In an unprecedented political initiative, five green parties from Western Balkan countries, plus Croatia, signed a declaration on Sunday about a cooperation platform, pledging to work together for peace and environment, and against corruption.
The declaration was signed in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“We want to promise a hundred years of peace to the region. We’ve had enough of divisions, enough of walls, we have come to build bridges among us. We think the entire region should join the EU together because there are more things that unite us than those that divide us,” said Amna Popovac, leader of Bosnia’s green party ‘Hocemo’ (We Want), according to Klix.ba.
The other five parties are the Albanian Green Party, Ura from Montenegro, Dom (Home) from North Macedonia, Zajedno (Together) from Serbia, and Orah (Walnut) from Croatia, which is an EU member and not part of the Western Balkan six but shares a joint history with the region as a former member of the now defunct Yugoslav federation.
Kosovo is the only Western Balkan country whose green party did not take part in the initiative, for now.
“We are united by nature, but we are also united by corruption. Therefore, the green parties of the Western Balkans have decided to work on, along with the protection of the environment, the fight against corruption and on upholding stability and security of the Western Balkans,” Popovac said.
“You can see it is possible to reach agreements. If we, the greens, have reached an agreement, why wouldn’t the social-democrats do it? Why wouldn’t the conservatives? After all, we have a common interest – a good life for our citizens, and there are 20 million of us,” Nebojša Zelenović, the co-president of Serbia’s Zajedno party, added.
All of the six Western Balkan countries have set membership in the EU as a political priority.
Montenegro and Serbia are already in the accession negotiations, Albania, North Macedonia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina are official candidates, while Kosovo formally submitted an application for membership in December 2022.
(Zoran Radosavljević | EURACTIV.com)
Source: euractiv.com
