[ Western Balkans and EU ]

You might disagree with the idea behind a ranking of failed states or with the methodology, but now that the EU officially decided - after Olli Rehn met with Carla del Ponte yesterday - to suspend SAA negotiations with Serbia and Montenegro, the future looks indeed rather bleak for the whole region. If the government in Belgrade decides to do without the EU, and this is what it has been hinting at for a while, the EU will quickly lose its influence and its credibility. This will deeply affect the Kosovo status talks, of course, but also the EU integration process of the whole region... Eric from the East Ethnia blog thinks the "arrest will be coming", but: "the longer it takes, the less it will matter".

TAZ Balkan correspondant Erich Rathfelder writes:

Jetzt rächt es sich, dass das liberale und proeuropäische Lager in Serbien vorwiegend taktisch argumentiert hat. Man müsse Mladic ausliefern, um den Fuß in die EU zu bekommen, so der Tenor. Kaum jemand sprach darüber, dass Mladic, Karadzic und Milosevic auch Serbien in die Katastrophe geführt haben, kaum jemand über die Verbrechen der ethnischen Säuberung und die Notwendigkeit, diese Vergangenheit zu bewältigen. Die nationalistische Propaganda wirkt nicht nur in der Gesellschaft, sondern auch bei vielen Demokraten nach. Deshalb knickt die Regierung immer wieder gegenüber den Rechten ein. Die demokratischen Kräfte in Serbien müssen deshalb endlich Klartext reden - weil es um die Zukunft des Landes geht.

And he concludes: if the Serbian government is not able to deal with its past, there is no place for Serbia in the EU. Right... but the EU should not forget that it needs Serbia as much as Serbia needs the EU.