European Council President Herman Van Rompuy visited Zagrep on July 5-6, 2010 and said Croatia has the full backing of Brussels for EU membership. Rompuy met Croatia's high level officials and recommended Croatia to continue the accession negotiations at full speed.

Having lived for centuries under the shadow of Catholic Europe, Croatia is now trying to get a place in the rundown of European countries with its 70 years of experience as part of the former Yugoslavia and 20 years of re-structuring and reforms. Croatia rejects its Balkan identity and considers itself a central European country, acting independently of its neighbors that it once shared a state with and believing that its EU accession will be much faster that those of the others in the region. Croatian officials who have always been against the EU approaching the Balkans as one whole say insistently they do not want to wait at the EU door for their neighbors who are more sluggish in carrying out their reforms.

Today, Croatia is a country having overtaken all its western Balkan countries in its race to enter the EU. Although Macedonia, among the western Balkan countries, is also a candidate, it has yet to begin accession talks with the Union after surmounting Greece's veto. Greece has been saying over and over again that unless an agreement is reached on Macedonia’s name, it will always veto the EU membership of this country to which it refers as Skopje. The other regional countries also lag behind Croatia because of a variety of reasons in the race for EU membership.

Of the 33 chapters Croatia has opened to date in its accession talks, 20 have been completed. Croat officials are of the conviction the negotiations process will likely be wrapped up either at the end of 2010 or at the beginning of 2011 and their country will be ready to sign the accession convention in spring 2011. The thing is that there is quite a lot that Croatia is required to do in re-structuring its system, fighting corruption and organized crime and completing privatization.

We can say Croatia's EU membership will set a most favorable example for all the western Balkan countries, and will speed up their reforms process. As you know, the second half of the 2000s saw the emergence of a process which called into question the European Union's essence and future. The discourse of many of the EU officials indicated those years that there would be no permission for a new wave of expansion before the completion of that process. The global economic downturn which caused contraction across the world resulted in Brussels assuming a foot-dragging policy to expand towards the Balkans.

The European Union, in the second half of 2000s, continued closely monitoring the Balkan countries' reforms process on the one hand and hoped on the other, owing to its skeptical approach to a new wave of expansion, the reforms movements in these countries would be stunted. That is why the western Balkan countries, confused with suspicion and worried by a lack of EU commitment, believe that EU's Balkan policies may one day change and Brussels may start backpedalling on its promises. Concerns of this kind serve as perfect stumbling blocks causing the reforms movements to go at a snail's pace. Once Croatia is admitted into the EU, the western Balkan countries will see they can also enter the Union provided they too fulfill the criteria laid down by Brussels.

What the conditions are to join the EU are well known. However, when it is the western Balkans being mooted with regard to full membership there are certain subjects Brussels is meticulously keen about. When European Council President Herman Van Rompuy visited Zagrep, he reminded the officials of the Union's sensitivities about the region by stressing the importance it attaches to cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, developing regional cooperation, resolving bilateral issues through dialogue and ending the refugee problem.

Rompuy also said the method of settling the border dispute between Croatia and Slovenia should be a model for the resolution of other disputes in the region. Such a model could partially contribute to the name crisis between Greece and Macedonia. However, settlement of the problem between Kosovo and Serbia should not be expected to be very easy for the EU.