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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

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Stabilisation and Association talks could be over after nine months

Belgrade, 4 July 2005

Head of the Serbian EU Integration Office Tanja Miscevic said today that Serbia and the European Commission have stepped up preparations for talks on a Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA), due to begin this fall.

Author: Fonet

At the opening of a two-day seminar presenting Croatia’s experiences in association with the EU and the accession to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), organised by the Serbian EU Integration Office, the Hans Zeidel Foundation, the UNDP, and the Dutch government, Miscevic noted that the European Commission expects that Serbia will be fully prepared for the talks and that its representatives will now have a thorough knowledge of the subjects to be discussed.

Miscevic said that Serbia also must show to the EU that it is capable of fulfilling all its obligations, and she added that the negotiations might be completed after just nine months.

Head of EU affairs at the Croatian Foreign Ministry and a member of the negotiation team, Boris Grigic, said that Serbia could be in stabilisation and association talks for a few years.

He said that the date of actual admission to the EU will depend on the speed at which the 25 member countries ratify the SAA and he added that every member country will use that period to resolve its bilateral issues with Serbia-Montenegro.

Grigic said that it took three years and four months for Croatia’s SAA to come into force and he noted that cooperation with the Hague tribunal was the main reason why the process took longer than the expected two years.

He explained that before signing the SAA, Serbia-Montenegro, like Croatia, will adopt a provisional trade agreement that reflects all trade-related commitments from the actual SAA and which does not require ratification by member states to come into force.

Croatian former Minister of European Integration and chief negotiator for the SAA Neven Mimica pointed out that the process of approaching the EU must be part of a collective effort and social reforms if it is to be quick and successful.

Mimica said that in the forthcoming negotiation process, it is most important to set up competent negotiating teams and coordinate their work properly, because Serbia-Montenegro will be negotiating both the SAA and the accession to the WTO simultaneously.

It is important that negotiation teams are professional and that their members are not replaced after each election in the country, as was the case in Poland, which lost a lot of time changing negotiating teams, Mimica said.

Olga Spevec, a member of the Croatian delegation in the WTO membership negotiations said that the process of joining the WTO is more complex than the EU accession process, since the WTO is run by 148 member states, which often condition the admission with resolving all bilateral issues.