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The leaders of Albania, Serbia and North Macedonia are set to attend a European Union summit on Thursday after that they had contemplated a boycott.
The three Western Balkan leaders are heading to Brussels to debate their progress towards EU accession.
The leaders of Albania and Serbia had briefly thought-about not attending the summit amid disappointment over the dearth of progress on milestones to changing into EU members.
Anger towards Bulgaria
EU member state Bulgaria has been blocking the beginning of the accession talks with North Macedonia and Albania, angering the 2 West Balkan states with the specter of a veto from Sofia.
“We’ll attend the EU Council assembly,” Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama wrote on Twitter on Wednesday. “There will not be a lot to listen to about us,” he wrote in English, however the West Balkan states need to be heard on how that they had been handled by Bulgaria, he wrote.
Rama went on to say that Bulgaria was “kidnapping” the West Balkan states and “destroying” the spirit of Europe.
Bulgaria has demanded that problems with “widespread historical past,” language and id be mentioned with North Macedonia as a precondition for the accession talks, which North Macedonian President Stevo Pendarovski stated was “unacceptable.”
“It’s unacceptable that historic points and language disputes are included within the negotiating framework with the EU,” Pendarovski instructed Skopje-based TV24 Casa earlier this week.
What’s the standing of Western Balkans’ EU membership bids?
The European Union bought its begin in 1951 as a bloc of six international locations often called the European Coal and Metal Group, however has expanded over time. It now has 27 member states.
Western Balkan international locations, together with Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Montenegro, are at completely different phases of the applying course of to hitch the EU.
Accession negotiations with the EU for Montenegro and Serbia are underway, whereas negotiations with North Macedonia and Albania have been pending since 2020.
Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina have submitted their membership purposes, however nonetheless have not began negotiations.
Individually on Thursday, EU leaders are assembly to resolve on granting candidate standing for Ukraine and Moldova, step one in a protracted course of to turn out to be members of the bloc.
Ukraine’s extensively anticipated fast-track path to official candidate standing is seen as rising the Western Balkans’ feeling of being sidelined. However some see it as an excellent signal.
“From my perspective, it is good for the international locations of the Western Balkans as a result of it exhibits that the geostrategic significance of EU enlargement remains to be there and that there’s motion within the enlargement course of,” Manuel Sarrazin, Germany’s particular consultant for the Western Balkans, instructed DW.
fb/kb (dpa, Reuters)
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