European Union Special Representative Miroslav Lajcak said that the countries of the Western Balkans should advance on their European path now.

“The time for the Western Balkans to make rapid progress on their European paths is now,” he wrote in a Facebook post summing up his words at the To Be Secure Forum in Montenegro.

He said that he told the Forum panel on the future of the Western Balkans that each of the 6 Western Balkan countries faces unique challenges. “You cannot use a “one-fits-all-approach”. “The different circumstances and stages on their individual journeys to the European Union, require unique and tailormade approaches from our side,” he added.

According to Lajcak, the “urgency of including new members in the Union, underscored by the war in Ukraine, is not met with enthusiasm, but rather with stagnation and backsliding in the region … This has to change quickly as the time for EU integration is now”.