Balkans

The Bulgarian government Wednesday formally put forward Foreign Minister Rumiana Jeleva to be the country’s new EU Commissioner. 

A former Bosnian Serb army general has lost his appeal against a conviction for war crimes committed during the 43-month siege of Sarajevo. 

The OSCE has criticized the provisional institutions in Priština saying that they are not meeting their obligations toward the returnees in Kosovo. In its report, the OSCE said that the Albanian majority in the province had taken very few concrete steps since the adoption of the strategy for reintegration of …

The ambassadors of EU member states have agreed to proceed with Albania’s application for EU membership, local media reported on Thursday. The same sources said ambassadors from the 27 EU states decided at a meeting in Brussels to ask the European Commission to prepare an assessment of Albania’s readiness to …

A possible Greek decision to block EU member states from setting a date for the start of Macedonia’s EU accession talks would mean Skopje’s southern neighbour does not have any interest in resolving the name row, the Macedonian Prime Minister told media. “In December we shall see if Greece really …

Macedonia’s government has decided to turn its liaison office in Pristina into embassy, Deputy Prime Minister Abdulakim Ademi said. The decision was reached at a government session late Wednesday. “This is the government’s final decision. At the same time the government initiated a procedure for appointing an ambassador to Pristina,” …

Radovan Karadzic has asked the Hague Tribunal to grant him the right to appeal the Tribunal’s decision ordering the appointment of a defence attorney to represent him. In a motion filed with the Tribunal, Karadzic said that the decision imposing a defence attorney on him was “of extreme importance” for …

The EU’s Enlargement Commissioner has appealed to Albania’s government and the opposition to find a solution to the current political stalemate and end the opposition’s month-long boycott of parliament. “It takes two to tango and I appeal to the opposition to end the parliamentary boycott which does not respect European …

If Macedonia fails to secure a date of its EU accession talks in December, DUI and SDSM won’t call for snap polls because they don’t want to harm the positive momentum that will last in the coming months. “Unless Prime Minister Gruevski comes up with a plan, SDSM is ready …

The “name” row between neighboring Macedonia and Greece could be settled using the recent Croatia-Slovenia model, through international arbitration, Macedonia’s foreign minister Antonio Milososki said Wednesday.   Milososki made this remark after meeting Spanish members of the European Parliament, Francisco Jose Millan Mon and Jose Ignacio Salafranca, the Macedonian MIA …