Balkan Leaders Focus on Economy as Serbia Boycotts Gathering
March 20, 2010, 11:07 AM EDTBy Boris Cerni
March 20 (Bloomberg) -- Leaders of Europe’s Balkan region, shrugging off a boycott by Serbia, pledged at a summit to deepen economic ties to spur the nascent recovery and forge a common strategy to join the European Union.
The one-day meeting of leaders from the defunct communist Yugoslavia, which collapsed in the civil wars of the 1990s, was held 37 kilometers (23 miles) from the Slovenian capital Ljubljana. Serbia skipped the event over its opposition to recognition of Kosovo’s political autonomy. Representatives of Albania, not a former Yugoslav republic, and Kosovo, which declared independence from Serbia in 2008, also attended.
“We will focus more on the economy, on common infrastructure projects, because we sought to address issues other than our efforts to integrate the region with the EU,” Slovenian Prime Minister Borut Pahor told reporters after the summit. His Croatian counterpart, Jadranka Kosor, suggested “bilateral issues should be separate” from the EU accession process.
The former Yugoslav republics, recovering from the worst recession in more than a decade, need to look to the EU to help boost trade and living standards following the continent’s bloodiest conflict since World War II. Croatia plans to wrap up entry talks this year and join the EU by 2012, while Serbia is resisting increasing pressure to recognize the breakaway province of Kosovo.
Serbian President Boris Tadic said the organizers knew from the start it would be “mission impossible” to force the Balkan country’s attendance at the former Alpine residence of Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito. The summit was hosted by Slovenia and Croatia.
NATO Conflict
Kosovo, an enclave of ethnic Albanians that was the center of a 1999 military conflict that ended with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization ousting Serbian troops, was represented by Prime Minister Hashim Thaci, who reiterated his aim to join both NATO and the EU.
A majority of EU countries have recognized Kosovo’s independence, putting them at odds with Serbia. The nation also needs to apprehend Bosnian General Ratko Mladic, accused of genocide, in order to complete a free-trade agreement with the EU this year, a precursor to entry talks.
“Those that aren’t here have a legitimate right to have acted so as even EU nations have different opinions on Kosovo and there are also differences on the pace of further enlargement,” Pahor said.
Expansion Fatigue?
Slovenia is the only former Yugoslav republic that is an EU member and the first former communist country to be a member of the euro region. The 27-nation bloc, emerging from the deepest post-war recession, is wary of admitting new members except Croatia after 10 eastern European nations have joined the world’s largest trading bloc since 2004.
“Serbia will eventually have to face reality,” said Damir Grubisa, a European affairs professor at Croati’s Zagreb University for Political Sciences. “The future of all Balkan countries lies within the EU.”
--Editors: James M. Gomez, Alan Crosby
To contact the reporter on this story: Boris Cerni in Ljubljana, Slovenia, at bcerni@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Hellmuth Tromm at htromm@bloomberg.net
