BRUSSELS – Croatia and Bulgaria on Tuesday gave the official green light for the opening of Chapter 26 (education and culture) in Serbia’s EU accession talks, news agency Tanjug reports.
The Croatian and Bulgarian members of the Council of the EU working party on enlargement and candidate countries officially backed the opening of the chapter, enabling the necessary consensus on the matter.
Late last year, Croatia vetoed the opening of the chapter due to reservations over the rights of Serbia’s ethnic Croats to education in their native tongue. Meanwhile, Zagreb has received the “clarifications” it had requested from the European Commission, giving the political and now also the formal consent for opening the chapter.
Diplomatic sources in Brussels say a new Serbia-EU intergovernmental conference is being planned for February 27 or the beginning of March, Tanjug reported.