Western Balkans and Serbia : Difficulties on the Way to the EU

Over the past decade, a number of Balkan countries, including Serbia, have been striving to pursue a multi-vector foreign economic policy, one of the priorities of which is the expansion of cooperation with the countries of the eastern direction (Asian and Middle East). This new trend in the foreign economic strategy of the countries of the region has clearly emerged since the early 2010s, and the negative consequences of the crisis in Europe and the world only contributed to the diversification of the foreign economic relations of the Balkans. At the same time, European integration continues to be a priority vector for the countries of the Western Balkans, most of which have the status of official candidates for EU membership for quite a long time. The lack of real prospects and terms for the entry of the Balkan countries against the background of granting the status of candidates to Moldova and Ukraine in June 2022 cause their extreme dissatisfaction.Nevertheless, the countries of the region and Serbia do not give up their European integration intentions, given that in most cases the European Union is their key trade and investment partner. In particular, Serbia continues to systematically bring internal norms and rules in line with European requirements: fulfillment of the Copenhagen criteria, the requirements of the articles of the negotiation dossier and the conditions of the Stabilization and Association Process (SAP). However, the situation with the coronavirus crisis clearly demonstrated the attitude of the European Union towards its Balkan neighbors: the lack of pan-European solidarity, the ban on the export of medicines and equipment from the EU, untimely medical and financial assistance from European structures, problems in implementing the program for the distribution of vaccines. This kind of behavior in a crisis situation should make one think about the real attitude towards the countries of the region