Accession Conference with Montenegro - International ministerial meetings
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Council of the European Union European Council
Follow its sittingsMarta Kos
Dear Prime Minister Milojko Spajić, dear Minister Thomas Varane, dear citizens of Montenegro, dragi Crnogorci, dear citizens of the European Union. Just two weeks ago, I was in Montenegro for the Berlin Process ministerial meeting on the beautiful coast near Budva. And my first thought was that we really must bring this beautiful coastline into the EU as soon as possible. But first, your reforms need to be delivered time and again. And today is another example of that.
Congratulations for your hard work, dear Prime Minister, as well as the strong support of our member states. We are taking another important step towards Montenegro's EU membership. As we have heard, we have closed three more negotiating chapters, bringing the total to 21 out of 35, close to two-thirds. Reforms under the three chapters we closed today, economics and monetary policy, statistics, and social policy and employment, bring real benefits to Montenegrins. Reforms in economic and monetary policy help keep prices stable and public finances in good shape, so people can afford more with the money they earn.
Better statistics help governments make better decisions and businesses plan. And reforms in social policy and employment mean better protection for workers, safer workplaces, and more support for people looking for jobs. The hard work of Montenegro's institutions, public administration, and citizens has brought the country to the final stretch of its path towards EU membership. We fully support your ambition to conclude negotiations by the end of this year. We are now in a decisive moment, the remaining reforms, especially on the rule of law and the constitutional amendments on anti-corruption, cannot wait.
EU membership is Montenegro's national project. It is what citizens have entrusted their politicians to deliver. I call on all political forces, in government and opposition, to put the national interest first. This means working together, making compromises, and taking responsibility for the decisions that urgently need to be made. Failing to do so risks holding back Montenegro's EU future at the very moment when the country is closest to the membership.
Political unity and continued delivery of reforms, as well as further progress on good neighborly relations, are crucial to cross the finish line.
Montenegro's progress is part of wider progress on enlargement. It is now the third time since June that we have four accession conferences together. Thank you for being in a good shape, dear Thomas, dear Irish presidency. Our four frontrunners are delivering. Last week we presented our assessment how we need to prepare for a larger union.
Our message is that we can make a larger union work. And we are taking the steps needed to make it happen. We want Montenegro to join as a full and equal member with the same rights and responsibility as every other EU country. And I'm sure that soon Europeans will be able to discover Montenegro's beautiful coastlines, mountains, its people and everything else your country has to offer as part of our European Union. And there is something else you are bringing into the European Union.
Your people are the second tallest people in the European Union after Dutch. You can see this clearly because I'm probably nearly not to be seen, but if I look to the right, dear Mickey, you're quite well with him too, dear Thomas, we on our side. So, joke on the side. I think it is good that we also know some nice statistics about our hopefully soon newcomers to the EU. Thank you.
Speaker 2
Thank you, Commissioner. I'll now open the floor for questions. Please state your name and media organization. I'll go to the gentleman here, please. Thank you.
Ivan Mijanović
Thank you, Ivan Mijanović for Television of Montenegro. I will start with Commissioner Kos. Commissioner, tomorrow will be another attempt in Montenegrin Parliament to adopt constitutional changes. You already mentioned that point, so what will be your message to political stakeholders in Montenegro? Mr. Burn, is Montenegro still on track to close all the chapters until the end of your presidency?
And finally for Prime Minister Spajić, we could read in media these days that an obstacle for closing chapter 17 was the program that you announced, Euro-model. So, can you please comment on those comments? Thank you very much.
Marta Kos
On what do we expect? As I have said before, the final stretch of Montenegro's path to the EU requires more than ever political stability, unity, and cross-party cooperation on the EU agenda. It is a national project. It is not just about what the government is delivering, it is also what the opposition in the parliament is delivering. And the basis of democracy is being able to follow the compromise to the best possible for the Montenegro.
Thomas Byrne
The simple answer to the question put to me is yes. We want to deliver by the end of the year. It's not all on us. We of course count on the Montenegro government and parliament, count on the member states as well. But I do know that when my Prime Minister, the Taoiseach, goes to the European Council this week, he will be able to report to his fellow leaders of the substantial progress we've made so far at the halfway point of our presidency.
And I have no doubt that he will urge leaders to continue with the momentum that we have built up during our presidency.
Milojko Spajić
I mean, not much to add.
I think it's obvious we are putting immense efforts. We had a really hard-working summer behind us and we are very proud of that. Some of the results are now surfacing and more to come, more of these results to come. And obviously, I mean, there's a lot of noise in the media, a lot of information that is definitely not as obvious, not fitting the reality. And we are glad that, you know, some of these misinformation is now clear.
Vibor Vleinich
Thank you, Vibor Vlajnić, Croatian Radio Television. Dobra večer. Question for Prime Minister Spajić about the relations with Croatia. Croatian Foreign Minister today reiterated that Croatia will not block and it is not blocking Montenegro's accession, although Croatia is insisting on solving the open issues. Amongst them, he mentioned 2.7 billion dollars of military ships that during the war ended up in Montenegro from Croatia.
So, among other things. Also, Croatian Foreign Minister mentioned that he got some assurances from Montenegrin side that some movement is expected all in all. So, can you clarify to us, is Montenegro planning to solve some of the open issues? Thank you.
Milojko Spajić
Thank you very much. And I want to use this opportunity to thank Croatia for supporting of closing the three chapters. Obviously, without Croatia, we wouldn't be able to make it. So, we want to thank Government of Croatia, Croatian people, our friends and neighbors who have put immense efforts actually for closing not only these three, but 21 chapters in the past as well. So, that is, that is clear that we, we are also NATO partners.
We work very well for quite some time. We have almost a daily discussions and, and bilateral talks between relevant ministries.
Our ministries of foreign affairs are especially active and I think they meet a lot of, they use all the opportunities they can to even physically meet and to discuss all the open issues. Obviously, I mean, we have to bear in mind that we, you know, there are a lot of bilateral issues, there are a lot of, but these are things that I'm absolutely certain that Montenegro and Croatia have enough strength and belief in the future and belief in the better European future that we can close everything to the happiness of both sides.
Chris Powers
It's weird to walk away from you to ask you a question, but anyway, it's Chris Powers from the Kyiv Independent. Maybe first a comment, I saw Minister Bern, you said it's Montenegro Monday on your Twitter earlier today and I think you missed an opportunity to back it to Manic Monday music, because the syllable count's kind of the same.
Chris Powers
That's for tomorrow with the Super Tuesday. But anyway, so I actually have a question for the Prime Minister this time. So later this week at the European Council, leaders will discuss this proposal on the enlarged Union, which you're expected to be in.
And I'm wondering what's the Montenegrin reaction to these proposals? Might they help you in some ways? If so, how? And how might they help the other frontrunners that are trying to catch up? Thank you.
Milojko Spajić
Thank you for a great question and thank you for a great idea for next Instagram post is going to be exactly carrying that music in the background. And yes, today is a Montenegro Monday and I think it's it was really it was an honor for us as a small country to have a special day dedicated for Montenegro. I know more to come tomorrow, so terrific Tuesday is obviously there for three other countries, frontrunners. So we are very happy actually that we see the steady progress with other countries progressing on their way towards the EU accession. We also welcome and we are very happy to see immense work that Marta but also the President von der Leyen, everybody's taking so much efforts to try to make things as quick and but not to lose the quality and everything else that goes with the process that we are on now.
So, Montenegro is a constructive member as evidenced by our track record in the past as well, like in terms of all the international arena, Europe could always count on Montenegro and obviously vice versa as well. So, I think it's about time that we move forward and I'm really hopeful that we will see Montenegro as becoming sort of a beacon of light for all of these other countries who have very high hopes of EU enlargement process happening to them as well throughout obviously the processes that have been presented by our friends in European Commission.
Speaker 17
I would say the better Bangles song would be Eternal Flame, actually, when they join the European Union.
Speaker 2
I don't see any other hands up in the room. I don't see any hands up online, so we'll wrap it there. Thank you very much everyone.
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