Mogherin and Its Successable Policy in the Balkans

Pandora's open box in the Western Balkans must now close its Spanish successor, Josep Borelli, because European diplomacy chief Federica Moghrin has failed to do so in her mandate.

Moghrin will now again gather leaders of the six Balkan Balkans at a farewell dinner in Brussels. She says it will be an extended meeting with representatives of the region, which has been, as she says, the top priority in her policy, immediately behind security and defence issues.

In its report to the European Parliament, in April of this year, Federika Moghrini said that the “polica of EU enlargement has been one of the most successful in the past five years of its mandate”, when it led European diplomacy.

Mogher's statements for “successful”

Our “Policy towards the Balkans, in the Balkans, and primarily with the Balkans, is a success story, which has had a beginning and a hard way towards establishing trust and common life”, Moghrini said. Western Balkan media correspondents say that there is a “no match between words and works”, because the EU's senior representative for foreign policy and security has no other topic to boast about besides the declarative commitment to bringing the Western Balkans into the EU.

”Bosnia and Herzegovina has not even received candidate status, dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia has been brought to a dead end. Serbia and Montenegro have not progressed in negotiations, while Albania and Northern Macedonia have not received the green light for opening EU membership negotiations”, Radio Television of Serbia correspondent Dusan Gajic tells Deutsche Welle.

He adds that the responsibility for this situation in the enlargement process is primarily held by member states, but also by Moghrin, who has lost credibility in the region for many reasons.

For example, with the warning to abolish visas for Kosovo, which has not happened. Then statements about opening negotiations with Tirana and Skopje, which have not been realised, against the Prespa Agreement on changing the name. It has finally lost credibility even because of numerous warnings for reaching the final agreement between Belgrade and Pristina, until the end of its mandate. When you look back, all of this looks like a large pile of empty words and cannot be presented as a good legacy to its successor”, Gajac claims.

Loss of dialogue wheel

European leaders often answer, that they do not have the magic Archbishop” in hand to solve problems. While the EU's outgoing diplomacy chief could say she has believed in realising positive steps. You may not have success, but if you insist and have clear goals and principles, then success may also come. Maybe 25 years later, after seven or only two years”, Mogher said.

The Kosovo Radio Television correspondent in Brussels, Gjeracina Tuhina, thinks, that Moghrin has not been principled and committed to its policy towards the region, in particular in the dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia. It has not adhered to principles, because its motive has been for dialogue to be completed during its mandate. Rumours about the possibility of winning the Nobel Peace Prize have probably done so that it can engage in a solution with all means during its mandate, while the quality of the solution has been less (and perhaps nothing) significant”, Tuhina estimates.

RTK newspaper, which conducts the dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia from the beginning in 2011, says Moghrin has selected co- talkers according to will by changing the forms of meetings, depending on the persons she preferred as conversationators, but also by changing the phases of negotiations, without explaining what has been achieved in the previous phase.

Tuhina says Moghrin “has turned his back on dialogue”, when he realizes, that the solution will not be reached during its mandate. “Normising reports between Serbia and Kosovo is a real orphan, because “drikla” has given up on him since April of this year, when the German-French initiative has been launched, which has been aimed at amortising damage caused by Moghrin”, Tuhina tells Deutsche Welle.

With estimates from RTK's journalist, her Serbian colleague from RTS agrees. ”Dicu from the middle of its mandate has shown signs that Moghrin has lost the thread of dialogue, while over the past year it has been very clear that it will not achieve results. Its personal commitment, but without proper leadership and commitment to keep things under control, lack of authority and support from some member states, has ultimately resulted in a failure of”, Gajic claims.

Is Brussels ready for the Balkans?

After years of verbal enthusiasm for the commitment and commitment of both sides, Federica Moghrini has no longer mentioned dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina in recent months. At the beginning of the mandate, it said, even BiH is the priority of EU policy, but now it is no longer mentioned anywhere. Somewhere near the end of the mandate, when speaking of the Balkans, Moghrin mentioned only the agreement between Athens and Skopje on the name of Northern Macedonia. But Moghrin has not made any good impressions in northern Macedonia either.

Besides the moment of signing the Prespa Agreement, Moghrin has not been more present in Macedonian opinion. One of the hypotheses that can be heard in Macedonian political circles is that Moghrin has not helped Macedonia, because he has insisted that northern Macedonia and Albania remain in “a package” for negotiations, which is Italy's position. According to this theory, it has been easier for Macedonia to start negotiations, as if it were not for Albania, which has opposed several countries such as the Netherlands or Denmark”, the Macedonian National Agency's correspondence told Deutsche Welle. IA, Tanja Milevska.

It underlines that Moghrin has been known in northern Macedonia only by the prism of her commitment to the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, which has caused concerns in Macedonian-north opinion.

” I think that North Macedonia has expected Moghrin and the EU to generally be more clear against ideas for the exchange of”, Milevska says.

Federica Moghrini has never clearly dismissed the idea of exchanging territories between Kosovo and Serbia, respectively, for changing borders in the region. There have been other positions and unclear agreements, changes to red lines, in particular in dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina, where there were very true “”.

It may be a lack of Moghrin's experience, poor conditions or simply the Balkans are like this, but the Federica Moghrini failed to reach this “historical agreement” in the Balkans. Her successor, Joseph Borell, says they expect much work and that his mandate will start precisely from the Western Balkans. / DW/