Cooperation and Development Institute with the support of Hanns Siedel Stiftung organized on 23 May 2023, in Tirana, a Roundtable on “Enlargement Scenarios in Spring 2023- A Think Tank Perspective”. This event aimed to come up with a better understanding of the different designed scenario and of their contribution to EU enlargement in Southeast Europe.
After welcome of the organizers, the general lines of Albania’s position over the Berlin Leader Summit in Tirana were presented. Statin that the event will bring regional ownership, however the region needs to i) transplant this political will into a policy agenda for the region by bringing it closer to the EU Single Market; and, ii) ensure policy continuity from the Berlin Process Summit Ministerial to the WB Summits not only in policy terms but also in political terms.
Furthermore, the Albanian chairmanship priorities where presented and more concretely the will focus on: i) transport connectivity within the region and EU Member States (from infrastructure to simplification of the border procedures) ii) Energy connectivity by bringing the Green Agenda forward, as well as energy security; iii) Digital Connectivity; and iv) Mobility, Youth and Higher Education (including issues such as migration).
The discussion continued with the “Staged Accession” proposal and it was mentioned that this proposal was welcomed by both EU institutions and Western Balkan countries and offered a different angel to the whole enlargement process. Two main suggestions of this very comprehensive model are to: i) to keep the cluster structure as proposed by the EU but to make them simpler to implement for the national government and for the citizens; ii) open structural funds to the WB depending of the preparedness per chapter and per cluster in order to create “predictability’ among the WB governance and citizens.
It was highlighted that the EU Member States have two main issues with enlargement which are: i) concerns about the rule of law and justice reform; ii) that countries that are in the accession process become Member States can have veto right in the parliament. To address this concern the staged accession proposal alternatively put on the table the suspension of the veto right for new Member States for a certain period.
Later on, the paper “Avoiding the Trap of Another Paper Exercise: Why the WB Need a Human Development-centred EU Enlargement Model” was elaborated by specifying that the GDP of the countries of the Wester Balkan is way lower to the average GDP of EU 27, creating the opposite of socio-economic convergence with EU Member States. Furthermore, in order to achieve this convergence and boost WB development the IPA funds should be closer to the amount of funds that neighboring Member States are receiving.
Additionally, the publication on “Conditionality and Solidarity: Frontloading Cohesion into EU Enlargement to Southeast Europe 6” was detailed by argued that Enlargement process needs to take into account the structural differences between SEE6’s current stage of development and the EU, as well as the current extraordinary geo-political and climate-change context. Furthermore, IPA amounts are not adapted to SEE6 development needs and that the differential of IPA with current EU transfers to new Member States contributes to SEE6 – EU divergence, so direct access to cohesion fund would help with creating a better convergence.
Solidarity principle is needed to complement the Conditionality principle in the SEE6 accession towards EU. The SEE6 access to Cohesion policy needs no EU Treaty changes. The indicative amounts to be attributed to SEE6 are insignificant for the EU budget. But more important than receiving Cohesion funds is the SEE6 access and the subsequent obligatory implementation of good governance rules to absorb them. The concrete steps should start now with the aim to be ready for the preparation of the EU Multiannual Financial Framework 2028-2035.
