The EU opened this Monday the accession talks for Montenegro, and Serbia.

The President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, said that these countries are expected to join the EU by 2025.
In a press release, the EU Commissioner for enlargement, Johannes Hahn, considered this development a deserved merit for Serbia. He warned that further progress of Serbia is conditioned by Kosovo and if they normalize their relations.

“There has been a good job as regards the relations with Kosovo and the rule of law, but there are still many challenges ahead”, Hahn said.
The Austrian diplomat, Wolfgang Petritsch, former representative for Bosnia Herzegovina, said that based on Vucic’s declarations about Kosovo, this is a historic opportunity to resolve the last conflict in the region once and for all.

In an interview for Deutsche Welle, he insisted that Brussels must focus on overcoming this stalemate, maybe by giving a political term to a personality that has a good understanding of Balkan and its problematic.

The diplomat said that internal dialogue between Serbs is of a major importance. It should be seen as a basic condition for real regional stability. Petritsch thinks that when the new EU administration takes office in 2019, the accession of Western Balkan should be on top of the list.