EU Official: Serbia Belongs in EU

Margaritis Schinas, Aleksandar Vucic (BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV)

A vice-president of the European Commission, Margaritis Schinas, said in Belgrade, on Oct. 7, that he wanted Serbia to be “part of the European Union (EU) family, particularly in these challenging times, when peace and the security of our continent are at stake.”

“We are fully committed to this. Unity is very important to us today,” Schinas said, having signed an EU grant worth EUR36 million for the Commissariat for Refugees and Migration. He said during the signing ceremony hosted by the Government of Serbia that Serbia held its European future in its own hands, and that he trusted that it would stay determined in its  accession to the EU.

Schinas said at a meeting in Belgrade with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic that Serbia had been a reliable partner to the Union in managing migrations and that it was still producing  positive results in that respect, the Office of the President of Serbia quoted the EC official as saying. Vucic said that Serbia “plans to significantly align” its visa regime with the Union’s by the end of the year, in order to prevent Serbian territory from being used for illegal migrations to the West.