Countries divided over plans for two-tier EU with accession without full voting rights - Politico
Kyiv • UNN
Countries that have been waiting for years to join the EU are divided over plans to become members without full voting rights. Some insist on all the benefits, while others are happy to be at the negotiating table.
Countries that have been waiting for years to join the EU are divided over plans being developed in Brussels that would allow them to become members without the usual full voting rights, Politico reports, writes UNN.
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"A split is emerging among several Eastern European and Western Balkan countries poised to join the bloc over the conditions attached to their applications. Some insist they must receive all the benefits of the bloc, while others are happy to simply be at the negotiating table," the publication states.
To allay concerns among existing members that a larger EU would make unanimous decision-making more difficult, the European Commission is considering granting new members full voting rights only after the EU revises the way it functions, the publication writes.
This push, it is noted, will make it more difficult for individual countries to exercise veto power and aims to prevent political decisions from being derailed. Currently, new members immediately receive full voting rights, as happened when the last country to join the EU, Croatia, acceded in 2013.
Among the powers that may initially be limited is the right of new members to block sanctions, among other issues that currently require the participation of every EU country. Leaders have found it time-consuming to circumvent veto threats from the populist governments of Hungary and Slovakia, the publication writes.
The prospect of accession without full voting rights is met with mixed reactions from candidate countries.
Edi Rama, the Prime Minister of Albania, which has now opened all so-called negotiating clusters through which it will have to work, said that these measures are a "good idea" and that his country would even agree to not having its own European Commissioner in Brussels for some time.
Albania, he said, does not want to challenge the will of large founding members such as France and Germany. "Ultimately, it is the adults in the family who make the important decisions," he said, adding that one of the advantages for smaller EU members is that if larger countries "fail," it is not the fault of the new members.
Salome Zourabichvili, Georgia's last directly elected president, said she had long advocated for such a step in negotiations with EU officials. Her tenure was canceled by the ruling Georgian Dream party, which Brussels condemned, and accession talks are now stalled amid warnings of democratic backsliding.
Moldova, whose membership application is a twin to Ukraine's, said it wants to see the details of the proposals.
"We are ready to take responsibility at an early stage and would welcome the opportunity to participate in these discussions and help shape them," said a senior Moldovan official, granted anonymity to speak frankly. "At the same time, full membership – with equal rights and full participation in the EU decision-making process – must remain a clear and ultimate goal."
Ukraine, which has carried out extensive reforms as part of the accession process, even while facing Russian aggression, is reluctant to support this idea.
"If we are talking about EU membership, it must be full-fledged," President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in November.
Montenegro, the candidate country most advanced on the path to accession, also insists that there is no need to revise the terms under which it is granted membership, and expects to complete the screening process this year.
"The thing is, the EU already consisted of 28 member states," said Montenegrin President Jakov Milatović. "And currently we have 27 due to Brexit. So in that regard, if Montenegro becomes the 28th EU member state by 2028, then the answer [to the question of whether reforms are needed] is no, isn't it? ... But that is definitely a question that EU leaders must answer."