Bregu: Fully functional Common Regional Market can be our vessel to the EU Single Market
13 December 2023
RCC Secretary General Majlinda Bregu arriving at the EU-WB Summit on 13 December 2023 in Brussels (Photo: RCC/Laure Geerts)
RCC Secretary General Majlinda Bregu at the EU-WB Summit, in Brussels on 13 December 2023 (Photo: RCC/Laure Geerts)
EU-WB Summit reiterates that the Common Regional Market is a stepping stone for EU integration
Brussels - The European Union (EU) and Western Balkan (WB) leaders reiterated the shared commitment to step up the efforts to enhance integration of the Western Balkans with the EU single market, with the WB Common Regional Market (CRM) serving as a stepping stone for region’s EU integration, at the EU-WB Summit hosted by the EU Council in Brussels today.
“One year after the EU-WB Summit in Tirana, we feel that the pace and sense of heightened urgency for reforms and regional cooperation on the side of the region, and for institutional and budgetary preparedness of an EU fit for enlargement, is more palpable. Deepening our economic integration and continuing to build on the policies aligning us more with the EU is always valuable. A true and fully functional Common Regional Market, unhindered by regional disputes, can be our vessel to the EU Single Market, which, in all likelihood, will be our future prospect,” said RCC Secretary General, Majlinda Bregu at the Summit.
The EU invited the region, with the help of the RCC and partners, to prepare an ambitious successor to the current CRM Action Plan before the current one expires in 2024.
“The new phase of CRM that RCC started to delineate with the EU Single Market 4 freedoms in mind will include clear strategic aims in areas such as education, innovation, digitalisation, green agenda, energy, air depollution, migration, brain drain, and women economic empowerment. Developing the region’s potential will require new sources of dynamism and transformation to overcome the challenges. Yet, in order to have Europeanisation and convergence engines fully in function, CRM, and the recently published EU’s Growth Plan for the region, will have to be paired with the budgetary debate and adjustment of EU instruments like SAA’s, which might be the most difficult part of the new gradual accession of WB into the EU,” added Bregu.
The EU-WB leaders welcomed the reduction in data roaming costs between the EU and the Western Balkans as of 1 October 2023, a CRM deliverable facilitated by the RCC and EU, with a view to developing a long-term roaming arrangement to include the region in the EU’s Roam Like at Home area. The will for continuation of enhancement of cybersecurity in collaboration with the Western Balkans has been expressed, emphasising the growing importance of the RCC in its facilitating role in this area.
“The relentless work is ahead of us - centred on domestic reforms, deeper economic integration and regional cooperation and catching up with the EU no matter what! RCC is primed to contribute strongly,” concluded Bregu.
The participants of the Summit underscored the need for the commitment by the Western Balkans partners to inclusive regional cooperation and strengthening good neighbourly relations, including with EU Member States.