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    • After years of delay, Western Balkans hope for progress on joining the EU - and financial support

    Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama speaks during a press conference after talks with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in Belgrade, Serbia, Friday, July 7, 2023. Rama is on a two-day visit to Serbia. (Darko Vojinovic/(AP Photo) Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama speaks during a press conference after talks with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in Belgrade, Serbia, Friday, July 7, 2023. Rama is on a two-day visit to Serbia. (Darko Vojinovic/(AP Photo)
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    TIRANA, Albania -

    Leaders of the six Western Balkan countries met informally Monday in the Albanian capital, Tirana, to prepare for a summit on progress toward European Union integration, known as the Berlin Process.

    At an informal lunch, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama welcomed his counterparts from Montenegro, Serbia and North Macedonia, together with EU Enlargement Commissioner Oliver Varhelyi.

    On Oct. 16, Albania will host the summit on the Berlin Process, an initiative from Germany and France to encourage the Balkan countries in their path toward membership into the European Union.

    The six Western Balkan countries -- Serbia, Kosovo, Bosnia, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Albania -- are at different stages of integration into the bloc.

    Rama said he expected "the summit to have a meaningful outcome for the Western Balkans and serve as a further step" in facilitating the interactions between the countries of the region with the EU.

    "In parallel with the negotiation process, (we) expect extra financial and economic support for the Western Balkan countries," he said.

    They also discussed with the commissioner "how to open paths to integration (for the regional countries) into the European single market without expecting membership of the EU."

    Serbia and Montenegro were the first Western Balkan countries to launch membership negotiations a few years ago, followed by Albania and Macedonia last year, Bosnia and Kosovo have only begun the first step of the integration process.

    "What is important at this moment is to consider the region as one, because that is the way the EU sees us, despite the fact that some countries are ahead and some behind," said Rama.

    The war in Ukraine has put integration of the Western Balkans on the bloc's top agenda which is trying to reinvigorate the whole enlargement process.

    In 2013, Croatia, also a Balkan country, became the newest EU member state. Since then, progress has stalled.

    The EU has not deemed the Western Balkan countries' economies and political institutions ready for integration into the EU's single market of borderless trade and Western democratic ideals.

    A bitter dispute between Serbia and Kosovo, a former Serbian province that declared independence in 2008, remains a great concern for the Western powers ahead of the summit.

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