEECH/08/350

Olli Rehn

EU Commissionner for Enlargement

With patience and determination the EU can steer progress in the Western Balkans

Friends of Europe European Policy Summit  "A Balkan Balance Sheet"

Brussels, 24 june 2008

Your Excellencies, Dear Colleagues and Friends,

Two questions will be on many minds this morning, as we start this important Summit on the "Balkan's Balance Sheet."

First, will the Irish "no" to the Lisbon Treaty affect enlargement too? Second, has Europe got enlargement right in the Western Balkans?

My answer to the first one is a qualified "no." To the second, a clear "yes."

I followed the debate in Ireland. Enlargement was never an issue in the campaign.

Accession negotiations have never in the past been disrupted by stops and starts in the institutional reform process. The same goes for the European perspective of the Western Balkans.

So while the Irish vote gives cause for reflection, we should not take any sabbatical from our work for peace and stability. While the EU considers how to pursue its institutional reform, we keep on working in parallel on a carefully managed and gradual accession process in South East Europe.

Since the Irish vote, two chapters have been opened both for Croatia and Turkey, and we signed the Stabilisation and Association Agreement with Bosnia and Herzegovina. The EU's enlargement policy is on track.

So where do we stand overall in the Western Balkans?

I wrote a piece in the Guardian earlier this year. I argued the region had a chance to achieve stability and prosperity, once the challenges related to Kosovo's status and Serbia's EU future had been met. At the time, it was hard to find an editor who would take it. Most found it way too optimistic.

In the article I wrote that, by end 2008, all the Western Balkan countries should have passed through the gateway for candidate status by signing Stabilisation and Association Agreements with the EU. Thanks to the SAA signature with Bosnia-Herzegovina last week, we reached this milestone.

In my article, I also hoped that the Serbian citizens would seize the opportunity and vote for a Europe- and reform-oriented government.

The elections of 11 May were a close call but paved the way for it. The signature of the SAA with Serbia in April and the opening of visa dialogue were cited by many observers as crucial signals of the EU's commitment.

Finally, I challenged the pessimists on Serbia's ICTY co-operation. I believe that full co-operation is possible once an EU-oriented government takes office – I hope by the end of this week. With Zupljanin in The Hague, a new momentum may be underway in Belgrade. Time will tell.

Last year, a well-known think tank mused that "Euro-Atlantic integration is not the magnet once thought" in Serbia. The West, it warned, "may have to recognise Serbia has chosen a different path, and there is little to do in the short term to shift it back... The West needs to realign policy accordingly and prepare for the possibility of living with a rejectionist, isolationist, pro-Russian and anti-EU Serbia."

The past month's events tell a different story.

Let me be clear: tough criticism can help to shake up politics. In the Western Balkans in the past 20 years this has been badly needed.

Yet I simply disagree with those who belittle the EU's policy in the Balkans. The empirical evidence of the last years proves the point.

We need patience and determination, not doomsday scenarios, to drive progress in the region. And especially with Serbia in my mind, evolution rather than catharsis is certainly the better recipe for change.

Thus, I am glad that the European Council last week gave its "full support for the European perspective of the Western Balkans." It stressed that "by making solid progress in economic and political reform and by fulfilling the necessary conditions and requirements, the remaining potential candidates in the Western Balkans should achieve candidate status, according to their own merits, with EU membership as ultimate goal."

This is a powerful message. The EU sticks to its word.