The National Assembly delegation which took part in the 49th COSAC as an observer at the invitation of the Irish Parliament’s Joint Committee on European Union Affairs, comprised European Integration Committee members Dragan Sormaz, Dijana Vukomanovic and National Assembly Deputy Speaker Gordana Comic.
Members of the Union affairs committees of all 27 EU member states took part in the plenary meeting in Dublin, as did the representatives of the Parliament of Croatia, currently with the status of acceding state, and from 1 July the status of full EU member, as well as representatives of the parliaments of candidate states: Turkey, Montenegro and Iceland. Members of the European Parliament, as well as representatives of the European Commission and EU Council of Ministers were also in attendance.
Deputy Speaker Gordana Comic spoke in the part of the Conference titled “Enlargement and neighbourhood policy – maintaining momentum” on the behalf of the National Assembly delegation, stressing that EU enlargement is a live idea for us, not because of our delay and the EU crisis, but because of the very dialogue at the heart of the policy. Serbia will continue to take active part in the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina, aware that without dialogue there can be no regional enlargement, no democracy or rule of law. We want out European partners to understand that Serbia’s progress is at the same time a progress of the enlargement policy and an achievement of EU’s foreign policy. Only a policy grounded in dialogue can be successful and Serbia has shown its commitment to the process, as well as to the comprehensive reform it had conducted. At the end, Deputy Speaker Comic said that she expected the European Council to set a start date for the beginning of talks on 28 June i.e. to give a clear and specific response as to what Serbia’s next European steps should be.
At the margins of the meeting in Dublin, the National Assembly delegation spoke with the Chairman of the German Bundestag’s Committee on the Affairs of the European Union, Gunther Krichbaum about the upcoming issue of the start date for the beginning of talks, considering that the German Bundestag would decide on it on the penultimate day of the session, 27 June. The delegation underlined that Serbia had done all in its power to conduct the necessary reforms and meet the membership requisites and proved its commitment to the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina. Krichbaum said that what is expected is the fulfilment of the Implementation Plan of the Agreement for normalisation of relations between the two sides, that the talks would probably start in January 2014, and that after the meeting of political groups at the Bundestag, it will be decided to give the European Commission the green light to prepare the framework for the talks.
At the margins of the COSAC, the National Assembly delegation talked to the representatives of the Lithuanian Parliament and thanked them for the ratification of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement, as well as with the representatives of the parliaments of Denmark, Finland, France, Croatia, Austria and Romania.