This week’s summit of Western Balkan and European leaders, held in the Austrian capital, concluded on Friday with a declaration outlining the goals of the summit process, the accomplishments of the Western Balkan states, and the challenges that remain.
The final declaration stresses the ongoing commitment of the European Union to the full integration of the Balkan region into the European community. It also notes that, while states in the region have built new cooperative structures since the wars of the 1990s, “more efforts are needed to solve outstanding bilateral disputes.” In this context, the declaration praised the signing of a border agreement between BiH and Montenegro.
The declaration also focused on the issue of migration, as thousands of refugees and migrants are currently overwhelming some of the Western Balkan states in an effort to reach the EU.
The full declaration can be found here.
