Details

08.30 – 09.00

Welcome coffee & registration of participants

09.00 - 09.05

Welcome by Peter R. Weilemann, Director of the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung,European Office

09.15 – 11.00

Session I: IS THE WESTERN BALKANS REGION NOW READY TO STAND ON ITS OWN TWO FEET?

The decisive move transforming the international community’s Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe into the Balkan-run Regional Cooperation Council (RCC) marked a key moment. Based in Sarajevo and headed by a senior Croatian official, the RCC looks set to give a major boost to political and economic cooperation between the governments of the Western Balkans. But nation-building in the region seems incomplete.

Bosnia and Herzegovina remains torn between competing visions of confederation or a centralised state. So is the goal of full sovereignty a realistic one in the foreseeable future? And with the issue of Kosovo’s independence still hanging over the region, how optimistic are its political leaders that a new era of regional development is dawning?

Keynote address by Stjepan Mesić, President of Croatia

Carla del Ponte Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former

Yugoslavia (ICTY)

Božidar Đelić Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia

Mladen Ivanić Co-chair of the House of Peoples and Former Minister of Foreign Affairs

of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Jean-Pierre Jouyet French Secretary of State for European Affairs

Michael Leigh European Commission Director General for Enlargement

Doris Pack MEP Chairwoman of the European Parliament Delegation for relations with the

countries of south-east Europe

11.00 – 11.30

Coffee break

11.30 - 13.00

Session II: HOW ENCOURAGING ARE THE BALKAN REGION’S ECONOMIC INDICATORS?

Recent years have seen a heartening new buoyancy in trade flows between the EU and countries of the Western Balkans. But confidence in the region’s sustained economic revival does not yet appear to be shared by international investors. Trade with Romania and Bulgaria accounts for much of the surge in EU-Balkan trade, and on the investment front, only Croatia has been attracting satisfactory inflows of capital. Will the embryonic Central European Free Trade Agreement improve the economies in the Balkans, and what economic boost for their Balkan neighbours is likely to result from Romanian and Bulgarian membership of the EU? Are new economic policy initiatives needed in the region, or is the best approach to simply wait for present policies to pay off?

Boris Divjak Chair, Transparency International Bosnia and Herzegovina and South-

East Europe Consultant, Foreign Investment Advisory Service (FIAS)

Gordana Đurović Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration, Montenegro

Harald Hirschhofer Resident Representative to Serbia, International Monetary Fund (IMF)

Jelko Kacin MEP Member of the European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs and rapporteur on relations between the European Union and Serbia

Viktor Mizo Director of Invest Macedonia

Vebi Velija Founder and President, VEVE Group

Moderated by Dusan Gajic, Chief Editor South East Europe TV Exchanges

13.00 – 14.30

Lunch

14.30 - 16.00

Session III: KOSOVO IS THE THREAD OF THIS DAMOCLEAN SWORD CLOSE TO BREAKING?

Although the past 17 years have been marked by nationalism in the Western Balkans, to what degree are regional cooperation and the EU integration process beginning to trigger a new sense of cooperation? Serbia is doing much to promote the region’s economic re-birth and to achieve a closer EU relationship, but its efforts have been hampered by two important questions: How can the new Serbian coalition government reassure Brussels that alleged war criminals will all be brought to justice, and what will be the reactions of Serbia, Kosovo and the EU itself to the possible outcome of the Kosovo status negotiations? Is there a serious possibility of Balkans politics slipping back down a path towards open conflict?

Mark Almond Lecturer in Modern History, University of Oxford

Agim Çeku Prime Minister of Kosovo (under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244)

Vladimir Chizhov Ambassador, Mission of the Russian Federation to the EU

Edith Harxhi Albania’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs

Joost Lagendijk MEP Member of the European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs

and Rapporteur on the future of Kosovo and the role of the EU

Stefan Lehne Director for Western Balkans, Council of the European Union and former

EU Special Representative on the Kosovo future status process

Robert Manchin Chairman and Managing Director, Gallup Europe

Moderated by Giles Merritt, Secretary General of Friends of Europe

16.00 End of Summit