European Partnership and Action Plan Receive Unanimous Support at Sixth STM Meeting

European Partnership and its Action Plan were the focus of the first STM meeting of this year. Representatives of the European Commission, UNMIK and the PISG expressed today in Pristina their strong commitment to this process that will from now on guide the European Community assistance to Kosovo. It was the sixth meeting of the EU’s Kosovo Stabilisation and Association process Tracking Mechanism. The purpose of the STM is to support Kosovo in EU-compatible reforms to keep it on track in its progress towards Europe. “Kosovo as part of the Western Balkans has a European perspective, and we want to make this happen as quickly as possible”, said Reinhard Priebe, Director for Western Balkans at the European Commission, who led the European Commission team. “The format of STM meetings between the European Union, UNMIK and the PISG is to first explain from our side the European standards and then to check with the government what progress has been made to get Kosovo closer to the European standards. So, it is part of a long-term exercise,” he said. “The European Partnership and the Standard Process reinforce each other and I want to thank Reinhard Priebe and the EU Commission who have shown over the years a great commitment and we have seen it again today”, said SRSG Søren Jessen-Petersen. “Clearly, Kosovo’s future lies in Europe and the EU has a crucial role to play in the entire process leading to status talks.” Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj emphasized that “the Government is very conscious of the unique conditions under which Kosovo begins the EU integration process. The Stabilization and Association Process strengthens Kosovo’s relations with the EU and enables us to have a framework of priorities for our EU agenda. I believe that the process of Standards implementation goes hand-in-hand with the STM.” All three senior officials called the meeting “very constructive”. The 6th STM meeting introduced a novelty: Prior to it, two working groups were held. On Monday, senior officials, including Miltiades Economides from the European Commission and Giorgio Mamberto, the Commission’s ambassador to Kosovo, DSRSG Joachim Ruecker and Energy Minister Ethem Ceku, discussed the situation in the energy sector. The regional electricity market, the electricity corporation KEK and the energy strategy were the main topics. On Tuesday, Pavret de la Rochefordiere from the European Commission, DSRSG Ruecker and Economy Minister Haki Shatri chaired a working group meeting on Economic Dialogue. Progress on the economy standard, economic developments in 2004 and the outlook on 2005, as well as fiscal issues, privatisation and incorporation were discussed by the participants. The Council of Ministers of the European Union (EU) adopted in June 2004 the European Partnership with Serbia and Montenegro including Kosovo as defined by UNSCR 1244. The document contains a separate annex outlining the priorities that the EU has identified as actions for Kosovo to move closer to European Union. The European Partnership consecrates the implementation of the Standards for Kosovo as the general short-term priority. On top of the Standards, the EU has identified a few short and medium term priorities in areas falling mostly outside the scope of the Standards. The Action Plan has been developed by the PISG and as such co-ordinated by the Office for European Integration Processes within the Office of the Prime Minister, with the support of UNMIK. On 25 January this year, the Government adopted the Kosovo Action Plan for the Implementation of the European Partnership and the SRSG submitted the plan to the Commission. This STM meeting was the first time that the actual Action Plan was on the Agenda.

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