In the past three days representatives of Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia, and the UN Mission in Kosovo discussed the text of an agreement expected to replace the 31 bilateral agreements on free trade existing among them.
The Croatian delegation was led by the state secretary at the Economy Ministry, Vladimir Vrankovic, who said the next, and likeliest last, negotiating round would be held early next month, with a new deal expected to be ready for signing in late October.
Regarding a CEFTA secretariat, he reiterated Croatia's position that there was no need to create additional bodies to supervise the implementation of the agreement, but added that Croatia was open to different positions, aware that the other countries in the region did not have its administrative capacities.
If the parties to the negotiations agree to that effect, the secretariat would assist the joint committee, the most senior body which has been in charge of settling disputes to date. The committee is chaired by the country chairing CEFTA on a rotating basis.
Vrankovic said it was not discussed where the secretariat might be based.
The European Union and the Stability Pact for Southeast Europe strongly support the creation of a single free trade zone in the region. At Croatian Prime Minister Ivo Sanader's suggestion, this would be achieved by enlarging CEFTA to include the countries which are not parties to it yet. This calls for easing the criteria for CEFTA membership and one, membership of the World Trade Organisation, has already been scrapped.
CEFTA comprises Croatia, Bulgaria, Romania and Macedonia. Upon joining the EU on January 1, 2007 or 2008, Bulgaria and Romania will leave CEFTA, while BiH, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania and Moldova are expected to join it this year. When it was set up in 1992, CEFTA also comprised the states which joined the EU in 2004.
Since 2001, the countries of Southeast Europe have signed 31 bilateral agreements among themselves. According to European Commission figures, those agreements led to an increase in regional trade by 33 per cent between 2002 to 2004, from EUR2.6 billion to 3.5 billion.
Croatia's exports to those countries went up 27 per cent, from EUR839 million to 1.066 billion.
The EU maintains there is more potential to boost trade within the region and with the rest of the world.
Trade between the region and the EU from 2001 to 2005 went up 53 per cent, from EUR52 billion to 79.77 billion. Croatia-EU trade in said period went up 41 per cent, from EUR10.169 billion to 14.340 billion.