Dossier

"The Netherlands and Belgium have stuck to their guns: for them it is out of the question to open up the road to EU accession for Serbia so long as General Mladic, former military leader of the Serbs in Bosnia, has not been put on a plane to the Hague in order to be judged by the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (TPI)", explains Jean Quatremer, the daily's Brussels correspondent. "And yet the Commission and almost all other Member States considered that [the signature of a stabilisation and association agreement (SAA)] would reinforce the position of the outgoing Serbian President Boris Tadic and help him to win the second round of votes having been beaten by five points scored by his ultranationalist rival [Tomislav Nikolic] in the first round. With this in mind, they were prepared to show more leniency towards Serbia."

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