Negotiations Put EU Closer to Pact With Serbia

[Marulus]

Negotiations Put Europeans Closer to Pact With Serbia

By STEPHEN CASTLE

April 28, 2008

BRUSSELS — The European Union is moving closer to signing a long-delayed pact with Serbia after the Netherlands and Belgium said Sunday that they would drop their opposition under certain conditions.
An agreement on the pact on Tuesday, when European foreign ministers will meet, could encourage pro-Western forces in Serbia, which will hold parliamentary elections next month.

The Netherlands and Belgium have resisted signing the accord because Serbia has not cooperated fully on war crimes issues, but on Sunday they submitted compromise proposals.

Under the new plan, the Stabilization and Association Agreement, which is considered a steppingstone to membership in the European Union, would be signed in June and not this week, as some members want. It would not take effect, however, until Serbia cooperated fully with the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague.

Most members want to send a clear signal to the Serbs that they have a future in the union, which currently has 27 members, before the crucial elections in Serbia on May 11. Until now, the Dutch had resisted any commitment to sign the accord before the United Nations tribunal indicated that it was happy with Serbia’s cooperation.

“We have submitted a compromise proposal under which the accord could be signed in June on the condition that it did not enter into force until there was full cooperation with the tribunal,” a spokesman for the Belgian Foreign Ministry said Sunday, on the condition of anonymity under normal diplomatic rules.

Slovenia, which holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, said the proposal would be discussed Tuesday by the member nations’ foreign ministers in Luxembourg.

The initiative is occurring amid anger in Serbia at the declaration of independence in February by Kosovo, which most Serbs consider an integral part of their country.

[source]