Bosnia-Herzegovina will officially apply to join the European Union on February 15th, the country's presidency said on Tuesday.
The announcement is a major milestone in the former Yugoslav republic’s integration with the European mainstream two decades after emerging from war.
Bosnia-Herzegovina lags far behind its Balkan peers on the road to membership of the EU, with progress dogged by ethnic divisions after a 1992-95 war in which some 100,000 people died.
Years of tough negotiation and reform lie ahead if Bosnia is ever to join the bloc, complicated by a highly decentralised and often unwieldy system of government bestowed by a 1995 peace deal that divided up power along ethnic lines.
The country faces frequent threats of secession from ethnic Serbs, who are considering holding a referendum on the authority of the country’s national court over their autonomous region.
Little chance
Observers say Bosnia-Herzegovina stands little chance of joining before 2025.
"It is now quite definitive and clear that we have got the date by the EU chairman, the Netherlands, to submit the application on February 15th," the Croat chairman of the country's three-person rotating presidency, Dragan Covic, told reporters.
“It is realistic that we get candidate status at the beginning of the next year,” he said. “I deeply believe this is a great chance for Bosnia-Herzegovina.”
The country’s EU aspirations have been given impetus by a joint German and British initiative launched last year to encourage economic development and reform in exchange for EU funds and integration.
The initiative followed years of delayed reform and a dramatic bout of civil unrest in February 2014, fuelled by popular anger over political inertia, sky-high unemployment and rampant corruption.
The European Commission has said the union will support reforms in Bosnia-Herzegovina to the tune of €1 billion over the next three years, and a further €500 million for investment in infrastructure upgrades.
Reuters