Category: Enlargement
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Fifteen Chapters Stand Between Montenegro and a 2028 Accession
Podgorica: Montenegro has provisionally closed 18 of its 33 negotiating chapters, the most recent two…
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Two Balkan Capitals Lose Their Place on This Year’s Commission Tour
Skopje: The itinerary is the message. When the European Commission President sets out on 30…
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Accession Talks Can Close by 2028 and Still Go Nowhere
Chisinau: Ukraine and Moldova are now moving through accession clusters faster than the Union is…
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Montenegro Has Fifteen Chapters and Six Months Left to Close Them
Podgorica: Montenegro has opened all 33 of its negotiating chapters and provisionally closed 18 of…
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Enlargement Speeds Up While the Hardest Chapters Stay Open
Accession negotiations have a rhythm that flatters the early years. Chapters open with speeches, close…
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Screening Reports for Moldova Returned to a Quiet Working Party
Chișinău: Accession negotiations rarely fail in public. They stall in working parties whose names most…
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Can Europe Widen Without Reopening the Treaties
Skopje: Every serious discussion of EU enlargement eventually collides with the same wall. Admitting new…
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Albania Closed Three Chapters and the Hard Ones Remain Open
Tirana: Albania has opened every one of its thirty-three negotiating chapters and provisionally closed three…
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Serbia’s Cluster 3 Is Still Waiting on Capitals That Will Not Move
Niš: Serbia’s negotiating team has prepared for the same moment three times now, and three…
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Montenegro Has Fifteen Chapters Left and Fifteen Weeks to Close Them
A deadline that almost nobody outside the Montenegrin government believed is now fifteen weeks from…
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Albania Accession Enters Its Closing Phase With Thirty Chapters Left
Tirana: Albanian negotiators returned from the ninth accession conference in Brussels on 14 July with…
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Fifteen Chapters and an Accession Treaty Draft Due This Month
Podgorica: Montenegro expects the first draft of its accession treaty before the end of September,…
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Albania Closed Three Chapters and Still Needs Twenty More
Durres: The container terminal on Albania’s main port handles cargo that will eventually move inside…
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Montenegro Has Fifteen Chapters Left and Four Months to Close Them
Podgorica: The government here set itself a target that looked ambitious in 2024 and looks…
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Hungary Blocks Two More Clusters and Ukraine Accession Stalls
Diplomats came back from the summer break on 1 September expecting to nudge Ukraine accession…
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Montenegro Has Eighteen Chapters Closed and a Deadline of December
Podgorica: Accession talk in this capital has changed register. For a decade the conversation was…
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Seven Hundred Million in Balkan Funds Runs Out of Calendar
Tirana: Albania has pulled 212.8 million euros out of the Reform and Growth Facility across…
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Hungary Blocks Two Accession Clusters and Ireland Will Not Split Them
Brussels: Hungary refused again on 1 September to sign off the screening results that would…
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Montenegro Accession Talks Face Fifteen Chapters and Four Months
Podgorica: Montenegro enters the final stretch of its accession bid with fifteen negotiating chapters still…
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Bosnia Has Completed None of the 113 Reform Steps It Promised
Sarajevo: Bosnia and Herzegovina has finished none of the 113 reform steps it signed up…
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Why a Draft Accession Treaty Arrives Before the Chapters Close
Brussels: A Council ad hoc working group is racing to put the first draft of…
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Gradual Integration Offers Candidates Everything but a Vote
Podgorica: Candidate countries have spent two decades being told that accession is merit-based, and roughly…
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Hungary Decides Today Whether Two More Accession Clusters Open
Chișinău: Diplomats return from the summer recess today to a question they failed to answer…
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Iceland Votes No and Reykjavik Falls Back on the EEA
Reykjavik: Icelandic voters rejected the resumption of EU accession talks in the Iceland referendum held…