Serbia makes formal application to join EU

President Boris Tadic submits membership request but failure to arrest Ratko Mladic remains obstacle to process

Serbia today formally applied for EU membership as it took another step in shedding its pariah status after the conflicts that tore apart the former Yugoslavia.

President Boris Tadic presented his country’s application to the Swedish prime minister, Fredrik Reinfeldt, at a news conference in Stockholm. Sweden currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency.

Serbia is the latest country in the queue to join the 27-member bloc. Croatia and Turkey have been in negotiations for accession since 2005 and Macedonia is waiting for similar talks to start. Iceland – badly hit by the credit crunch – applied for membership in July. All countries in the western Balkans, including Bosnia and Kosovo, want to join.

In an indication of improving ties between Brussels and Belgrade, the EU last week dropped a 20-year-old visa requirement for Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia, affecting some 10 million people.

The requirement remains in place for Bosnia, Kosovo and Albania, but it will be reviewed next year.

Citizens of the former Yugoslavia had enjoyed free travel to other European countries in the past, but visa requirements and fees were introduced as the federation disintegrated into war in 1991. The EU’s visa policy caused much resentment as residents were forced to wait in long queues at EU embassies.

Serbian membership, however, still faces considerable obstacles, not least the country’s glaring failure to arrest Ratko Mladic, the former Bosnian Serb general wanted for genocide by the UN war crimes tribunal.

The ratification of the EU’s pre-membership stabilisation and association agreement with Serbia is on hold because the Netherlands wants Mladic extradited to the Hague tribunal first. Tadic, the leading reformist figure in Serbia, acknowledged the application was only a start.

“It is a completely different matter whether we will get the candidate status before we complete our co-operation with the Hague tribunal,” he said.

Some analysts say it could take as long as 10 years for Serbia to become a member of the EU and that the visa-free travel regime is compensation for the long wait.

Only one former Yugoslav republic – Slovenia, which joined in 2004 – is in the EU. Croatia, which became a member of Nato in April, hopes to conclude its EU entry talks in 2010 and join in 2012.

The EU is Serbia’s main trading partner and EU-Serbia trade has been rapidly growing since 2000. In 2007 exports and imports of goods and services to and from the EU increased to 56% of the country’s total exports and 54% of its total imports, compared with 53% and 49% in 2006.

Following parliamentary elections in May, the new Serbian government has made European integration a key objective.