Serbia gets EU candidate status

EU leaders to approve Serbia’s candidate status this evening.

National leaders will tonight (1 March) grant Serbia the status of candidate for membership of the European Union. But in a break with established practice, the leaders will debate – rather than endorse without discussion – a decision taken by national ministers for foreign or European affairs on Tuesday (28 February) to confer candidacy on Serbia.

At Tuesday’s meeting, Romania made last-minute demands for greater rights for the Vlach minority in Serbia, to the annoyance of many diplomats.  ‘Bad behaviour’ A senior diplomat said that Romania had shown “bad behaviour” at Tuesday’s meeting, which dragged on for several hours.

He said that Romania was imposing new conditions on Serbia and that this was “not right”. Diplomats say that there is no doubt that the European Council will grant candidate status to Serbia and that Romania was throwing its weight around to make a point.

Romania has been led by a caretaker government since Emil Boc stepped down as prime minister on 6 February.

Boris Tadic´, Serbia’s president, told a Serbian broadcaster on Tuesday that the Vlach issue was a question of principle for Romania, which “like every country only wants to defend its interests and to protect its ethnic community in a neighbouring country”. Tadic´ said this was “a question of respect for the principles for which we fought during the ‘90s” – an apparent reference to the wars Serbia fought in the former Yugoslavia.

Tadic´ was on an impromptu visit to Brussels on Monday and Tuesday for talks with José Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission, and Herman Van Rompuy, the president of the European Council.

In December, the EU postponed a decision on Serbia’s application, demanding that Serbia engage more constructively in negotiations with Kosovo, a former province. An agreement on how Kosovo can present itself in diplomatic meetings, reached last Friday (24 February), paved the way for Serbia to receive candidate status.

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