THE STATE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Towards a new legislative term

PERSPECTIVES FOR FUTURE ENLARGEMENTS OF THE UNION 35 Recommendations – Negotiations with the candidate countries for EU membership must be extremely rigorous in order to avoid problems such as those experienced by some of the current members. A key aspect to be assessed is the political readiness to embrace increasingly closer integration and to promote the EU’s strategic autonomy. – There must be no shortcuts to the accession of any new member, no matter how much there may be a desire to compensate for an anomalous or painful situation, as in the case of Ukraine, which will always be temporary. – Before proceeding to further enlargement, it will be necessary to tackle the necessary reforms to abolish unanimous decisions, in those matters where they still exist, to prevent a single country from being able to veto the decision of the whole. Abbreviations – BiH: Bosnia-Herzegovina. – EPC: European Political Community. – EUFOR: European Force for the Stabilisation of Bosnia- Herzegovina. – KFOR: Kosovo Stabilisation Force. – OHR: Office of the High Representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina. – NATO: North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. – PIC: Peace Implementation Council for Bosnia and Herzegovina. – RSK: Republic of Serbian Krajina. – TEU: Treaty on European Union. – EU: European Uniom. Conclusion In principle, as outlined in the TEU, all European states that meet the conditions can choose to join the EU. However, rigour must be stepped up in the negotiations to avoid problems at a later date. We have seen that all the candidate countries still have serious issues in essential matters such as Rule of Law, separation of powers, fighting corruption and oligarchies. In its opinion on Ukraine’s candidacy, the Commission stated that “the accession process remains based on established criteria and conditions. This allows any country in the process to progress based on its own merits but also means that steps towards the EU can be reversed if the underlying conditions are not met anymore,” which is all well and good, but steps cannot be reversed once the candidate is a Member State. It must be stated that some enlargements, such as in 2004 and 2007, have included countries that theoretically met the cri- teria but subsequently did not meet them entirely and therefore their integration has weakened the EU more than strengthened it. It is necessary and good for the EU, and the country in question, to strictly require full compliance with the criteria. It also means not hurrying the negotiation, for other reasons, as preferred by some Member States, in cases such as Ukraine and Moldova, because there will be consequences to pay for this urgent approach. Furthermore, concerning technical criteria, incor- porating a new country means considering its foreign policy stance to avoid any discrepancies which might weaken the EU, as they do not always share the same geopolitical perception. For example, when the Euro- pean Council agreed in Reykjavik, on 17 th May, that Russia must pay for any destruction in Ukraine and im- plemented a register of damage, six countries distanced themselves from the decision, including one EU Member State, Hungary, and three accession candidates: Bosnia- Herzegovina, Serbia, and Türkiye. It is not possible to move forward towards the chosen strategic autonomy of the EU without solid internal unity. The growing number of members, and their diversity, means that before further enlargements, reforms should be made as required to prevent a single country – big or small – from conditioning the policy of the whole or requiring some kind of compensation in return. Only by adopting these reforms and maintaining the strict requirement to meet the accession criteria, can future enlargements meet the goal of contributing to a larger and stronger Union for the benefit of all Europeans.