MOSCOW, September 17 Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said in an interview newspaper Financial Times that the EU has never provided Serbia with the same support as Ukraine.
As the newspaper notes, Kiev applied for EU membership in February 2022 and four months later received candidate status, while Belgrade, after submitting its application, had to wait more than four years for the start of negotiations on accession to the EU.
“I have nothing against Ukrainians,” Vucic said. According to the newspaper, however, according to Vučić, the level of EU support for Ukraine, as well as its granting EU candidate status within a year of filing an application and the potential start of EU membership negotiations next year, “shows us that (such political support — ed.) we (Serbia — ed.) never had.»
The President added that the delay in the country's accession to the EU does not reflect the real situation in his country. Serbia, he said, is “in a much better state than Romania and Bulgaria were in 2007, when they joined the EU.”
«We (heard) about 2025, now 2030…, that's seven years. Who knows what will happen in seven years? Now the EU is not able to accept more members than before. There are 10 net donors and 17 countries that withdraw their money. None of them would like to have more participants on their payment list,» the newspaper quoted the Serbian president as saying.
On February 28, 2022, Vladimir Zelensky signed an application for Ukraine to join the European Union. The heads of state and government of the EU at the summit in Brussels on June 23, 2022 approved the granting of candidate status to Ukraine and Moldova for accession to the union. The European Commission, in its recommendations to grant Ukraine EU candidate status, set seven conditions. Judicial reform is the most comprehensive among the EU conditions: the Ukrainian government needs to reform the Constitutional Court, complete changes to the Supreme Council of Justice and the High Qualifications Commission of Judges, and continue the fight against corruption.
Obtaining candidate status is only the beginning of a rather long journey towards joining the EU. Turkey has been a candidate since 1999, North Macedonia since 2005, Montenegro since 2010, and Serbia since 2012. Croatia was the last country to join the EU in 2013, a process that took ten years.
It is expected that the issue of EU enlargement will be discussed at the autumn EU summit.