Berlin (dpa) – On the 20th anniversary of EU expansion in 2004, Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock has called for quick progress on awarding membership to accession candidates in the Balkans. “Political and geographical grey areas in the Balkans and the East of the EU are extremely dangerous,” wrote Baerbock in an opinion piece for various European media outlets. “We can’t afford these grey areas, as they are an invitation to Putin to meddle and destabilise,” she wrote, referring to the Russian President.
Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia, joined the EU on 1 May 2004. It was the largest single expansion in the history of the European Union.
“If it was not clear before, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has made it clear that expanding our EU is a geopolitically essential,” Baerbock wrote. She described how today, just as 20 years ago, millions of Europeans can see the opportunity and promise of becoming EU citizens. The Western Balkans states comprise Albania, Bosnia-Herzegowina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia.
