Just weeks before the European Commission is due to publish an assessment on Bulgaria and Romania’s accession to the EU, the French Senate cautioned against “stigmatising” the EU’s most recent members and suggested fine-tuning the Union’s Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, set up to assist the two countries after their entry.
In a report to the French [...]

EU officials in Brussels admit Sunday’s crucial parliamentary elections in Albania demonstrated electoral progress, but warn that more needs to be done before the country can be said to have achieved full international standards.
EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn has noted in a statement that “tangible progress has been made in some areas.

Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen is scheduled to visit Serbia in July to discuss trade cooperation between the two countries, but the visit will not change the Netherland’s against Serbia’s Stabilization and Association Agreement, SAA.
A Dutch Foreign Ministry statement said that Verhagen would discuss with his Serbian counterpart Vuk Jeremic further cooperation between the Netherlands [...]

There is no need for a new Ohrid peace accord as the existing one remains vital for the country’s stability, prosperity and EU-integration, the EU Ambassador to Macedonia Erwan Fouere said Monday in response to calls for the agreement’s revision.
“It has been emphasized on several occasions that Macedonia’s road to the European Union leads via [...]

Serbian residents of northern Kosovo continued efforts to maintain a road block at administrative border crossing points with Serbia on Monday.
The main cause of protest is aimed against introducing customs checkpoints at the Jarinje and Brnjak administrative crossings with central Serbia.
Protesters announced to reporters of Serbia’s Tanjug news agency that the roads block would continue [...]

SARAJEVO, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH)
High Representative Valentin Inzko met with members of a US congressional delegation on Sunday (June 28th) to discuss the political situation in BiH. He called for a broader commitment by the international community to pressure authorities into meeting their obligations related to the Stabilisation and Association Agreement and to intensify dialogue [...]

SKOPJE, Macedonia
Foreign Minister Antonio Milososki and Greek counterpart Dora Bakoyannis failed to meet on the sidelines of an OSCE ministerial conference on the Greek island of Corfu, local media reported Sunday (June 28th).

ANKARA, Turkey
Culture Minister Ertugrul Gunay says Turkey plans to re-open the Greek Orthodox Seminary on the island of Heybeliada — Halki in Greek — off Istanbul, nearly four decades after it was shut down. He said on Sunday (June 28th) “The seminary does not currently fit into our university system, but another formula will be [...]

BELGRADE, Serbia
President Boris Tadic called for calm Friday (June 26th) concerning a law on the special status of the Vojvodina region, which is predominately populated by ethnic Hungarians. The law was forwarded into parliamentary procedure by a pair of minority parties, the Alliance of Vojvodina Hungarians and League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina. Tadic says [...]

PRISTINA, Kosovo
Thousands of Serbs turned out on Sunday (June 28th) to celebrate the 620th anniversary of the Kosovo battle in which the Serb Army confronted the invading Ottoman Turks.

PRISTINA, Kosovo
The government played down on Sunday (June 28th) suggestions of a border dispute brewing between Kosovo and Serbia in eastern Kosovo. The reaction came after a series of claims about a Serbian gendarmerie unit patrolling inside the village of Karacevo, an area Kosovo says is part of its territory.

Bulgaria has defended its decision to release former Kosovo prime minister Agim Ceku, wanted for alleged war crimes in Serbia.
“I guarantee that Bulgarian justice institutions acted in accordance with the domestic and international laws,” Bulgaria’s deputy prosecutor, Galina Toneva, told media in reference to the release last week of Ceku from custody.
Toneva indicated that Serbia [...]

In a joint statement issued on Monday, the international election observer missions for Sunday’s parliamentary poll concluded that Albania’s election process demonstrated “marked improvements” but did not yet meet international standards.
The mission included more than 400 short-term and long-term election monitors from the OSCE, ODIHR, Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly and a delegation of the [...]

Balkan nations, despite their commitments to the Central European Free Trade Agreement, are engaged in a tit-for-tat protectionist trade war, much of which has political motives, Ekrem Krasniqi and Anes Alic report for ISN Security Watch.
By Ekrem Krasniqi and Anes Alic in Brussels and Sarajevo for ISN Security Watch
Free trade in the Western Balkans has [...]

NICOSIA, Cyprus
Cypriot President Demetris Christofias and Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat agreed Friday (June 26th) to open a new crossing point between the Greek and Turkish-run parts of the divided island. It will be located near the village of Limnitis (Yesilirmak in Turkish).

BELGRADE, Serbia
Serbian President Boris Tadic on Friday (June 26th) demanded an explanation from Bulgaria over the release of former Kosovar Prime Minister Agim Ceku who is wanted for war crimes in Serbia. Tadic said the way Bulgarian authorities handled the case “does not contribute to good relations”. Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic described Ceku’s release [...]

BRUSSELS. Belgium
Turkey is determined to push ahead with legal and political reforms to meet conditions for joining the EU as a full member, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday (June 26th) after talks with EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn in Brussels.

BRUSSELS, Belgium
High Representative Valentin Inzko said on Friday (June 26th) the EU may lift visa requirements for Bosnia and Herzegovina’s (BiH) citizens as of July 2010, media reported. “BiH may expect getting a visa-free regime six months after Serbia, which would be on July 1st, 2010,” he said after talks with EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli [...]

TALLINN, Estonia
Former Croatian Serb leader Milan Martic arrived in Estonia on Friday (June 26th) to serve his 35-year sentence for war crimes committed in Croatia between 1991 and 1994, local authorities said. His transfer was arranged under an agreement between the Estonian government and the UN. He is to serve his sentence in a prison [...]

Nato and Russia have agreed to resume military ties in their first high-level meeting since Russia’s war with Georgia disrupted their relations 10 months ago.
Nato’s outgoing secretary-general, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, announced that the so-called Nato-Russia Council, a panel set up in 2002 to improve ties between the former Cold War rivals, was operational again.

Russia has begun war games in its North Caucasus region neighbouring Georgia, in a warning to foes that the military remains on standby for any new conflict in the area.
Dubbed Caucasus 2009, the week-long exercises that began on Monday are just north of the border where Russia and Georgia fought a brief war last August [...]

KUWAIT
Kuwait’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed Al-Sabah met here on Sunday with Romanian Foreign Undersecretary Doro Costa.
The Romanian diplomat handed Sheikh Mohammed, also deputy Prime Minister, a letter from Romanian Foreign Minister Cristian Diaconescu.

BEIJING
A delegation of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee, China’s top political advisory body, left here Sunday afternoon for good-will visits to Romania and Ukraine. 

Top world countries charged with overseeing peace-implementation in Bosnia and Herzegovina will begin meetings today in Sarajevo to decide the future of the international presence in the troubled country.
The meeting of the Peace Implementation Council, PIC, comes amidst the worst post-war crisis in Bosnia and at a time of growing tensions between the Bosnian Serb [...]

Slovenia and Croatia have entered into a new diplomatic dispute when Slovenia accused its neighbor of violating its airspace only a few days after Slovenia blocked Croatia’s EU accession talks.
The Slovenian news agency STA reported on Saturday that two Croatian fighter jets, which were escorting a foreign delegation, had violated Slovenia’s airspace on June 19. 

Serbs nationwide marked Vidovdan (St. Vitus Day) at the weekend, a largely celebrated religious and national holiday.
On Sunday, the largest crowd since 1999 gathered for the Vidovdan celebrations, with several thousand people in Gazimestan, located near the Kosovo capital of Pristina, attending a ceremony commemorating the 620th anniversary of the Battle of Kosovo.

At the George W. Bush café in the Albanian town of Fushe Kruja, clients were glued to the television screen on Sunday morning as they watched Albania’s parliamentary election unfold.
Roughly 3.1 million Albanians are eligible to vote for the country’s next parliament, in one of the most scrutinised elections in its recent history. A peaceful [...]

„FMI pleacă a doua oară ca o soţie infidelă de la bărbat. Ei cred că noi o să întindem picioarele…?”
(Preşedintele Vladimir Voronin, 24 iunie 2009)
Acum vreo lună ne întrebam, la această rubrică, în ce monedă se va face „stabilizarea” RM: „euro” sau „rublă”? Evenimentele recente ne-au confirmat presupunerile – Moscova a fost mai rapidă şi [...]

Članovi parlamenta BiH su veoma osjetljivi na siromaštvo, glad i nezaposlenost. Na svakoj sjednici većinu vremena parlamentarci potroše u traženju rješenja za ove probleme. Na njihovim licima svakodnevno se može iščitati snažna suosjećajnost sa siromašnim, obespravljenim, gladnim, nezaposlenim, izbjeglim, protjeranim… Teško je to breme koje je život natovario na pleća 42 poslanika i 15 delegata [...]

SARAJEVO – Predsjedavajući Predsjedništva BiH Nebojša Radmanović pozvao je juče političke lidere u Bosni i Hercegovini da pomognu u smirivanju situacije u državi.
Ocijenio je da prudski proces mora biti nastavljen i proširen, poručivši da je princip dogovora jedino rješenje za BiH.
“Nije vrijeme za slavlje zbog moguće propasti prudskog procesa. Nakon propasti aprilskog paketa BiH je [...]

SARAJEVO – Predsjednici osam najvećih stranaka pozicije i opozicije trebalo bi da se sastanu u nedjelju u Mostaru kako bi razgovarali o aktuelnoj političkoj situaciji u zemlji uoči predstojećeg sastanka Vijeća za implementaciju mira u BiH.
Izjavio je to Dragan Čović, predsjednik HDZ BiH, koji će biti domaćin ovog sastanka. Inicijativa za ovaj sastanak usaglašena je [...]

SOFIA, Bulgaria
Former Kosovo Prime Minister Agim Ceku was released from detention Thursday (June 25th) but was not allowed to leave Bulgaria. The leader of the Social Democrat Party was detained Tuesday by Bulgarian police at a border crossing with Macedonia, based on an international arrest warrant issued by Serbia.

SARAJEVO, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH)
High Representative Valentin Inzko insisted on Thursday (June 25th) that there is no alternative to dialogue among the three constituent peoples in the country. He was meeting with Milorad Dodik of Republika Srpska’s Alliance of Independent Social Democrats and Dragan Covic of the Croat Democratic Union of BiH.

SKOPJE, Macedonia
Slovak Foreign Minister Miroslav Lajcak on Thursday (June 25th) urged both Macedonia and Greece to resolve their long-standing name dispute. At a meeting in Skopje, he assured his Macedonian counterpart, Antonio Milososki, of Slovakia’s support for the country’s EU and NATO bids.

ZAGREB, Croatia
The country celebrated the 18th anniversary of its independence from Yugoslavia on Thursday (June 25th). President Stipe Mesic, Parliament Speaker Luka Bebic, and Prime Minister Ivo Sanader laid flowers and lit candles at the Mirogoj Cemetery in Zagreb to honour the memory of all Croats who died in the Homeland War.