DPM Pažin: Montenegro's path to EU is not only matter of institutions, but society as a whole

Podgorica, Montenegro (29 June 2017) -- Deputy Prime Minister Zoran Pažin took part in the conference entitled “First Five Years of Montenegrin Negotiations with the EU," sponsored by the Centre for Civic Education, in cooperation with the German foundation Friedrich Ebert.

Opening the conference, DPM Pažin noted that Montenegro has opened 28 chapters, 3 of them have been temporarily closed, and the initial benchmarks have been met in 4 out of 5 remaining chapters, and the last benchmark within Chapter 8 - Competition will be fulfilled by the end of the year.

"Results achieved by Montenegro are respectable, but the data on open and closed chapters are not their own goal or purpose, but the answer to the question of the extent to which Montenegro has progressed in recent years is how much it has managed to improve the quality of life of citizens: in the field of the rule of law, entrepreneurship, intellectual property, industrial policy, environment and others," DPM Pažin explained.

He emphasised that Montenegro's path to the EU is not only a matter of institutions, but the whole society.

"Five years of negotiations is an important turning point for everyone to recall, regardless of our differences, that we need all need to join our forces in order to complete European integration process successfully. I do not say that cooperation did not exist, but I think that it can and need to be better and improved," said the Deputy Prime Minister.

He said that the crisis occurring in the EU, the crisis of identity, did not hinder nor in any way diminish the value of the Montenegrin path to the European Union.

"Government of Montenegro's efforts towards the Europeanisation of the country are visible and measurable. A single digit number of unopen chapters speaks for itself. The fact that we are far ahead of the countries of the region is commendable, but does not mean that we have to stop there. There is a lot of what we have yet to do, not only to harmonise our legislation with that of the EU, but to establish effective mechanisms for the application of the legislation, but also the difficult process of changing access in many areas and breaking with some bad habits", Deputy Prime Minister Pažin stressed.

OFFICE OF THE DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER