Montenegrin President Says EU Shares Early Outlook On Membership

PRAGUE -- Montenegrin President Jakov Milatovic predicted on August 31 that his Balkan nation of under a million people will join the European Union within the next five years.

He also told the audience at the Globsec security conference in the Czech capital that he had spoken with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen the previous day and suggested she agrees.

Von der Leyen addressed the same forum in Prague on August 30.

“Now I truly believe, and I think that she also believes, that Montenegro can and will become [an EU] member state during her mandate,” Milatovic said.

Von der Leyen was recently approved for a second five-year stint as president of the EU’s executive arm, which should keep her in the post into the latter half of 2029.

She has not publicly commented on any discussions this week with Milatovic.

Speaking on a separate panel on August 31, the EU special representative for the Serbia-Kosovo dialogue, Miroslav Lajcak, said Montenegro's goal of accession in 2028 was "realistic."

Montenegro has been an EU candidate country since 2010 and has long been regarded as a front-runner for the first wave of bloc expansion since Croatia joined in 2013.

Momentum waned for years over enlargement despite Balkan enthusiasm as the bloc grappled with its own internal problems, but it has publicly increased since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began early in 2022.

Milatovic, 37, a former finance minister elected president in early 2023, suggested at a panel discussion beside Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic that “size matters” in terms of the bloc’s ability to absorb new members and Montenegro is the smallest of the Western Balkan aspirants.

But, describing himself as an “optimist” and Vucic a “pessimist” on EU enlargement, he also said Montenegro had been using the euro and aligning its foreign and security policies with the European Union for decades and been a NATO member since 2017.

Montenegro is the region’s only EU aspirant to have opened all of its negotiating chapters with the European Union, Milatovic said, although he acknowledged it had closed just three.

But Milatovic added that his country had passed key barometers on rule of law and “there is a hope that by the end of the year we will be able to close a few new chapters.”