STADT SCHLAINING, Sept 6 (Hina) - Southeast Europe has not been completely pacified and stabilised and it would be dangerous to integrate it in the European Union as it is. Rather, it would be even more dangerous to leave it outside
the framework of the EU, Croatia's President Stjepan Mesic said at a roundtable entitled "Southeast Europe and European Integration: In what Direction is Europe Heading", organised on Friday in the Austrian Schlaining Castle.
STADT SCHLAINING, Sept 6 (Hina) - Southeast Europe has not been
completely pacified and stabilised and it would be dangerous to
integrate it in the European Union as it is. Rather, it would be even
more dangerous to leave it outside the framework of the EU,
Croatia's President Stjepan Mesic said at a roundtable entitled
"Southeast Europe and European Integration: In what Direction is
Europe Heading", organised on Friday in the Austrian Schlaining
Castle. #L#
Adopting European standards, resolving existing problems in mutual
relations and cooperation in the region are the three tasks that
countries in Southeast Europe need to satisfy in the process of
establishing permanent peace and stability in the area, the
Croatian President said.
The international community and the EU can and must play a
significant role in this and it must not allow "new iron curtains to
be created between developed European countries and transitional
countries," Mesic said.
Southeast Europe will be remembered as the last war zone in the 20th
century, as an area where the aggressor and victim often changed
roles, as an area where there was open flirting between ideologies
that should have been quenched with the fall of Nazism and Fascism,
and as an area in which all conflicting sides tolerated movements
that had nothing to do with democracy, the rule of law and the
respect of human rights, Mesic said.
Croatia's prospects lie in its accession to the EU which were opened
following the elections on January 3, 2000, and for Yugoslavia with
the arrest of former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic in The
Hague, Mesic said.
Croatia aspires towards the EU and that is its fate, but it has to
prove itself mature enough to satisfy criteria to be accepted to the
Union.
Apart from the Croatian President attending the round table, other
speakers include former Finish president Martti Ahtisaari,
Yugoslav Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic and the President of
Austria's Parliament, Heinz Fischer.
In his speech, Ahtisaari acknowledged the progress made in
countries of Southeast Europe and the process of democratisation
and reforms, stressing that the area needed to be integrated into
the EU, but, he added, the process of fulfilling remaining
obligations would not be easy.
Svilanovic said that his country was now ruled by democracy
dedicated to peace and Euro-Atlantic associations. He admitted,
however, that this was a frail democracy. He emphasised that he
believed the Balkans to be a region with five crisis points:
relations between Podgorica and Belgrade, the Kosovo issue, the
instability of Macedonia, the integration of Bosnia and the
situation in Albania.
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