The EU Strategy for the Western Balkans envisages the countries of the region to join the EU by 2025. A 2025 enlargement deadline absolutely demotivates the candidate countries and that is why I hope the EU will regard Montenegro through its achievements and decide to accept it as the EU member state before 2025, said ex-president of Montenegro, Filip Vujanović, at the opening ceremony of the Crans Montana Forum in Geneva.
Vujanović noted that the EU, in the first line, must be stronger before it becomes larger. “This statement of mine has two unpredictable sides. The first one refers to the time when the EU will become stronger, whereas the second one refers to the enlargement date. Both dilemmas have weaknesses contrary to core principles of every union of states. The EU was set up on the basis of cooperation and integrations, initiated by 6 states that had clear enlargement vision.”
According to him, the UK’s exit from the EU completely opposes the enlargement policy.
Vujanović continued: “A 7-year slowing down and delay of the EU enlargement in terms of the Strategy for the Western Balkans are in contravention of the core EU principles.”
“There’s no doubt the EU has some open issues and challenges, which are neither new nor intractable. But that should be the matter of reform and responsible relationship towards the EU, not the enlargement requirement. In the end, such a long enlargement deadline, in my opinion, completely demotivates the candidate countries,” concluded ex-head of state, Filip Vujanović.
