Western Balkans

In her 2021 State of the Union address, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen appealed to Europe’s soul, which, she said, has been tested to the core in times of multiple crises. The team of the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung European Union did its own soul-searching, pointing at the good, the not-so-good and the missing in von der Leyen’s speech.

Is Serbia a transit country or slowly becoming a buffer zone for the EU’s illegal pushback policy and overall goal to reduce migration to its territory?

The small Adriatic state and EU candidate Montenegro is at a historic crossroads after the parliamentary elections on 30 August. After 30 years of permanent rule by Milo Đukanović and his DPS, a change of power is possible for the first time.

Expectations for the German EU-Council Presidency on EU-Enlargement in the Western Balkans. From previous disappointments and disorganisation to the desire for stability and peace in the region.

Simon Ilse, head of our Belgrade office, talks with the future Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, about his future government’s priorities, the dialogue with Serbia, his green agenda, and addresses the issue of ethnicity vs nationality in the Balkans.

After the EU accession talks with Albania and North Macedonia have been vetoed by French President Emmanuel Macron, the question remains how and why the EU accession process for the Western Balkans seems to be going nowhere, and what this potentially means for the region.

Why EU-integration? Why should the Western Balkans, a region where criminal networks have been gaining ground and corrupt elites have systematically captured state institutions for the benefit of their own criminal business models, enter the EU? Why, when human rights are trampled upon in the region, with manifestations of nationalist radicalization overall? One can hear these questions repeatedly in the political discourse.