SKOPJE – The leaders of the South East European Cooperation Process (SEECP) endorsed the appointment of Amer Kapetanović as the new Secretary General of the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC), starting on 1 January 2025, at the summit held in Skopje on Thursday. In this post, Kapetanović will succeed Majlinda Bregu, who has been serving as the RCC Secretary General since 1 January 2019.
Newly-elected RCC Secretary General, Amer Kapetanović has been a career diplomat for the last 25 years, serving in various high-ranking diplomatic positions in Bosnia and Herzegovina. For the past six years, he has served as the Political Director of the RCC.
“I want to congratulate my esteemed colleague Amer on the appointment and wish him the best of luck and success as my successor at the helm of the RCC starting next year. This is not an easy job, but is a rewarding one. Working together for the past almost six years, we can proudly say that RCC and regional cooperation yielded many important results for the citizens of our region. Yet, a long way is still ahead of us”, Majlinda Bregu said.
Bregu concluded that the “regional cooperation should not be just about signing agreements; full implementation of the commitments, such as these on freedom of movement, is a must”.
The SEECP leaders, as well as foreign ministers, praised the excellent work of the RCC, adopted and endorsed the organisation’s Annual Report, and expressed gratitude for the outstanding efforts of the incumbent RCC Secretary General Majlinda Bregu in leading the RCC over the past almost six years that profiled the RCC as an indispensable partner and the driving force of regional cooperation in South East Europe.
The SEEP leaders adopted the Declaration underlining dedication to the European integration process, expressed commitment to regional security and advancing economic cooperation and connectivity, and acknowledged the importance of RCC’s involvement, dedication, and support in promoting and enhancing connectivity in a political, economic, social and cultural sense.
In 2021, RCC received the annual European Western Balkans Award “for its unwavering commitment to the European future of the region, continued strengthening of regional cooperation and connecting the region by facilitating the Roam-Free-Western-Balkans, as well as principled promotion and work on furthering economic cooperation in the Western Balkans”.