Homepage
Sitemap
Larger
Smaller
Login
Registration
Help
Terms of use
Small Slovenia takes on highly-charged EU agenda
02.01.2008, 14:01
Only three years after its entry
to the European Union membership, Slovenia took on the EU presidency yesterday
(1 January) landing itself a highly politicised agenda.
This small country will be dealing with numerous issues, over the next six
months, amongst which the Kosovo question and the EU renewable energy package
are set to dominate the agenda.
Slovenia has reluctantly inherited the thorny issue of the future status of
Kosovo. EU member states are only slowly working themselves towards a unified
approach on what to do when confronted with Kosovo's likely future bid for
independence.
Matters are likely to come to a political head after the Serbian presidential
elections on 20 January and 3 February. Kosovo indicated in December it would
wait until February to make any independence declaration.
This will also give the EU time to work out what it means by "coordinated
procedure" - the process by which Pristina is to seek independence, in
theory allowing each member state the option of choosing whether to recognise
it or not.
Ljubljana has also indicated that it is to put special focus on the Western
Balkans more generally, hoping to devote the traditional summer gathering of EU
leaders to the issue as well as pursuing other ways of tying the region more
strongly to the 27-nation union, such as involving them in European research or
infrastructure projects.
On the internal front, the EU is set to be thoroughly preoccupied with its 2020
targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, with the commission due on 12
January to publish legislation on how each member state should contribute to
the overall target.
Aside from the planned summits with Japan, Russia and the US, the Alpine
Republic with its 2-million strong population, will also have to deal with
Turkey's EU membership bid and the pending EU treaty.
During the six-month presidency, it will also steer discussions on the new EU
treaty. The recently-agreed set of institutional rules leaves several open
questions concerning the division of power in the bloc. These need to be
cleared up before the treaty comes into force, probably in 2009.
Finally, it will also oversee the final step of the expansion of the bloc's
passport-free zone when it is extended to apply to airports in March. Sea and
land borders were relaxed in December.
Slovenia, which expanded its personnel in its representation in Brussels to 166
people - up from around 50 two years ago - says it is basing its presidency on
Ireland's model. Dublin held a highly successful presidency in 2004.
Source: EUobserver.com