Govt. looking for “right time for EU candidacy”

Office for EU Integration Director Milica Delevic said that the government will choose the best possible moment for submitting its demand for EU membership. She said that this would be done by the end of 2009. Govt. looking for “right time for EU candidacy” “This shows the desire to speed up Serbia’s integrations, but also the concern that the demand for EU membership is not ‘wasted,’ so to say, it’s the only bullet in the gun. That is why it is important to work on getting support from EU partners, without which it is likely that our demand will be put on hold,” Delevic told daily Blic. Asked when the Stabilization and Association Agreement could be unfrozen, Delevic said that she did not want to give any dates, adding that lost trust comes back very slowly. “We are now in a situation where we are paying the price of earlier tardiness,” she said. Asked whether the rushed acceptance of Iceland into the EU could delay the integration of the Western Balkans, Delevic said that Iceland is in a completely different position compared to the Balkans, because it is a part of the European economic space, which already calls for harmonization with the legal attainment of the Union. “I think that the promise of the integration of the Western Balkans is something that is there and no one is questioning it despite the fact that the circumstances in the EU are more difficult now than in earlier instances of enlargement,” she said. Delevic said that the question that comes up regularly is when Serbia could become a full-fledged member of the EU, but that this is not what is most important. “I think that it is a lot more important to worry about whether we are dedicated enough to fulfilling conditions and whether we are moving quickly enough, because that is what changes the lives of the citizens,” she said.

Govt. looking for “right time for EU candidacy”

“This shows the desire to speed up Serbia’s integrations, but also the concern that the demand for EU membership is not ‘wasted,’ so to say, it’s the only bullet in the gun. That is why it is important to work on getting support from EU partners, without which it is likely that our demand will be put on hold,” Delević told daily Blic.

Asked when the Stabilization and Association Agreement could be unfrozen, Delević said that she did not want to give any dates, adding that lost trust comes back very slowly.

“We are now in a situation where we are paying the price of earlier tardiness,” she said.

Asked whether the rushed acceptance of Iceland into the EU could delay the integration of the Western Balkans, Delević said that Iceland is in a completely different position compared to the Balkans, because it is a part of the European economic space, which already calls for harmonization with the legal attainment of the Union.

“I think that the promise of the integration of the Western Balkans is something that is there and no one is questioning it despite the fact that the circumstances in the EU are more difficult now than in earlier instances of enlargement,” she said.

Delević said that the question that comes up regularly is when Serbia could become a full-fledged member of the EU, but that this is not what is most important.

“I think that it is a lot more important to worry about whether we are dedicated enough to fulfilling conditions and whether we are moving quickly enough, because that is what changes the lives of the citizens,” she said.