"I expect Macedonia to be given a date for the start of EU accession talks in the second half of this year, which will make the country a model of future European integration instead of Croatia," Kacin said at a news conference in Ljubljana on Monday.
"Croatia is getting more and more entangled and it is isolating itself, thus getting farther from the European Union, so the process of integration of the Western Balkans should be accelerated by Macedonia's progress," Kacin told reporters.
The Slovene official said that Slovenia's strategic interest was the integration of the entire Western Balkans into the EU.
Asked whether he believed that Western Balkan countries should be admitted at the same time, Kacin said he could not say what would happen in the end, because the process of integration had not begun yet, however, it should be accelerated by finding a better EU candidate than Croatia.
Kacin said that the Hague tribunal's prosecutor Carla del Ponte enjoyed his support.
Kacin is a member of the Slovene Liberal Democrats, and he is a member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe in the European Parliament.