Serbia calls for fair treatment on EU accession progress

President of the Serbian National Assembly Ana Brnabić said that Serbia fulfilled the conditions for opening Cluster 3 in 2021, as well as additional requirements.

She added that it would be fair for European Union member states to give the green light for opening this cluster, CE Report quotes FENA.

“It would be fair and just for EU member states to give the green light and for us to open Cluster 3. I would also like to remind that in the last five annual reports on Serbia’s progress, the European Commission recommended opening this cluster. Many thanks, above all, to our partners from France and Italy, who even sent a request to other EU member states calling for Cluster 3 to be opened,” Brnabić said.

Brnabić also expressed her regret that Serbia is the only country where representatives of the former government, i.e., opposition blockers, continue to write letters urging that Cluster 3 not be opened.

“This is truly a unique case, where some so-called pro-European political parties in a country are appealing to the European Union to slow down that country’s European path,” Brnabić told Radio Television of Serbia.

Serbia continues to declare EU membership as a strategic goal, which the Union takes seriously, but the authorities in Serbia must clearly demonstrate this strategic choice and avoid anti-European rhetoric, according to the Head of the EU Delegation to Belgrade, Andreas von Beckerath.

Serbia is expected to overcome deadlocks in the areas of justice, rule of law, human rights, and urgently reverse the decline in freedom of expression and erosion of academic freedoms.

“Serbia must overcome divisions, rebuild trust among political and civic actors, and we need to see concrete, tangible progress in the rule of law, the electoral framework, and media freedom,” Von Beckerath said while presenting the report on the progress of candidate and potential candidate countries for EU accession.

Serbia began negotiations to join the EU in 2014 and over the past 11 years has opened only 22 chapters, of which two have been closed. In the last nearly four years, Serbia has made no progress in negotiations, with the last cluster opened in December 2021.

Serbia is also the only candidate country not aligned with the EU’s foreign and security policy regarding relations with Russia.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine and geopolitical changes have shown that EU enlargement is necessary, but the Union warns that although Serbian leaders often stress that EU membership is their strategic goal, their words are not followed by actions, and reforms in the country have significantly slowed.

Foto: SNS