Essential criteria. Given that all the Balkan countries are European, they should all be allowed to join the EU. Ongoing debates are not concerned with the principle but with the conditions that need to be respected (see this column yesterday).
Two criteria are essential: (a) future enlargement must not compromise the Community acquis, which has been the fruit of the past half century of building the united Europe. This is not any new discovery - it is a principle that clearly stems from the Copenhagen Criteria. These criteria are still valid and provide the conditions for enlargement and highlight the fact that the EU's integration capacity must be preserved; (b) the different situations must be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, according to the position of each candidate country.
In my opinion, yesterday's exploration indicated that for the time being no Balkan country appears ready to follow Croatia, whose negotiations were in fact completed this Thursday. It is difficult to make any forecasts. Most of the arguments would appear to support Serbia following in the footsteps of Croatia when the time comes, having satisfied certain indispensable political conditions and having reasonably positive economic prospects. This is a personal opinion.
A single Balkan entity? Nothing is in the bag. For the time being, it is more constructive to take note of the initiatives that are exploring the new ways of reconciling the different positions on accession, as described yesterday. To my knowledge, the most daring and innovative suggestion was made by Antonio Puri Purini, a well-known figure in Community circles. It considers that Balkan countries should be seen as a single entity but that this should not jeopardise the independence of any of the individual member states recognised today and that within Community institutions they should have a single seat: this joint representation would operate on a rotating presidential basis assumed by each of the different countries. The question still remains of whether Serbia will be able to join Slovenia and Croatia as a future member state in its own right but the concept of a common entity is quite clear. According to Puri Purini, this would be a way of indicating that fragmentation into several mono-ethnic states is not the best way forward for joining a Europe that is increasingly more united, especially if it is pointed out that:
(a) the only attempt to build a state bringing together three different ethnic groups (Bosnia Herzegovina) is a failure;
(b) the capacity to establish a bona fide autonomy in each of these different small states is doubtful.
For a new policy. Jean-Guy Giraud, the president of the UEF (Union of European Federalists) has prepared a draft EU Enlargement Revision Policy, which (1) rejects the assumption that accession is synonymous with opening up and generosity, and that any misgivings imply insularity or selfishness; 2) considers that any decision should be preceded by a comprehensive debate on the consequences of enlargement on the viability of the EU at an institutional and political level; (3) demands that a referendum becomes the general rule not only in member states but also in candidate countries, in an effort to prevent “accessions that do not have any popular mandate”; (4) would like to see the enlargement process not to be exclusively based on the technocratic negotiations of the 36 chapters and the purely formal scrutiny of the candidate countries' legal adaptations but which lack any guarantee of effective implementation; (5) would also like more widespread alternative formulas and each specific negotiation to be able to either result in accession or “preferential relationships”.
Mr Giraud advocates a pause in the enlargement process until 2014, which would allow for greater reflection between the institutions and a public debate in view of the forthcoming European elections in that same year.
Preventing an inefficient Europe. Without wishing to give my view on these different formulas, I do think that a word of warning is necessary to prevent the EU being watered down as a whole and becoming limp and inefficient. A scenario made up of member states that are unable to respect common rules but have considerable punching power in the institutions, or which do not share the same objectives, has to be avoided. Such an entity would lose sight of its international goals. This objective does not in any way consist of closing the doors but rather, further exploring opportunities for developing alternative formulas. The Union for the Mediterranean is a bad example because it came into being with ridiculous goals. Neighbourhood policy, however, is already a valuable and efficient instrument, which is likely to be further strengthened. My preferred initiative in this context is the European strategy for the Danube region, which the summit formally approved last week and which deserves further examination. This will be the subject for tomorrow.
(F.R.trans/fl)