Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-03-15-Speech-3-237"
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"en.20060315.21.3-237"2
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".
Mr President, up until recently, a swift and extensive enlargement of the European Union was suggested as a tremendous step forward, and as something meriting universal support. It was seen as a reunification of Europe and as the victory of the West in the Cold War. After the major enlargement of 2004, that climate changed dramatically. Public opinion in the old Member States does not experience this enlargement as a success, particularly as a result of the increasing exploitation of the disparity between high-wage and low-wage countries.
The politicians too, are distancing themselves from it. This change is palpable in the report on the enlargement strategy that is the topic of today’s debate. Attention is being drawn to the EU’s absorption capacity, to the external borders, the costs that are involved in enlargement and to administrative problems that are attributed to the absence of a European constitution. As a result, Romania and Bulgaria are likely to be the last countries that are allowed to join in the short term. Other European states are being referred to the neighbourhood policy. Even for the three countries that have already been selected as candidate countries, no date of accession has been given.
Everywhere across the western Balkans, in recognised states, as well as in federal states or protectorates striving towards independence, where groups of people who speak different languages and practise different religions, and who, in the 1990s, were at daggers drawn with each other, public opinion now expects miracles of a swift accession process to the European Union. The EU uses those expectations to demand reforms, and in that way, makes deep incursions into the administrative choices that are being made over there.
The EU does not, for the time being, want enlargement, but it does want influence outside of its borders. That is why Bosnia and Herzegovina now have a tax system that nobody asked for, and the regional autonomy that was guaranteed in the Dayton agreement is being pushed back. According to the propaganda posters, it is thanks to the EU’s military presence that this country is on its way to joining the European Union. Public opinion in Montenegro and Kosovo, areas where four years ago, along with 12 Member States, the euro was introduced as legal tender, take it as read that they will soon be admitted to the EU as independent states, while the Hungarian-speaking people of Vojvodina expect protection against Slav dominance.
So far, the EU’s actions have left all these people disappointed. Do we not have anything to offer those countries in the western Balkans other than the invitation to form a common market in the territory of the former Yugoslavia and to adapt their government and their economy to our wishes without them being able to join before 2020? My group can muster little enthusiasm for this proposal.
We also recognise, however, that thanks to this text, it is possible to stress that the forthcoming referendum in Montenegro must be taken seriously and that the conflict about the use of the name Macedonia should be resolved quickly in sound consultation between Greece and its northern neighbour. What is also positive is that in Kosovo, a solution must be found in the short term which accommodates the needs of both the large Albanian majority and the Serbian and Roma minorities."@en1
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