EU leaders have decided to start negotiations on the accession of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Foreign 22 March, 2024 19:35

The 27 leaders gave the political green light at a summit in Brussels after the European Commission – the EU’s executive arm – last week agreed to start talks in spite of deep lingering ethnic divisions in the nation with 3.2 million inhabitants, France 24 reports.

“The European Council has just decided to open accession negotiations with Bosnia and Herzegovina. Congratulations!”, EU Council president Charles Michel said.

“Your place is in our European family.”

Michel followed it up immediately with a warning that a lot of work remains to be done before the country can join.

“Now the hard work needs to continue so Bosnia and Herzegovina steadily advances, as your people want," he said.

In the summit's conclusions, leaders emphasized the need for Bosnia to keep on taking “all relevant steps set out” by the Commission that include economic, judicial and political reforms as well as better efforts to tackle corruption and money laundering.

Bosnia is riven by ethnic divisions, even decades after the 1992-95 war that tore the country apart, leaving more than 100,000 people dead and millions displaced.

In 2022, Bosnia was granted candidate status. In order to join the EU, candidate countries must go through a lengthy process to align their laws and standards with those of the bloc and show their institutions and economies meet democratic norms.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said upon his arrival in Brussels that a lot of work still needs to be done before Bosnia can really get into the thick of negotiations with the bloc.

“It’s crucial that Bosnia will fulfil all the necessary actions in the Commission’s report so that you really will have ticked all the boxes,” Rutte said.

Gitanas Nauseda, the president of Lithuania, said he supports Bosnia’s candidacy, but with strings attached.

“We have to respect the rules, rules of game, implementation of all necessary requirements,” he said.

Bosnia-Herzegovina is one of six nations from the region — the others are Albania, Serbia, Kosovo, Montenegro and North Macedonia – which are at different stages of the EU membership process.