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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

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Serbia may be "technically ready" to become EU candidate country by 2007

Belgrade, 11 September 2006

Director of the Serbian government's EU Integration Office Tanja Miscevic said that next year, Serbia may be "technically ready" to become an EU candidate country, which means that as soon as 2008 it could start using EU candidate funds and abolish the visa regime related to Schengen countries.

Tanja Miscevic

In an interview for the Tanjug news agency, Miscevic said Serbia is technically up to the task, but with clear political obligations. She added that they do not only imply the cooperation with The Hague Tribunal, but also internal reforms, as well as the issue of unambiguous support to the EU integration process. She stressed that the negotiating team is absolutely ready to discuss the Stabilisation and Association Agreement with the EU (SAA), though it is not known whether the negotiations will be resumed this autumn since the principal condition for that has not been fulfilled, which is full cooperation with the Tribunal, or in other words, the extradition of Ratko Mladic and other indictees to the Tribunal.

She recalled that the Tribunal's Chief Prosecutor Carla Del Ponte will meet with the European Three in September to discuss the implementation of the Serbian government's Action Plan on the conclusion of cooperation with the Tribunal and explained that according to their assessment, the European Commission will decide whether to resume the negotiations or maintain Serbia's current status.

According to Miscevic, the European Commission will decide whether the talks will be resumed at the recommendation of EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn, following his meeting with Carla Del Ponte concerning Serbia's cooperation with the Tribunal.

Miscevic explained that the signing of the SAA is very important since it would be the first contractual relation and the first step toward EU accession.

So far, all relations between Serbia and EU have been on a voluntary basis, Miscevic pointed out and added that Serbia voluntarily accepts harmonisation and EU's recommendations because they are good for the country, while by concluding the SAA Serbia enters into a contractual relationship which will serve as a measure for its success in further undertakings, first of all in the petition for EU membership.

The Director of the EU Integration Office stressed that the Serbian negotiating team can easily make up for the period lost because the negotiations conducted up to the time they were called off had been developing quickly.