The head of Serbia’s parliament says the EU’s recent approach to enlargement is unfair and argues the rules of the game have changed since Serbia began accession talks in 2014.
“The EU is changing their standpoint toward enlargement and obviously this is becoming an increasingly hot topic,” Ana Brnabić, president of the country’s National Assembly and a former prime minister, told POLITICO on Thursday at the GLOBSEC security conference in Prague. That shifting stance is especially visible in the context of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, she added.
“When we started the game … back in 2014 … you have this gradual alignment with common foreign security policy, and you need to align 100 percent before entering into the EU. Now those rules of the game have changed, but I don’t think that that is actually fair.”
Serbia gained the status of an official candidate for EU entry in 2012, and opened talks on areas of alignment with the bloc, known as “clusters,” in 2014.
Asked whether Serbia’s pro-Moscow stance is complicating its EU membership drive, she said, “It doesn’t make things easier for us, which is more than obvious, since we have not opened any new cluster in the EU integration process since December 2021.”
Meanwhile, other Western Balkan countries such as Albania and Montenegro have made progress in their EU accession talks, while Serbia’s negotiations have stalled, Brnabić said. This isn’t because Serbia is not ready, she said, but because the country isn’t “aligned fully with the EU’s Foreign and Security Policy.”
The former prime minister also feels that the “narrative” of Serbia’s democratic backsliding is unfair, contending that the country is being singled out for the same reason.
“We saw, for example, interestingly, tear gas and water cannons used against protesters in Albania, but no one said a word,” Brnabić said, referring to recent opposition-led protests which resulted in clashes between protestors and police. “And why is that? In my view, because Albania has aligned 100 percent with common foreign and security policy, and then, you know, you [the EU] turn a blind eye to anything”.
“Whereas in case of Serbia, you do push to quite a large extent false narratives and you do apply a different kind of standard” she added.
As reported by POLITICO, the EU is poised to slash up to € 1.5 billion in pre-accession funds to Serbia over the country’s backsliding on democratic standards.
