Transcript of the press conference in German only

At a press conference held with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Monday as part of the summit on the Berlin Process for the Western Balkans that was held in the Chancellery in Berlin, Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that he would continue the Berlin Process “gladly and with top priority”.

Germany created the Berlin Process ten years ago to help Europe grow closer within the EU. The goal was to overcome old divisions in the Balkans, to create new connections and to interlink the six Western Balkan states – Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia – more closely. 

The term Western Balkans has political as well as geographical significance. It was adopted as an official EU term at the 1998 EU Summit in Vienna and refers to those states on the Balkan peninsula which are not yet members of the EU. This is why Albania, the former Yugoslav states of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia are all counted as Western Balkan states, but not Slovenia and Croatia, which joined the EU in 2004 and 2013 respectively.

The most important points from the press conference:

• Common Regional Market Action Plan: The participants of the summit signed a Common Regional Market Action Plan during the meeting, aiming to further consolidate economic cooperation.
• Strengthening collaboration: Further agreements and declarations made during the Conference on the Western Balkans concern the promotion of student exchange, and fighting irregular migration and organised crime. The states also committed to a quicker implementation of the Green Agenda that is to be realised in the Western Balkans by 2030, and Germany is supporting this endeavour through a regional German-Western Balkans climate partnership.
• Overcoming historic divides: In view of the dialogue to normalise relations between Serbia and Kosovo that had not been going “satisfactorily,” the Federal Chancellor called on those involved to overcome historic divides. He added that nationalist, divisive rhetoric posed a risk to coalescence and peaceful and prosperous coexistence in other countries, too, making the initiative to promote good neighbourly relations, which all six Western Balkan states joined today, all the more important.