The former Yugoslav republic saw its share of sidesteps and potholes along the road, including a bitter four-year war with Serbia that required supervision from the United Nations to return previously conquered land back to Croatia. Yet it applied for EU membership just 10 years ago, and the following year the European Commission recommended the nation for official candidacy, opening a lengthy negotiation process, which was by no means easy.
Croatia had a maritime border dispute with Slovenia as recently as 2008, and negotiations stalled for 10 months because of it. In the end, 66 percent of the nation’s population supported accession in a 2012 referendum. But public opinion in the country about joining swung wildly, dipping as low as 26 percent as recently as 2011, according to one poll cited by BBC at the time.
But regardless of the struggle, the nation completed the accession process and will now be a member of the European family: A family that shares many common values and freedoms, as well as a common market, the biggest in the world based on purchasing power. Croatia will surely be better off as a part of it.
We would like to see Ukraine follow in its footsteps.
Ukraine now has a unique chance to sign an Association Agreement with Europe. It’s not a promise of membership, but it is an unprecedented arrangement with a non-EU member state, which includes a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement – the treaty that regulates how the European and Ukrainian markets will gradually open up to each other and play by the same rules.
Ukraine is badly pressed for time. The window of opportunity to sign will close in November if Ukraine fails to release Yulia Tymoshenko from prison and make progress on legislative and electoral reform. Many European politicians and diplomats have sent distress signals recently calling on Ukraine to step up the effort, which indicates that anxiety about Ukraine’s performance is on the rise.
If Ukraine fails this time, a wave of bitter disappointment – the kind that followed the euphoria of the Orange Revolution – will inevitably swamp European nations, many of which are taking the Ukrainian accession process very seriously.
We hope the nation’s leadership has the political will to avert this and follow Croatia on the path to Europe.
