Austria, the Czech Republic, Italy, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia, like France the day before, called on the Commission to present proposals to improve the enlargement process on Tuesday 19 November.
“We call on the Commission to develop, by January 2020, concrete proposals on how to improve the effectiveness of the enlargement process as an instrument to support reforms and integration efforts” in the Western Balkans, explain these six countries in a joint letter, still open for signature and obtained by EUROPE. In this document presented to the General Affairs Council, the six Member States express their readiness to “engage constructively in an effort to improve the process”, recognising that, within the current framework, progress is slow and rather uneven.
Despite this request, the EU Council has not formally instructed the Commission to present a document by January 2020. “We cannot do it, we have to wait until it is in place”, explained Tytti Tuppurainen, Finland's Minister for European Affairs, who holds the rotating presidency of the EU Council, at the end of the Council, emphasising that the period was “very special”, due to the imminent change of Commission. “We expect the Commission to start as soon as possible and then come up with ideas to move forward”, she added. A few hours earlier, the European Commission spokeswoman had suggested that the Commission was waiting for a request from the EU Council to act.
Austria, the Czech Republic, Italy, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia want to improve the process in parallel with opening negotiations with Albania and North Macedonia. “We are ready for a reform of the EU enlargement process; there is always room for improvement, but this must not lead to a delaying tactic regarding North Macedonia and Albania and their European perspective”, warned Austrian Minister for Europe Alexander Schallenberg on his arrival in the EU Council.
While the European Council decided to return to the issue before the Zagreb summit, scheduled for May 2020, the Minister added that these six countries wanted to ensure that “next year, by all means, there will be a green light for the opening of accession negotiations”. According to it, this is “the best way to get these countries to reform, and it would not be reasonable to give up on this. Now, whether it is in March or April, it is not important, what is important is that it happens.”
Before the meeting, French Minister Amélie de Montchalin explained that the objective was to achieve a more efficient procedure by the time of the Zagreb Summit. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)