Croatia will "almost certainly" join the EU on July 1 next year, but it is likely to be the last southeast European country to do so for some years, The Financial Times says.
Recalling the statement by Bundestag Speaker Norbert Lammert that "Croatia is clearly not yet ready for membership" and Slovenia's threat to block Croatia's accession unless agreement is reached in the Ljubljanska Banka dispute, the FT asks: "So is Croatia's long-awaited EU accession seriously at threat? Statements by the EC (European Commission) and a German government spokesman suggest that, in reality, it isn’t."
Even though Lammert's statement is "not the message that Zagreb wanted to hear as it prepares for EU accession, particularly from a figure as senior as the speaker of the German parliament," it suggests that the country's EU accession is actually not questionable, the newspaper says.
"Their essential message is that Croatia will join in July, and that it must push on with reforms on which it has already made good progress. Slovenia may attempt to extract advantage from the situation, but it is very unlikely to cause an EU-wide storm by blocking a process that is all but set in stone, and backed by the other 26 members," the FT says.
It says that there are two different interpretations of the European Commission's October 10 progress report on Croatia. The most common one is that the EC's view is favourable, given that it says the country is on track for membership and has done well in fulfilling the prerequisites for accession.
On the other hand, the German newspaper FAZ took a different view in its article on the progress report, focusing on the EC’s claim that Croatia still falls short in ten policy areas, including judicial reform and privatisation.
