2 hours agoKosovo in the EU? Membership, complicated task ask Albania
Periskopi(25 days ago)
(25 days ago)The war in Ukraine has taken Europe's focus and the idea of Kosovo gaining EU candidate status is not on Union plans.
That's what Sweden's ambassador to Kosovo, Jonas Westerlund, is thinking, in an interview for Info Magazine in Klan Kosova, stressed that obstacles are even EU member states that do not recognise Kosovo
“You and your viewers know that Kosovo applied to obtain candidate status on December 15th of 2022, now this is a long time. In Europe, a lot of focus is on Ukraine and that it becomes an EU member. As I said before, we want to have Western Balkan countries part of the Union as well as”.
“Now, you know there are a number of EU members that have not recognised Kosovo. But, to be precise, there are five non-recognitional countries and there must be discussions within the EU to advance Kosovo's” application, Westerlund said.
He added that becoming a member of the European Union is a complicated task, <x0feet Albania and Montenegro, which has taken years and they are advancing”.
When Sweden became a member of the EU in its '90s, it took several years to achieve this. You may remember when a few years ago we became NATO members, we applied and then realized there are certain bilateral issues that we should discuss with a number of member states. And we did so for a while before we entered NATO”.
So it's important to have bilateral negotiations and negotiations. I cannot determine specific issues, this belongs to other EU members to mention this. Sweden is very much in favour of expansion for Ukraine and Western Balkan countries to be members of the European Union”, the Swedish ambassador said.
According to him, many countries have previously become NATO members, and later EU members, though according to him, Sweden and Austria are the exception of this rule.
But, given the current situation in Europe, Russia's aggression against Ukraine I would say the first step would be Kosovo's membership in the Partnership for Peace Programme before becoming a NATO member. That would be credible, PFP access. I would encourage Kosovo to engage in this work”, Sweden's ambassador to our country, Jonas Westerlund, said. /Periscope
