In a debate on the Balkans 10 years after Srebrenica, the European parliamentarians said it was time to regulate the issue of Kosovo's status, settle the current standing of Serbia and Montenegro, and settle the issue of Macedonia's name.
The British minister for Europe, Douglas Alexander, said during the debate London hoped that Croatia's EU entry negotiations would be opened in the second half of this year, but underlined that for this to happen the last obstacles in the cooperation with the Hague tribunal needed to be removed.
The minister whose country is the incumbent six-month EU president said this would be best achieved with the arrest and surrender of fugitive general Ante Gotovina.
Speaking of the massacre of Srebrenica's Muslims at the hands of Bosnian Serbs in July 1995, Alexander said that 10 years after that dramatic event it was time the authorities in the region, in Serbia-Montenegro and in Croatia faced international commitments and cooperated with the Hague tribunal in order to eliminate the last hurdles preventing their countries from taking their place in the European family.
Alexander and European Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn voiced hope that negotiations on stabilisation and association with Bosnia-Herzegovina would be opened in the autumn if the conditions for this were met, including police reform and cooperation with the Hague tribunal.
Alexander said the EU would like to open the negotiations by the tenth anniversary of the Dayton peace agreement, which ended the war in Bosnia when it was signed on 21 November 1995.
He said he wished stabilisation and association negotiations were opened with Serbia-Montenegro by October 5, the fifth anniversary of the democratic changes in Belgrade.
Speaking of the Srebrenica massacre, Rehn said the EU could serve as a model of peace and reconciliation in the Balkans, but added this was not possible until all war criminals were in The Hague.
He said it was unacceptable that the main culprits for the massacre, Bosnian Serb wartime leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, were still on the run.