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The leaders of European Union always insisted on the fact that the map of European Union won’t be full until the Western Balkan countries would join the European Union. Under the Western Balkan countries Brussels mentioned Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia and Albania. Slovenia, which was also the member of Yugoslavia until the 1990s has already joined the European Union and does not want to be associated with the Balkan region. Croatia is mentioned to be the following country of the region that would join the European Union and Zagreb planned to join the Union yet in 2007. The negotiations about the entry to the European Union got to start at the 17th of March 2005, but the foreign affairs ministries of EU postponed their beginning. The integration of the Balkan region into the European Union seems to be already discussed question, the negotiation processes started and the applicants are ready to provide the reforms. European Union is already deeply involved in different social, political and cultural processes in Balkan region: “The European Union is today actively involved in conflict prevention and stabilization in the Balkans. It has fostered regional initiatives aimed at stabilizing the region and promoting democracy and prosperity. These initiatives are based on experiences and lessons from international crisis management and are the first serious attempt to replace the previous, reactive crisis intervention policy in South Eastern Europe with a comprehensive, long-term conflict prevention strategy. In this paper I intend to examine the European Union strategy of encouraging regional integration in South East Europe” (Mejlina Modanu, 2003). The collective meeting held in Greek Thessaloniki (2003) revealed the interest of the European Union in the Balkan Peninsula. The members of the meeting, representatives of European Union and the republics, which were the members of former Yugoslavia and also Albania discussed perspectives of further integration process of this region into united Europe: “The western Balkan countries have now realized that they have responsibilities towards each other and that they have many challenges in common, some of a cross-border nature. They see now the considerable benefits of increasingly close regional cooperation — political understanding, economic and social prosperity. This new resolve to address issues of common relevance in a cooperative manner is reflected by concrete progress on the ground” (European Comission, 2005). The first steps were made in Greece and to see the result of this meeting we could observe already.
History changes far more quick than politics does, which the same time is changing quicker than the institutions. The wars on Balkans and their after effects have taken by surprise the plans of the European Union dealing with the international process: “The wars in FRY greatly disrupted trade in all Balkan countries. The slow pace of transition, political instability and the effects of war have delayed economic growth and the integration of the Balkans in regional and international trade initiatives. However, precisely because of these region-wide consequences of the wars, there is major interdependence among the SEE countries today” (Mejlina Modanu, 2003). They made a stress on the peculiar role of the western alliance, and especially the European Union as a peace guarantor and security of the Balkans as well as promotion of the democratic reforms within the region. The real long lasting success in Kosovo could be provided only by the perspective of the Balkans integration with the already developed part of Europe. The lost countries of the South – Eastern Europe are transformed into formal and non – formal protectorates, which also supposes deep involvement of the European Union in the providing the security in the whole region: “The promotion of order in the Balkans (within the context of a larger European context) has been the central policy concern of states and international organizations since the early 1990s. The existence and the persistence of the conflict seemed to challenge the new possibilities for security and stability in Europe. It is very much in response to the Balkan crises that the EU had to develop its order-promotion identity. In the wake of the Kosovo crisis this identity was transformed into committed policy-making both towards the region as well as its larger external relations. This was reflected in the understanding that the countries of the Balkans no longer represented a distant abroad but potential candidates. This shift of policy suggests that the accession, association and partnership activities of the Southeast European states can extend the EU’s order to the region by initiating the development of a nascent security community in the region. The justification for such supposition derives from the history of trust-promotion among the member states of the EU. The establishment of order in the region is made out in the promotion of security community practices in Southeastern Europe through the socialization by and in EU-initiated activities. It is significant that at the current stage, the EU involvement in the Balkans is actively engaging regional state elites in activities that intend to bring their decision-making in line with promoted standards” (Milan Kavalski, 2004).