The EU and the Balkans: It's not true love

According to the European Commission's Enlargement Strategy, Serbia and Montenegro should join the European Union by 2025. But what about reforms? The German agency dpa analyzes the situation in the Western Balkans.

There are two very different worlds. On the one hand are the leaders of the European Union, such as the President of the European Parliament, Antonio Tajani, who announced last Sunday in Belgrade that, due to many alleged reforms, he considers Serbia's accession to the Union possible even before 2025. On the other hand, there are large parts of civil society that complain that the democratic shortcomings, the pressure on the media and the judiciary, are worse today than in the wartime nineties.

The small Adriatic country, Montenegro, has been negotiating with Brussels for almost six years, and with 30 of the 35 chapters open, it is the furthest advanced in the process of joining the European Union. But the domestic political situation is fragile. Half of the opposition has been boycotting the parliament for a long time. She thus protests against the decades-long dominant Milo Đukanović, who with a couple of friendly families runs the country as if it were his property. With only a few brief exceptions, the long-time chairman of the Socialists (DPS) is either the president or the prime minister of Montenegro.

Brussels forgives Vučić's undemocratic moves

The President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, has also been in politics for a small eternity: a long-time Greater Serbian nationalist and oppositionist, then head of government, and today the president, an ardent European. The West, whether it's Washington, Berlin or Paris, sees the 47-year-old as his most important partner, despite his long career. Brussels forgives Vučić for all his undemocratic moves at home, only if he does not provoke new conflicts and advocates reconciliation with Kosovo, the Albanian province that seceded ten years ago, says sociologist Jovo Bakić.

Favorite partners of Brussels have also been in power in Bosnia and Herzegovina for decades, such as the Muslim leader Bakir Izetbegović. But he, like the leaders of Serbs and Croats in BiH, has been misleading the EU by promising reforms for a long time, criticizes Srđan Blagovčanin.

"Stories about reforms are fairy tales," complains the director of the non-governmental organization "Transparensi" in Sarajevo. Moreover, "parties are criminal organizations" and function "like a mafia".

Opposition politician Predrag Kojović sees it similarly.

"Party cliques only want to secure their illegally acquired wealth, without any legal, political or social consequences," the president of Our Party told the German news agency dpa. Almost all foreign experts agree that parties in every country of Southeast Europe are "gods and clubs": no one controls them, and they rule every area of ​​the economy and society, the media and the judiciary, encourage professional and entrepreneurial careers, or destroy them.

And who should we negotiate with?

Western diplomats sometimes themselves realize how problematic their partnerships with powerful people in the Balkans are. They justify these ties by the fact that the opposition in those countries is fragmented, divided and often organizationally incompetent. They say that they simply do not have another partner for talks and negotiations. And indeed, the opposition in all those countries is usually deeply divided, without any perspective for joint political activity.

It is very similar in other countries that want membership in the European Union, such as Albania, Macedonia and Kosovo. Disputes, blockades, boycotts and corruption are the most important terms of their internal politics. All six potential candidates are involved in dozens of border disputes.

EU diplomats hope that these countries, despite small steps, will one day succeed in making a breakthrough towards democracy and a market economy. But the population does not want to wait. Many disillusioned people look for a way out and emigrate from their country, primarily to Germany and Austria. These are well-educated young people, engineers, doctors and caregivers welcome in the West. Their homelands miss them, and that only sets the local societies back even more.