THE STATE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Towards a new legislative term

THE STATE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION 32 Commission’s recommendations, from October of that year, to strengthen the Rule of Law, fight corruption and organised crime, control emigration and respect funda- mental rights. No date has been decided yet to open ne- gotiations, as these requirements have still not been met. Acceptance of BiH’s application can only be under- stood for the purpose that it is not left as the only State in the Western Balkans without this status, apart from Kosovo that, as mentioned previously, is not yet eligi- ble because some EU members have not recognised its independence. BiH is not even a completely sovereign state as it is overseen by the Office of the High Repre- sentative (OHR), to ensure compliance with the Dayton Agreement (1995) which brought the war to a close, created the current state of BiH and gave it a constitu- tion. In turn, the OHR is led and supported by the Peace Implementation Council (PIC) which has a Steering Board made up of 12 countries plus the EU. In 2008, the PIC set the goals for BiH to meet as a condition for closing the OHR. Furthermore, Eufor Althea (a European multinational military force with participation from oth- er countries) is deployed in the country to ensure that the agreements are met. On the other hand, BiH is dangerously close to be- coming a failed State right now, as the complicated institutions set up by Dayton to achieve a peaceful bal- ance between the three “constituting peoples” that live together in the country: Bosnians, Croats and Serbs, are not working at State level, particularly as the Bosnian Serbs refuse to participate in the common government because, as a majority, they prefer to separate from BiH and join Serbia as explained above in the section on Serbia. It is likely that their only reason for not separat- ing is fear of the international reaction, particularly from the EU. BiH is divided into two entities: the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Republika Srpska (RSK), plus the District of Brcko that does not belong to either of these two and is completely autonomous. Each entity has a president, two vice-presidents from different eth- nic groups, a prime minister, government, a legislative power (one chamber in RSK, two chambers in the Fed- eration), Supreme Court, judicial system, police, customs service and their own postal service. These are governed by the common institutions, another two-chamber par- liament at state level, in which each ethnic group can invoke the “vital national interest” of their community to veto any law. The Head of State is a collective body, made up of three members, one from each “constituting people” that rotate the Presidency every eight months, although any decisions must be taken by consensus. The Executive Power at state level lies with a Council of Min- isters, led by a President and two Vice-Presidents, each representing one of the ethnic groups. The same formula is used for the Minister of Defence. It is easy to deduce that this system can only succeed if the ethnic groups really want it to work, which is cur- rently not the case. A possible accession negotiation be- tween the EU and BiH is likely to find that commitments from the state government might not be accepted or implemented by the entities, particularly the RSK. In conclusion, it is not possible to incorporate BiH into the EU under current circumstances, and this will not hap- pen without real reconciliation between the three ethnic groups within the country, with a consolidated political system that allows the State to work effectively with all its prerogatives, including dissolving the OHR and end- ing Operation Althea (formally Eufor), which still seems a long way off today. Eastern Europe Ukraine asked to join the EU on 28 th February 2022, four days after the Russian army began to invade the coun- try. The European Council awarded it candidate status on 23rd June, mentioning that new steps would be de- cided when the candidate met the conditions specified in the Commission’s report of 17th June, which include judicial power reforms, fighting corruption, legislation against money laundering and the oligarchy, media in- dependence and the child protection law. The decision to approve the candidacy of Ukraine was clearly political, motivated almost exclusively by its painful circumstances then, and now. The six candida- cies we have analysed so far clearly demonstrate that the time between application for accession and receiv- ing candidate status varies between 19 months for North Macedonia and 12 years for Türkiye, an average of 60 months, while in the case of Ukraine, not even four