Marta Kos: Reforms Needed for Common Market, Schengen Are As Hard As Those Needed for EU Membership

Marta Kos (BETAPHOTO/STA/Thierry Monasse)

European Commissioner for Enlargement Marta Kos has stated that a country’s admission into the EU Common Market or the Schengen zone, which Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic have said they wished, called for reforms that are as hard as those required for EU membership.

In a recently published opinion piece for Germany’s FAZ newspaper, Rama and Vucic criticized the slow pace of efforts to enable the benefits linked with closer association with the EU, which they attributed to “internal reforms, geopolitical tension, institutional limitations and legitimate reservations of the member states.”

They declared that they wished for their countries to join the Common Market and the Schengen zone without obtaining political rights and the full members’ right to veto. This “two-tier EU” plan is supported by certain smaller member candidate countries, but not Moldova and Ukraine, which want to be members like all others.

Kos dismissed the proposal by Rama and Vucic, saying that she was uncertain if the two leaders were “aware of how much they have to accomplish to become a part of Schengen or the Common Market” and went on to state that reforms required for economic integration with the EU were as hard as those needed for joining the Union.