Berlin Process summit in Tirana: President Novák urges Western Balkan countries to join the EU

Hungary is a factor that cannot be ignored when it comes to European Union enlargement in the Western Balkans, which is why it is important for the country to be represented at the Berlin Process summit at the presidential level, President Katalin Novák said ahead of the summit in Tirana on Monday.

“Hungary can’t be ignored on EU enlargement in W Balkans”

“Today is also important because Hungary, too, has finally joined the Berlin Process in the form that we can be here and express Hungary’s position at the highest level, which is clearly in favour of enlargement in the Western Balkans,” Novák told public media.

“We will finally get a chance to say that the EU has failed to do its homework, because these countries should have joined the bloc a long time ago,” she added.

Hungary and the EU both need the Western Balkans region, just as they need stability in the area, without which neither can be secure, the president said.

Novák said another reason why she had accepted Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama’s invitation to the summit was to make clear that Hungary would do everything it can to ensure that the Western Balkan countries can join the EU as soon as possible. She added that Hungary would speed up this process when it holds the EU’s rotating presidency in the second half of next year.

The Berlin Process was set up in 2014 as a platform for high-level cooperation between high official representatives of the Western Balkan Six (WB6) comprising Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia, and their peers in the Berlin Process host countries.

“EU needs Serbia”

“We need Serbia and the Western Balkans in the European Union,” Hungarian President Katalin Novák said after talks with Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic in Tirana on Monday.

Novak, who is in Albania to attend a summit of the Berlin Process, said Serbia and Hungary were strong strategic partners “with a shared interest to see Serbia within the EU”.

She said Hungary could have a crucial role in Serbia’s integration “since we know the region and its culture very well”.

Hungary supports Serbia’s EU accession because “Serbia is an integral part of the EU, with European values that nobody could question,” she insisted. She added that Serbia’s integration was key in terms of the community’s protecting its borders against illegal migrants.

Novák said Serbia respected the rights of its ethnic minorities, adding that they could prosper and contribute to Serbia’s development.